Ten years later, will you thank yourself today?

 

01

Ten years ago, my colleague Alice was preparing for the postgraduate entrance examination. At that time, she was financially tight and did not dare to resign, so she could only prepare for exams while working.

Everyone who has experienced it knows that this is a VERY tiring thing. I vaguely remember her schedule at the time: wake up at five and read until seven; go to work; read from seven to ten in the evening at the nearby library.

In my impression, she is thin and small, always carrying a big bag that is disproportionate to her body. She walks like a wind and eats very fast. It is often when we just start to eat, she has already finished eating.

Eventually, she was accepted by the university, opening a new chapter of her life.

I met up with her a few days ago. We were reminiscing our past as we had not been meeting up for the past few years. Alice said that the exam preparation year was the hardest time in her life. She didn't go shopping or put on makeup. Social and entertainment activities were basically eliminated. Breakfast was bread and lunch was in the canteen. Even going out for a dinner was a luxury. She was very uncertain about her future, she won’t know what she will do if she failed the exam. Fortunately, her wish was fulfilled. Now that she think about it, she is very lucky. If she can go back to the past, she will really want to hug the "poor" girl ten years ago, thank her for her persistence in her efforts and not giving up.

02

Perhaps many people have had such tough period in their lives. They are extremely tired, confused, and almost want to give up, but if they manage to hold on, success may come.

I went to an office building yesterday. While I was waiting for the elevator, a girl hurried over, devouring a hamburger and at the same time, holding a large stack of documents in her hand.

When she entered the lift, the documents in her hand were scattered all over the place because of her urgency. I helped her pick it up and saw that there was also a workbook related to the judicial examination in a pile of materials. She looks like Alice from ten years ago.

"It's hard work, right?" I said. She gave a wry smile.

I watched her walk out of the lift, and deep in my heart I think, it's worth it. Ten years later, you will definitely be grateful to who you are today.

03

Everyone may have this or that plan in their minds, what kind of life they want to live, and what kind of person they want to be. However, the process of realizing a dream is never easy. You have to defeat confusion, grievance, laziness, and weakness.

And if you can hold on a little longer when you want to give up, and hold on for a little longer when you want to escape, tomorrow you will have another reason to thank yourself today.

When you weigh yourself every morning, you will thank yourself for resisting the temptation of ice cream yesterday and insisting on exercising for a while; when you win the recognition of colleagues and customers, you will thank yourself for uninstalling the game software yesterday and making the planning seamless. When discussing cooperation with foreign customers, you will thank yourself who wakes up early to learn new languages; when you get promoted and get a pay raise, you will thank yourself who are self-disciplined, hardworking and not lazy...

Thank you for not admitting defeat, thank you for not giving up, and thank you for working so hard to attain a better version of yourself.

Read also:

Thoughts after 30 years old

Listen:

Ten years later,will you thank yourself today?

Can you stop working now?

 

Even if you have a golden mountain or silver mountain, and there is no new source of wealth, wealth will be expended one fine day. As the saying goes: It is better to teach people how to fish than to give people fishes.  Most people work hard for financial independence, but in the end they find that they have been slogging for most of their lives but they are still running in cycles. To achieve financial independence, we must remember a few principles:

Income structure determines rich or poor

Most people earn income through 8 hours of work, so the essence of earning income is selling time.

Most people are thinking about how to increase the duration of paid work or increase the per hour rate. Most of their income comes from the salary they get from work every day.

No matter how much time a person can work in a day, it is also limited. Therefore, the way to increase income mainly depends on the per hour rate and whether it can be sold repeatedly. Most people will strive to become managers. This is because managers have greater responsibility and the greater the responsibility, the higher the return. So you can improve your leadership ability and make yourself a manager, so that the per hour rate will increase.

So, how can time be sold multiple times? For example, a well-known company gave a live broadcast class on career planning. The preliminary preparations plus the live broadcast time are about 40 hours, but there are more than 300 people watching the same live broadcast concurrently.

If a person wants to sell his share of time many times, he must have the ability to build products. You must be able to convert your knowledge, skills, and experience into products, and sell products to more people, so that you can sell them many times at once.

The importance of continuous income

Now there is an option of 10 million dollars and an option that can generate 10,000 dollars every day, which one would you choose? This is the same reason that teaching people to fish is better than giving people fishes. Suddenly owning a huge amount of wealth does give people a sense of satisfaction for a while, but no matter how much money you have and you don’t know how to use money to generate more money, it will be depleted eventually.

The definition of being rich is: when you do not go to work, or lose the job at hand, you can still live a life without worry for yourself and your family. This is because when the rich are not working, they will rely on stocks, funds, bonds, and even rents to provide them with income. This is continuous income.

During good times, people must think about how sustained income can be created.  For example, investment income, copyright incomes are all types of continuous income. However, we know that any unsustainable income is not worthy of envy, and it is even less worthwhile to work overtime and pursue it at the cost of health. In addition, the interest on savings alone is not enough to support your retirement.

Here is a small story for everyone. There used to be two mountains. One mountain lived Alan, and the other mountain lived Ben. There is no water on the mountain. Every day Alan and Ben have to go down to the mountain to fetch water, and the two quickly became good friends. One day, when Ben went to pick up water, he found that Alan didn't show up. He thought, maybe Alan was sick. The next day, Ben went to fetch water again, but Alan still didn't show up, Ben became worried and decided to visit Alan. After going up the mountain, he found that Alan was doing Tai Chi under the big tree. Ben was surprised and asked: "Alan, why didn't you pick water and still have water to drink?" Alan replied: "For the past 3 years, I have used my free time to dig well after picking water every day. Now I have dug a well and the water from the well is pouring continuously. From now on, I don’t have to go down the mountain to carry water anymore! I can also save a lot of time and do what I like.” Therefore, Alan no longer has to carry water. Ben still can't rest.

Choice is more important than effort.

Read also:

The eight golden periods of financial management in life, have you missed them?

Listen:

Can you stop working now?

Money management is only for the rich? 6 points of financial management knowledge that ordinary people should know to realize your financial dreams

Financial management is not exclusive to the rich, and ordinary people should also understand financial management. Is financial management really hard to learn? The answer is no, so here are some financial knowledge that ordinary people like you and me can understand.

Everyone desires to have more wealth. Wealth is very important. Everyone knows that, but when it comes to financial management, many people start to feel confused. Because many people think that financial management is complicated. There are many wealth management products, including stocks and bonds, funds, wealth management products, paper gold, foreign exchange, P2P...etc. These investment types seem complicated. Therefore, many people prefer to store their money in the bank because they think financial management is too complex.

But in fact financial management is neither difficult nor complicated, and ordinary people can understand it. For financial management, ordinary people only need to understand from two aspects, one is how to make a financial plan, and the other is how to invest.

In real life, many people misunderstand the concept of financial management. They think that financial management is investment. In fact, the starting point of financial management is not to invest, but to recognize what you are pursuing. You can understand from the following three aspects: First, why is money important? Second, what is your wealth goal? Third, what is your current debt?

01 Why is money important?

Money is needed everywhere in life, so money is very important. If you have enough wealth, you will become more free. Think about it now. If your wealth is enough for you to live freely, you don't have to work hard every day, what do you want to do most? travel? read? fitness? Take a blank sheet of paper and write down why you think money is important. You will find the most important things in your mind so that you will not be disturbed by other trivial matters. After you realize why money is important, you will move on to the second stage to set your financial goals. The future is always full of variables, so you only need to set a general goal.

02 Your wealth goal

Every country has a five-year plan and a ten-year plan, and each individuals should have too. They should have their own short-term, medium-term, and long-term plans. Just like when you plan a trip, you must know which attraction you want to go to. How long do you plan to spend on buying your favorite car, or changing to a new house, and how long will it take you to achieve financial freedom? Then calculate how much wealth you need to achieve these goals, how much money you need to become rich and free in your city, and write them on a piece of paper.

03 How much debt do you have?

Next is the third step: write down how much debt you have. Many people don't want to list their debts, because they feel embarrassed, and don't want to think about the mobile phones they bought in installments, the credit cards they owed, and the 30-year mortgage they took on. Learn to face it from now on, because only when you have a clear understanding of your financial situation can you better achieve your financial goals.

Here is a simple method. You take a piece of paper and draw a vertical line in the middle of the paper. List your assets on the left, such as deposits, investments, etc. List your debts, credit card debts, mortgages, car loans, etc on the right. The total assets on the left minus the total liabilities on the right is your total. Isn't it simple? Okay, after finishing the above content, let's take one more step and look at savings and spending..

04 Where does the money come from?

When you don't have additional income, saving money is the best way. If you want to save money, you must learn how to save money. There are always many places in your life where you can spend money. For example, you must pay your mortgage on time, change your phone frequently, and eat out at a nearby gourmet restaurant. So how can we save money in this area? The answer is simple, that is, continue to write a list of expenditures. After writing the list for a while, you will find that there are some things you don't need to buy. This will help you develop the habit of spending money on important things, while reducing your spending on unnecessary things. The amount of savings will increase, and deposits will naturally increase.

Save money early, no matter if you are in your twenties or thirties, and no matter what spending habits you have in the past, now you try to act immediately and start your savings plan. Don't wait until you had entered society for many years without any savings. Not to mention that you will need money during an emergency.

05 How to invest

The next step is to know how to invest. The entire investment activity probably contains three items. The first is to figure out whether you want to buy life insurance; second, you have to give priority to debt repayment; third, to understand the difference between investment and speculation.

When it comes to insurance, many people find it hard to face it, but as a rational investor, they must face problems. If your family depends on you financially, then you should have insurance.

Then, priority is given to paying off debts owed. Why did I say that? Because repayment of debt is also an investment, your debt requires interest. If your investment income is not as high as the interest on your debt, it is wise to repay the debt rationally. In addition, there are uncertainties in investment, so the best investment is to give priority to debt repayment.

06 A clear distinction between investment and speculation

There are millions of investors, and I don’t know how many have made money. But when it comes to financial management, many people still consider which stocks to recommend. Which industry is better these days? Many investors will hear some gossip from relatives, friends, colleagues, relatives of colleagues, etc. , Saying that a stock will go up several times, so they put all their money, even money borrowed from friends, into that stock. What happened in the end? I have not heard of how many people actually make a lot of money.

Why are many investors still unable to make money in a bull market? What is the problem? Why do investors still lose money when the market rises? The reason is that they confuse investment with speculation, and a little personal understanding of individual stocks is far from providing income protection.

We still need to know how to diversify investment risks. The classic philosophy of financial management is not to put all the eggs in one basket, in case there is a hole in the basket, all the eggs are gone.

Read also:

The eight golden periods of financial management in life, have you missed them?