Making more money in your 20’s is very important when trying to build wealth and improve your financial situation for your financial future. Earning more and growing your salary is all about providing more value over time to your customers, clients and coworkers. In this post, you’ll learn how to make 6 figures before age 30 and receive many ideas to grow your income over time.

To improve your financial situation, you can either make more money, or save more money.

While cutting expenses is great, and will probably work for awhile, it will only get you so far. Saving money is not enough to build a financially secure life.  If you’re going to become financially stable, you need to find a way to increase your income.

Crushing your 20’s can lay an incredible foundation for future success. By earning more money in your 20’s, you can create an amazing financial base for your future goals.

Are you looking to make more money? I want to help you grow your income and become financially successful.

If you are an income minded millennial, and a young adult focused on making more money, you NEED to read these tips.

In this post, I will be sharing with you tips to making more money and becoming a high earner in your 20’s. I’m going to look to answer your money making questions and provide you answers on the following topics:

• Why Becoming More Valuable Will Lead to Increased Earnings
• How I Became a Six Figure Earner in My 20’s
• Skills Required to Increase Your Income
• The Importance of Creating Multiple Income Streams and Multiple Income Stream Ideas
• Side Hustle Ideas to Make More Money on the Side
• Examples of Money Making Side Hustles
• If Certifications and Advanced Degrees Matter for Growing Your Earnings
• The Importance of Cultivating a Growth Mindset When trying to Advance Your Income
• What’s the Best Kind of Company to Work for to Improve Income Potential
• Books for You to Read to Further Your Personal Growth Journey

Let’s get started with why focusing on value will help you increase your worth, and allow you to raise your level of pay.

Becoming More Valuable Will Lead to Making 6 Figures

“Try not to become a person of success, but rather try to become a person of value.” – Albert Einstein

Increasing your income, salary, hourly rate, and earnings comes down to a simple variable: value.

If you can create and provide tremendous value and results, you WILL grow your income.

What is value?

For getting paid to do work, value is the monetary and assessed worth of a service.

Becoming more valuable, and increasing the worth of your service go hand in hand. Creating value in yourself, for an employer, or for others is not too complicated, but it can be complex.

How can you create value for others, or an employer?

There are many people we interact with on a daily, weekly, monthly, etc. basis.

With each person we interact with, there is an opportunity to either add to that person’s life, subtract from that person’s life, or leave that person’s life be.

Think about this for a second: how would you feel if you could add to every single person’s life you came across. Wouldn’t that be wonderful? If everyone walked away from interactions with you saying, hmm, I really like that guy/gal.

It’s not going to be easy to always be providing value. However, through becoming a servant and giver, you can receive anything you want in the world.

Value in the business and money making world is a combination of skills, likability and experience.

Becoming a person of value and putting the best version of yourself into the world will lead to a higher wage.

How to Create Massive Value at Your Day Job

Increasing your income at a day job comes from 3 things in particular:

1. Providing Value to the Entire Department through creating Efficient Solutions
2. Securing a Job in a Highly Visible Department at a Reputable Company
3. Working on Communication and Leadership Skills

Let’s discuss more in depth each action to help you understand examples for growing your income.

1. Create Solutions which Benefit Everyone in the Team

“You can accomplish anything in life, provided that you do not mind who gets the credit.” – Harry Truman

Some work situations are difficult to navigate. Many people are trying to back stab you, and nickel and dime their way to the top.

Backstabbing is a not a sustainable strategy.

Instead, I look to GIVE, and provide solutions which make processes more efficient. This will help the company save more, allow others to work less on busy work, and more on important work.

In my first year in my current role, we needed numerous codes to run testing on our models. Many of my teammates had their own code for these models, but there was not a unifying set of codes which could be used across all models. In addition, we were interested in adding a few more tests which would require new code.

I was up for the task.

One thing I’m very good at is creating scripts which are usable for multiple situations. I ended up adding 4 different sets of code for the 10 team members over a 3 week period, and became a friend to everyone.

I ended up helping everyone and ended up saving potentially 10-20 hours per person.

Being a servant to your team and wanting to help others is definitely a recipe and strategy to follow to be more successful in your career. I look to serve others and add value in any way I can, and I hope you will as well.

Now, my managers have shown their appreciation for my work through raises and promotions.

Projects like these have definitely helped my case for a higher salary over the past few years.

2. Work at a Great Company in a Highly Visible Department

My current job is in a department which gets a lot of scrutiny from various regulators at the federal level. The department I work in builds statistical models (different varieties of regressions), and requires skilled programmers and statisticians to create robust models.

In the banking industry over the past 10 years, there has been an increased need for compliance in a variety of areas. Combining the high scrutiny with required programming skills, you get a very specific skill set with few people fitting the mold. This allows for a higher level of salary across the department.

In addition, the company I work for is a Fortune 500 financial institution.

All of these factors can contribute to a higher salary over time.

Working for a company which is not growing, or does not provide you opportunities for more responsibility, will, unfortunately, limit your earning potential over time.

3. Focus on Communication and the Soft Skills

A few years ago, there I was, age 24 and sitting in a room of 30 people presenting our models to regulators.

To my right, I had a few team members – some senior analysts and managers – who weren’t presenting.

I’m not bragging, I’m telling you the raw facts of the situation. I was chosen by the head of our department to present because of my communication skills. I’m able to translate technical concepts into every day speak, and help others understand more easily.

I’ve been working on my communication skills for a number of years – through everyday conversation, by creating this website, by podcasting, and by learning about interactions and conversation over time.

Communication is only possible if the other person understands what you are trying to tell them. Focusing on the other person is of utmost important in communication.

To conclude on this point, through increased responsibility and solid communication skills, I’ve been able to increase my value and increase my salary.

Now, I will share with you 8 important skills you can learn to help grow your value and increase your salary.

10 Important Skills to Learn to Grow Your Salary

To grow your income and increase your wage at a job, there are many skills, thoughts and abilities you can work on and improve upon.

However, through my experience and learning, there are 10 important skills which have lead to my success. Making more money at your job is possible, and some of these skills will be good to learn, while others might not be as important.

These 10 skills are broad, but can certainly be applied to other disciplines and fields of work:

1. Communication
2. Discipline
3. Teamwork
4. Big Picture Thinking
5. Leadership
6. Sales
7. Customer Service
8. Time Management
9. Problem Solving
10. Job Specific and Technical Skills

Why are each of these important? Below is a description of each skill necessary for increasing your income, and tips on how you can increase your abilities.

1. Communication

Communication is arguably the most important skill to have and focus on growing in a person’s life and career.

In every day life, we interact with many different people.  If you can’t communicate your thoughts and feelings in a coherent way, you will struggle.

Similarly for your career, written and verbal communication is so critical.

Being able to listen to instructions and ideas, and then go out and execute or instruct others effectively is part of almost every job out there.

As I discussed above in my income story, when I was 24, I found myself in a conference room full of people presenting because I knew the material, was confident in my understanding of the material, and could clearly express what was necessary.

Even though there were senior members in my department around the table who knew the material as well as I did, I was chosen because I was confident and clear in my verbal communication.

I’m a natural introvert, but I’ve improved my communication over time.

A few ways to improve your communication include:

• Writing in a journal or blog
• Recording yourself speaking on a topic, start a YouTube channel, or start a podcast
• Reading books on communication and practice with friends out in the world
• Joining a local Toastmasters club

Communication is so critical, and it’s essential for success in the world.

2. Discipline through Consistent Efforts

Success is the culmination of days, weeks, months, and years of work.

Being a servant at work for a month, and then taking a month off will not lead to increased pay. Working on yourself and taking a break won’t lead to self improvement.

Showing up day after day, week after week, and month after month, will lead to getting what you are looking for: more responsibility, more knowledge, and more pay.

Consistency and discipline are things we as humans know what to do, but sometimes lack.

Consistent daily efforts added up over time WILL lead to success.

Implementing a strong work ethic and mindset geared towards doing a little bit each day can get you on the path to increasing your skills and income.

3. Teamwork is Critical for Success in the Workplace

Being able to work on a team is another skill employers want.

Being an effective team player means being able to work with people from diverse backgrounds to best get the job done.

A good team player is reliable, genuinely committed to the task at hand, is respectful of others and is always ready to help.

A team player doesn’t care about getting credit, being right or “winning” – they only care about how to best get the job done.  Doesn’t that sound like an employee you’d want to hire?  😉

4. Big Picture Thinking

Big picture thinking is a rare skill. If you want to connect with your manager at a higher level, big picture thinking is a must.

Big picture thinking is the ability to take in many different pieces of information, understand how all of the pieces of information work together, and then provide a strategy to produce a favorable outcome.

Maybe, you have a strategic role that requires big picture thinking and you are fine in this area.

But, many people are still in the lower levels of an organization. It’s a difficult place to practice big picture thinking on a daily basis if your primary job functions are relatively static or routine.

However, through playing strategy games, learning about strategy, and taking a step back from the detailed processes can lead to improved big picture thinking.

Big thinking can bring big results!

5. Leadership

As with being a big picture thinker, leadership is a quality many want but few posses.

But leadership is an essential skill to have in business, because leaders:

1. Create an inspiring vision of the future
2. Motivate and inspire people to engage with that vision
3. Manage delivery of the vision
4. Coach and build the team so that it is more effective at achieving the vision.

A true leader is one that encourages us to do our best, helps us when we need it, is honest, trustworthy and confident.  A leader knows when to push and when to pull back.  They inspire us to do our best and their vision takes us where we want to go.

A good leader is indispensable to any organization.

6. Sales and Marketing

Even if you don’t work on the revenue side of a business, learning some sales and marketing strategies can benefit you in a few ways:

• Getting buy in on an idea or project from your managers and co-workers
• Raising awareness effectively of a new project or feature
• Selling your abilities and skills to get paid your worth

If you understand sales and marketing, you can apply sales concepts into your work and watch as other people start to buy into what you are saying.

Learning sales and marketing can be done through reading different books, watching videos, or trying to sell a product yourself!

As a friend once told me, without sales, you have no business! With sales, anything is possible!

7. Customer Service and Likability

At work, your customers could literally be the customers of the business, but they also could include your managers, regulators, auditors, other members of the organization, or anyone you come into contact with on a regular basis.

When you walk into a store, how do you like to be treated?

I’m guessing you’d like to be treated with respect, to have your questions answered in a clear and concise manner, and get on with your day stress-free.

Again, this isn’t rocket science, but if you don’t have much experience, start trying to become more friendly to people around you. Once you are on the job, you can continue these practices.

Likability is a huge component in raising your value as an employee or worker. Working on your customer service skills will lead to increased likability, and will help with increasing your pay.

8. Time Management and Planning

Meeting deadlines and expectations is a necessity in the world – but some people still don’t prioritize time management as much as they should.

Growing up, time management was stressed to me as important, but my parents seemed to dictate what I did and when around their schedule.

When you look to increase your income, all of a sudden your life becomes a balancing act between your day job, your side hustles, your personal development, your family, your friends, exercising, and relaxation time.

Being able to balance these things requires higher level thinking (something we just talked about), as well as the ability to prioritize and execute on your plans.

9. Creativity, Design and Problem Solving

A skill listed on many job listings is problem solving.

In jobs which are straightforward and grunt-ish, it’s very difficult to work on problem solving on the job.

However, for business owners and managers, thinking outside the box is a must. If someone can help solve a problem, they are instantly more valuable to you.

A few pieces of problem solving include creativity and designing a solution for the situation at hand.

Learning how to problem solve can come through playing games, doing puzzles, and studying strategies for problem solving.

Becoming more creative and working on your design skills can come from TRYING things. If you want to be UNIQUE and ORIGINAL, you need to triple your output.

It took Thomas Edison 1,000 attempts to make a light bulb. Do you think you’ll get it right on the first try? I know my first attempt at creativity was a fail…

Becoming a better problem solver will lead to increased value and over time, more pay.

10. Job Specific Knowledge and Technical Skills

The 9 skills I’ve listed above can help in many situations, but ultimately, the job you do will have some job specific knowledge and skills required.

The knowledge needed will depend on your job. This is obvious, but worth mentioning.

If you want to be a doctor, you’ll need to go to medical school. For a lawyer, law school.

For other roles, like becoming a electrician, carpenter, or plumber, a trade school, getting the appropriate certifications or becoming an apprentice can help you learn the necessary skills.

In many office roles, programming and the ability to make processes efficient is a great skill to add to your talent stack.

The Microsoft suite has the ability to automate processes with code (VBA) or with features (mail merge and Excel functions). You can learn how to use Microsoft Excel better with a site like Excel Easy, and learn pivot tables, VBA, or just basic functions to help make things more efficient.

Something I did this past quarter was automate reporting for a manager in our department. She was spending 10+ hours formatting charts and tables after manually copying and pasting in data (what a headache!). I added a few buttons to the Excel sheet, wrote some VBA code, and now, the process takes less than 5 minutes once the data is right.

If you don’t use Microsoft products, then learning how to code might make sense.

At my day job, I use SAS, Python and Javascript – these I either learned on the job, or at home by using sites such as Code Academy or learning from YouTube. R, Java, C, C++, Ruby, or C# might make sense to learn depending on your goals and wants.

Over time, adding new skills to your talent stack will lead to increased earnings. These skills can come from certifications, doing side projects, or getting more formal education.

Create Multiple Income Streams to Increase Your Earnings

Unfortunately, increasing your income at a day job can only happen so fast. There are budget restrictions, managerial approvals, and advancement structures which get in the way of growing your wage.

For example, in many jobs, there are strict time tables for advancement. After 2 years, you can become a senior analyst. With 5 years of experience, a manager. After 8 years, a senior manager.

Even if you have the ability to become a manager after 3 years, your pay and responsibility will be capped.

Fortunately, through side hustling and making money on the side, you can grow your earnings this month!

Side hustling is tough and not for everyone. However, if you are looking to grow your income fast, then side hustling is a must!

Below, I’ve created a list of side hustle ideas for your to possibly start to make more money this month.

Thousands of Side Hustle Ideas to Make More Money

There are thousands of ways to make money in this world.

Finding a side hustle which utilizes your existing knowledge is a great way to make money.

Below, I’ve listed a number of skills and interests which can be monetized. Maybe one of these will fall in line with your skills and you can start to work to monetize your life.

I hope that with the list below, you will have some ideas for earning some extra cash.

1. Tutor Students
2. Help with Yard Work
3. Edit Audio or Videos for Others
4. Build Furniture or Make Household Items
5. Referee Sporting Events
6. Start a Business
7. Help Others with their Businesses
   • Bookkeeping
   • Web Design
   • Social Media Marketing
   • Content Creation
   • Graphic Design
8. Rent Out Your Spare Things
9. Sell Your Stuff and Become a Merchant
10. Help Move People Out of their House
11. Edit Resumes
12. Invest in Income Producing Assets
13. Deliver Things in Your Car or Bike

Below is a description of each of these side hustle ideas. Maybe one of them will catch your interest and be the side hustle for you!

There are so many ways to make money in this world!

1. Tutor Students

If you have knowledge in math, writing, science, or history, you could become a tutor for high school or college students.

Many students need help with catching up to other students, or getting to the next level, and tutoring can help fill those gaps.

2. Help With Yard Work

Many people don’t like doing yard work – especially when it’s just snowed ten inches and they don’t want to go outside!

Getting outside and shoveling or mowing people’s lawns can earn you a decent amount of money for just a few hours of work.

When I was younger, I mowed 3 yards a week and was paid $20 for each lawn. For $60, I worked about 3 hours a week. Again, I was able to get some exercise and help out in the community. If you can handle some extreme conditions, mowing, raking leaves, or shoveling could be for you.

3. Edit Audio or Video

Video and audio quality is so important for businesses looking to attract views and listens online.

If you know how to do sound quality, video production, or sound mixing, you could secure a fun side gig helping others make amazing videos and sound clips!

Mastering the ability to edit videos can significantly enhance the overall quality and impact of your content, making it more appealing to audiences and potential clients.

4. Build Furniture, Do Repairs, or Make DIY Household Items

If you are handy, you could custom build things for others, or help friends with repair projects for pay.

Maybe you are someone who is DIY obsessed. If you love doing crafts, you could make custom crafts and sell these at local craft fairs or open an online store.

There are so many things people need help with around their house, and also, people love custom and handmade products.  You could fill a need with your skills and abilities.

5. Referee Sporting Events

When I was in high school, I refereed elementary school basketball each weekend during the Winter.

For an hour of work I got paid $15 a game, and got some exercise as well.

If you love sports, this could be an easy money maker for you – a few hours a week in exchange for some exercise and helping out your community.

6. Help Others with Their Businesses

Are you good with Excel or have a knack for social media? Business owners are paying top dollar for virtual assistants, marketers, and other helpers to grow their business.

Offering your skills for a certain hourly percentage could bring in some serious cash.

If you want to work online, I’d recommend looking at Fiverr, Upwork, or Freelancer. These platforms, freelancing websites and e-commerce marketplaces provide opportunities to monetize your skills and interests, reflecting current b2b ecommerce trends.

Below are 5 side hustle ideas for helping small businesses:

1. Web Design
2. Bookkeeping 
3. Social Media Marketing
4. Content Management
5. Graphic Design

A. Website Design

Every website that is created on the internet utilizes HTML, CSS, and Javascript to present data and content to the end-user. Learning how to use Javascript and other programming languages can be very lucrative for your career.

For many websites, the goal is to sell the user on some product (information, a physical or digital product, or a service).

There is a lot of technical information you need to know, but website design is a skill not many small business owners have. With that said, if you are a small business and you don’t have a website, good luck!

Small business owners are always looking for an edge over their competition. A nice looking and functional website can be the difference between a deal and a lost deal.

Web design could be a great side hustle for you if you enjoy programming, design or marketing, as these skills all lead to a great looking website!

B. Bookkeeping

When I was in college, I worked as a bookkeeper for a hotel management firm. It wasn’t sexy work, but it was extremely necessary for the business.

All small businesses need to have tax records, receipts, and documentation on their various financial activities, and many small businesses owners do NOT want to do this work.

It is tedious, it is a grind, but it is completely necessary and really only requires organization, data entry skills, and some finance and accounting knowledge.

Bookkeeping would be a great side hustle to get into for someone who is currently, or is looking to go towards, working in corporate finance or accounting in the future.

C. Social Media Management

Similar to websites, social media is another one of those must haves for small business owners. If you do not have a social presence, then the business brand will potentially look less desirable.

There are many different social platforms, each with a unique strategy and feel for connecting with potential customers and users.

The main social media platforms I will focus on discussing here are Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Managing the social media accounts for a business involves coming up with a strategy for engagement, scheduling out posts and content on the different platforms, interacting with followers and potential customers, messaging any potential partners, managing paid advertising campaigns, and executing on the engagement plan.

Many small business owners want to focus in on what they are good at, and social media might not be their expertise.

Roles that could come from this idea are Facebook ads managers, Google Adwords Manager, and Twitter and Instagram profile building.

Social media management could be a great opportunity for someone who is talented at marketing.

D. Small Business Content Management

Going back again to how important a strong website is, content is king when it comes to showing your brand is knowledgeable and worth trying.

Many small business owners are not experts in writing content, or determining which content is best for their audience.

A small business content manager is responsible for helping manage the existing content on the website (optimizing and cleaning up old posts), ensuring new web pages are strong, and communicating with all authors, editors and social media managers to make sure the message is consistent across platforms.

Some of the roles that come out of this idea could be website manager (webmaster), content site auditor, editor, and writer.

If you are good at writing, or enjoy some of the technical aspects of editing and formatting, content management could be a great side hustle for you.

E. Graphic Design

Every website needs a logo, every social media platform is image heavy, and how well printed and digital content is received is based on how visually appealing it is.

If you are good at graphic design (either in Canva, Photoshop, Illustrator, etc.), helping small businesses with their image creation could be a decent way to earn extra money on the side of your day job.

I’ve paid $20 for logos in the past, and now that I’ve also created a few logos myself, I could imagine myself being able to do 1-2 logos an hour.

If you can get involved with managing multiple pieces of the business and become responsible for a number of designs, this side hustle could easily scale up to a handful of hours per month.

There are so many ways to help small businesses out. Searching and finding what you will like to do most, and how you can be helpful can be done through communication and networking.

Now, back to the non-small business helping money makers.

7. Rent Out Your Spare Things

Over the past few years, I’ve made over $40,000 in rental income from house hacking. In July 2015, I bought a house with two spare bedrooms. Each of these rooms I rented out for $600+, and now, have made over $40,000 over time.

House hacking, the act of renting out your spare rooms to monthly renters, or to people using a service such as AirBnb, can be a great income generator. If you aren’t using those rooms, why can’t someone else use them and pay you for it, too?

There are also ways to rent out your car and other things, like appliances, storage, and parking.

These rental options are great since the incoming money is passive income once set up!

8. Become a Merchant and Sell Your Stuff

Over the years, people tend to accumulate stuff – I know I have. This stuff sometimes will end up sitting on a shelf in your basement or closet for years, never to be used.

Why do we hold on to these things?

Selling this stuff will free up space, and will put cash in your pocket.  It’s a no brainer.

Don’t have stuff to sell?  Buying underpriced things at garage and estate sales and flipping them on eBay has 8. proven quite profitable for many people.

Becoming a merchant sounds intimidating. However, it can certainly be done by going to thrift shops and finding underpriced items you can flip for a profit.

9. Start a Business

Coming up with something simple to sell isn’t that hard when you fully immerse yourself in the product development and brainstorming process. Satisfy the needs of others and you’ll be able to make money.

There is no guarantee of making money when starting a business, but it is a possibility if you have the right product, connection and skills.

10. Help Move People Out of their Homes

If you are physically up for it, moving people out of their homes is a great way to pick up some extra cash. It’s definitely hard work and not for the faint of heart.

It does pay quite well though – in college, I had a few gigs with my friends moving people, and we charged $15 an hour.  After the tip, it was closer to $25 an hour!

11. Invest in Income Producing Assets

Investing in income producing assets should help boost your income.  DIY minded people who are handy can buy real estate in a nice location, fix up whatever is necessary, and rent the property for a monthly income.

Real estate is just one of the many income producing assets a person can get involved in – and the hours associated with this side hustle is typically quite low.

12. Deliver Things in Your Car or Bike

Driving for Uber or Lyft, or making deliveries of food on the way home or on the way to your destination for Doordash or Postmates are all effective ways to multitask and earn some money.

There are so many ways to earn extra money through hustling on the side of your main occupation or job.

Do any of them seem interesting to you?  Start with one or two and see how it goes – you may find yourself earning enough income to one day quit your day job!

As I mentioned above, there are so many ways to increase your income and earnings through side hustling!

13. Edit Resumes

Helping people with their resumes and job searches by reviewing and editing their resumes could be a great side hustle.

If you have experience as a hiring manager or interviewer, this would be a great side hustle for you.

Now, let’s talk about some real world examples of side hustles which I’ve featured here on this blog.

Real World Examples of Side Hustlers and Side Jobs

On The Mastermind Within, I’ve had the pleasure and honor to feature some amazing side hustlers in my Side Hustle Spotlight series.

These side hustlers are making great money on the side of their day job. Here is a list of the side hustle interviews I’ve featured so far:

• Tutoring
• Consignment Store Flipping
• eBay and Online Marketplace Flipping
• Musician
• Food Tour Guide
• Sports Press Box Worker

Hopefully, these amazing interviews give you inspiration to start your own side hustle (and if you do, I’d love to hear about your side hustle!!)

Now, I have a few common income questions which I will answer before wrapping this post up.

Do Advanced Degrees or Certifications Matter for Growing Income?

Advanced degrees are quite valuable, for both personal development and career enrichment. By obtaining a graduate degree, you can expect the following:

• Personal growth
  • You should grow intellectually, but through your experiences you might also enhance your emotional capabilities.
• Wealth
  • On average – across employment fields and U.S. state lines – Graduate degree-holders earn about 30 percent more than workers with merely a bachelor’s degree. (I was able to increase my salary $20,000 through my graduates studies!)
• Connections
  • Professional networking opportunities abound in graduate programs, but social connections are also common. Many people meet their lifelong friends and loved ones in grad school.
• Recognition
  • Those with graduate degrees often enjoy higher social status than others. Master degrees and Ph.D.s are prestigious and earn praise and respect as a result.

At the same time, you don’t necessarily NEED an advanced degree for higher income. It really is dependent on your GOALS and your dream job.

Some of the most successful people I know didn’t go to college. Other successful people I know have multiple degrees.

Real world experience and knowledge are what will make you valuable at the end of the day. If you can provide enough value, you can do whatever you want, and make whatever wage you want.

If an advanced degree makes sense for you, go for it! At the same time, you could reach your goals without one.

How Important is a Growth Mindset for Making More Money?

Personally, I try to live my life with an abundance mindset. Living with a growth mindset can lead to amazing results.

Life is not zero sum: You can win, and I can win.

With an abundance mindset, I believe I can do anything in the world, become anything, and have anything.

With an abundance mindset, I know that you can improve our financial situation through increasing our income – there’s unlimited potential on the upside for income.

Provide value in places you haven’t provided value before and you will be compensated.

With a little more money each month, you’ll be on to bigger and better things.

There are billions and millions of dollars out there in the world today – do you think it’s possible we can skim a little bit off the top and make our financial lives a little better than the day before?

What Kind of Company Should I Work For to Increase My Income Potential?

Let’s be honest here: some situations have no ceiling and no chance for advancement. Part of emotional intelligence and being aware of your situation will allow you to realize this and get the heck out of there.

In my first role, I saw that it would take a while for me to gain the necessary skills to get to the next level. Even though they valued my work and I created some cool automation and Excel reporting, I didn’t fit in with the group’s vision.

I started looking after my first year, and found a job that had room for growth and the ability to advance in a shorter period of time.

During my second summer, I mentored an intern and this year, I’m leading a group of roughly 15 in learning Python and building multiple pieces of code to compare to our current production runs.

In my first job, I wouldn’t have gotten either of these opportunities. These opportunities have lead to more responsibility and higher pay.

If you value having a higher wage, then getting into a situation with opportunities for advancement, training and responsibility will be very beneficial for growth.

Next, I want to share with you a few books which have been beneficial for my income growth.

Resources to Further Your Personal Development for Income Growth

“Your level of success is rarely exceeded by your level of personal development, because success is something you attract by the person you become.”

Education doesn’t not stop after high school. Becoming a successful person and growing your earnings will require personal development.

Below are 7 books which have made a profound impact on my career growth, and have allowed me to increase my value and earn more money.

Skill with People, by Les Giblin

With these resources, you can learn and apply your amazing knowledge to reach your full potential, and earn more money.

Increase Your Income and Welcome Endless Possibilities

Over the past few years, there have certainly been many times where I was frustrated with my level of income, or lack of side income.

In 2013, my income was $20,000 – high for still being in school, but not where I wanted it to be.

In 2015, my income was $63,000 – high for 22 years old, but not where I wanted it to be.

I wanted more, and wanted it in those moments of frustration.

What I realized though is no matter how much I wanted something, unless I internalized those emotions and did something about it, nothing would happen.

I started focusing on what I could control: my thoughts and actions.

A few years later, I’ve improved my financial situation through improving myself, and have increased my income.

Reading books and blogs, watching videos, talking with successful people, learning, and then applying and trying things in the real world. All of these actions have been critical to my growth.

What did I learn about and then go out and apply? How to communicate more effectively, how to think a little bit bigger, and how to be consistent. I learned new programming languages, learned some marketing and web design, and joined different communities who needed help with different tasks.

Showing up is half the battle – I could have just as easily stayed at home, been content in my current role, and just met expectations. But, instead I made the choice to push the envelope and become better. But it wasn’t a one time choice; rather, a daily, weekly, and monthly choice.

Doing a little bit each and every day is so critical to working your way towards a higher income.

It will take time – patience will be required.

However, once you gain new skills, increase the level of your current skills, and provide value to the right people, the sky is the limit 🙂

I hope this post has been inspiring for you as an income minded millennial pursuing a higher salary.

Please let me know if you have any questions and how I can help you on your income growth journey!

Patience is a virtue and a skill which can unlock great benefits in your life. By working on patience and looking to become more patient, you will create many favorable situations for yourself.  In this post, you’ll learn about the benefits of being patient, the importance of patience, and ways you can be more patient in life.

Over the past few months, I’ve been meeting a lot of amazing women and going on a fair amount of dates. Something I’ve had to work on is being patient with some of the women I meet. I tend to get excited to hang out again, while they are slower to be open to seeing me again.

This push and pull is part of the dating game these days, and patience is very important for letting attraction build naturally.

I’ve been thinking a lot about patience recently with my focus on going out with new women, but I’ve also been thinking a lot about patience with regards to my level of physical fitness.

When looking to get into shape, there’s a lot of pain, sweat and suffering that goes into every workout.

4 sets of 10 of a certain exercise leads to no visible results the next time you look in the mirror. Doing it another day leads to more nothing after the next exercise.

Over time though, your body starts to change and you do see the results. With consistency, action, and patience, you can reach your fitness goals.

While you might not see the results in the first week or month, over time, you can get there.

Why is patience so important? What are the benefits of being patient? How can you be more patient and what are some ways to become more patient?

In this post, I will share with you why practicing patience is important for success, what are the benefits of being patient, and some tips for becoming more patient in life.

Why Practicing Patience is Important for Success

Patience is very important for success in life.

But first, what is patience?

Patience is defined as the the quality of being patient, as the bearing of provocation, annoyance, misfortune, or pain, without complaint, loss of temper, irritation, or the like.

Patience can be thought of of as being zen, and being unaffected by the crazy world around us.

When we are impatient, or not completely in control of our lives, we can get distraught, distracted and discouraged.

Think about a time when you were frustrated by the lack of your progress in a certain area.

Becoming frustrated didn’t lead to instant results, and may have even made the situation worse.

I know this has happened to me, especially in sports when trying to perfect a new swing and technique.

Recently, I’ve been rock climbing a lot, and as I’ve improved and gotten stronger, I have had to learn a ton about keeping a tight core and positioning my body in ways which will help me keep more balance.

It’s very frustrating when I fall off the wall because I’m slightly out of position. Instead of getting frustrated though, I need to stay calm, be patient, and keep working on the moves.

By being patient, we can stay calm, cool and collected, and keep on the path to achieving our goals and getting on to our dream life.

What are the Benefits of Being Patient?

There are many benefits of being patient in life.

Some of these benefits of practicing patience include:

• Helping you focus on longer term outcomes and goals, rather than short term pleasure
• Helping you with making good choices, rather than making impulsive decision
• Forcing you to show empathy and kindness towards others

By being patient, you will become a more peaceful, empathetic and kind human over time, and also, with a clearer mind, you can start to make better and rational decisions.

Being patient involves slowing down, understanding where others are coming from, and making a rational plan.

Becoming more patient doesn’t mean you are throwing emotions out the window – it just means that there are a time and place for certain emotions, and a time and place for being level-headed.

Now that we’ve discussed why being patient is important, let’s talk about some tips for becoming more patient, and also give some examples of the importance of being patient in different situations.

7 Ways to Be More Patient in Life

Below are 7 tips for becoming more patient in life.  The overarching thought of becoming more patient is slowing down in life and looking to live intentionally.

Whether you are trying to be more patient in the workplace, be more patient at home, or be more patient in general, these 7 ways to being more patient will help you with your goal.

The 7 ways to be more patient are as follows:

1. Slow Down
2. Breathe
3. Focus on What’s Important
4. Communicate Your Thoughts with Others and Yourself
5. Use Affirmations to Get in the Right Mindset
6. Understand Time Can Heal
7. Be Mindful of Your Progress and Current Situation

Let’s get into each of these tips for becoming more patient in more detail.

1. Becoming Patient Involves Slowing Down

Going one hundred miles an hour isn’t always the most optimal way to get to success.

Figuring out the right balance between when to push and when to pull back is tough, but is helpful for assessing the situation at hand.

Slowing down could mean taking a step back from the situation, pausing for a few seconds, pulling over on the side of the road, and once there, thinking to yourself, “What’s the best step I can take next?”

2. Breathing Will Help With Patience

Our bodies run on oxygen and getting this oxygen in times of need can be very helpful.

After slowing down, taking a few deep breaths can help with patience. There are many benefits of breathing, one of those benefits being that it quite literally is lowering your stress hormone cortisol!

By taking a few deep and slow breaths, you can reduce your level of stress, and work on making your next step a good one.

3. Focus on What’s Important

After slowing down and taking a few deep breaths, it’s important to figure out what is important and then act on this plan.

Another way to think about this step in becoming more patient is to completely ignore what you are stressed about and focusing on other tasks.

I know that if I’m stressed about a mistake, a misstep, or lack of progress, if I start doing something else, I can forget about what I’m stressed about and move on.

4. Communicate With Those Around You and Yourself

Frustration and anxiety can be internal, or external. In either case, asking the right questions of others or yourself can be helpful.

Asking, why am I stressed, or why am I not progressing, rather than getting frustrated and not doing anything about it, can be helpful.

Likewise, asking those around you about your situation can be helpful. Also, asking questions and looking to understand the other person’s position can help.

If you are frustrated with a child who keeps whining, trying to understand why they are whining can result in a better situation than complaining or yelling (though every situation is different – tough love could make sense too!)

The key here is to try and gain information you can use in a logical and rational way. There are times to be emotional in life, but when looking to become more patient, being calm is better.

5. Use Affirmations to Get in the Right Mindset

“I am a patient person.”

When you wake up tomorrow morning, say this 3 times.

“I am a patient person.”

“I am a patient person.”

“I am a patient person.”

Affirmations are incredibly powerful because you can quite literally reprogram your brain to think the way you want to think.

Getting in the right mindset is incredibly important for life in general, and is especially critical for becoming more patient.

6. Understand Time Can Heal

Unfortunately, time can sometimes be the best medicine for stress and anxiety. Giving yourself a break for a day, or week, can help your situation in times of impatience.

One example here is with training to get in shape.

Did you know your body actually grows when you are resting, rather than when you are in the gym?

Listening to your body and resting is sometimes the optimal way to proceed. If you are hurting, pushing to get one more workout in before the week ends might actually do the opposite of healing.

In a similar way, giving space to others when they aren’t living up to their responsibilities or doing what you want can work.

This is especially true in relationships, and is something I need myself as an introvert – space.

By giving space, you allow time to heal your frustrations, give the other person time to think, and after a while, you can revisit where you are going.

7. Gain Perspective on Where You’ve Came From and Your Current Situation

Looking back on where you have came from is a very powerful way to remain patient. This is something I experience when I look at my financial situation.

When I get stressed about money, and wish I had more, I look back on where I’ve came in the past 5 years and feel good about my progress.

I also think about those around me, and how many people would want to change places with me, and this also helps me gain a better perspective on my thoughts.

Seeing where you’ve came from, looking at those around you, and slowing down can help you with patience.

Now that we have talked about these tips for becoming more patient in life, let’s talk about the application of patience in a few different areas of life.

How to Find Patience in Different Areas of Life

You just learned about 7 tips you can take to apply in your life to become more patient, but now I’m going to share with you a number of situations where patience can help.

These situations are areas that I struggle with patience, and hopefully by sharing these situations with you, you can start looking at your life and make adjustments for the better.

The 4 situations I will share with you regarding patience are:

1. Patience with Other People
2. Patience with Exercise and Fitness
3. Patience in the Workplace and in Your Career
4. Patience with Money

Let’s dive into each of these four areas of life and talk about how being patient can help.

1. How to Be More Patient with Other People and in Relationships

As I discussed in the introduction of this post, I struggle with patience in my relationships from time to time (especially new relationships).

When meeting a new and attractive woman, I have to remind myself that I need to stay focused on my mission and purpose in life. When learning about someone else for the first time, there are a lot of things to get comfortable with, learn and do before attraction and comfort set in.

Having patience in my new relationships involves slowing down and having a longer term focus on my actions.

For existing relationships, friends, and co-workers, patience really boils down to understanding that other people have different goals and wants, and communication and empathy are very important.

Communicating with others when you have differences is the key to good relationships. If you can slow down, compose yourself, and understand where the other person is coming from, then you can navigate different social situations much easier than if you get upset.

2. How to Find Patience in Exercise and Fitness

Losing weight, “getting in shape”, improving in a sport, and gaining strength all require patience.

No one becomes an Olympic athlete overnight, even with so many diets and workout programs promising a quick fix.

Finding patience in exercise and fitness comes from an understanding that the body cannot change over night.

Weight is a simple “calories in minus calories out” equation, and while fasting can be beneficial, eating and getting the proper amount of nutrients is very important for general health.

Consistency and action are truly the most importance traits to cultivate when looking to get into shape, and by understanding this, you can develop patience towards your body.

3. How to Be More Patient in the Workplace

A very common question is how to be more patient in the workplace and how can I be more patient when I’m working.

One of the most frustrating things in my career is the lack of progression in responsibility and results, and how certain people at work can have no awareness of how they are working with others.

With working with annoying co-workers, if it’s really bad, then there are times when leaving your current role needs to be an option on the table.

If the situation is not that bad, then practicing empathy, breathing, and taking a long term view on why you are going to work is important here.

Sometimes, a crappy job in the short term is necessary to build skills, build savings, pay down debt, or provide for your family.

With waiting for a promotion, recognition, and results, understanding the goals and views of your organization are important for gaining perspective on the situation.

Again, some companies are not great companies and do not have a plan in place for you.

However, by communicating your goals and wants with your manager, and understanding the big picture, you can find clarity in the situation.

4. How to Find Patience with Money

Finally, if you are struggling with patience and your personal financial situation, there is hope.

I want to become rich at a young age. Becoming rich and financially free in my 20s or 30s would be an amazing accomplishment, but unfortunately to do so, I need to (a) make a lot of money, and (b) save a lot of money.

Becoming a millionaire, creating passive income, and becoming financially independent does not happen overnight.

Most months, my savings go up a few hundred dollars, and other months, a few thousand dollars.

$1,000, while a lot of money, isn’t enough to retire on, or enough to fall back on in the world today.

I sometimes get impatience at my lack of progress, but when I zoom out, I see some great results.

Falling back on this progress, and also understanding how time multiplies money via compounding, I find peace in my situation and keep going forward with my financial plans.

Start Working on Being More Patient Today

Practicing patience with yourself and with others will pay dividends for you in your life. Working on becoming more patient can result in great success, but it will take work.

Breathing, focusing on other tasks, communicating with others involved, becoming more self aware, and understanding sometimes time will cure things are great ways to become more patient.

Over time, through working on becoming more patient, you will become a more patient and positive person.

With this post, you now know a number of ways to be more patient, and how to become more patient in the workplace, become more patient at home, and become more patient in your daily life.

As we talked about, the importance of patience can’t be stressed any more, and with many benefits of being patience, you can’t not work on becoming more patient this year.

Slowing down and practicing patience can lead to less stress and more happiness. Will you give patience a shot?

Readers: how do you practice patience and how do you work on becoming more patient with those around you and yourself?

Thank you for reading!

The Richest Man in Babylon, by George S. Clason is a timeless classic. The Richest Man in Babylon teaches the value of saving, overcoming poor habits, such as procrastination and getting into a mindset to take advantage of opportunities.

I was drawn to read The Richest Man in Babylon because many people and bloggers recommended it as one of the top 10 personal finance books. I finally got around to it and I’m glad I read it! It was a quick and enjoyable read.

The rest of this post includes a summary of the book, my takeaways, and my recommendation for you. Enjoy!

Summary of The Richest Man in Babylon

The Richest Man in Babylon is a series of parables about personal finance. The parables take place in Ancient Babylon. The main story is about how an average man became the richest man in Babylon. He accumulated wealth by being disciplined with his spending, investing his savings, and working to increase his income.

Each story has a lesson and a moral. The lessons and principles in The Richest Man in Babylon are simple and easy to understand.

In addition to the many principles and lessons in The Richest Man in Babylon, The Five Laws of Gold are presented. The Five Laws of Gold form the foundation for your relationship and mindset with personal finance. Everyone should follow these laws:

The Five Laws of Gold

1. Gold cometh gladly and in increasing quantity to any man who will put by not less than one-tenth of his earnings to create an estate for his future and that of his family.
2. Gold laboreth diligently and contentedly for the wise owner who finds for it profitable employment, multiplying even as the flocks in the field.
3. Gold clingeth to the protection of the cautious owner who invests it under the advice of men wise in its handling.
4. Gold slippeth away from the man who invests it in businesses or purposes with which he is not familiar or which are not approved by those skilled in its keep.
5. Gold flees the man who would force it to impossible earnings or who followeth the alluring advice of tricksters and schemers or who trusts it to his own inexperience and romantic desires in investment.

These laws of gold are more important than gold itself. By following each of the laws, you will become wealthy. Translating into layman’s terms:

1. Save a minimum of 10% of your income
2. Your investments will grow and the returns will compound over time.
3. Always have insurance (FDIC insurance for a bank, for example) for your money
4. Don’t invest in things you don’t know about
5. Understand the balance between risk and reward. If you try for 50% returns, you won’t last long.

Takeaways from The Richest Man in Babylon

Personal finance is about being disciplined in your approach to your finances. If you want to have money, learn to discipline yourself now and not later. Most lottery winners are bankrupt within a few years and mostly because they lacked self discipline. Therefore, the problem is not the lack of money, but how it is managed.

Currently, I track my income, expenses, and net worth over time. I’m saving roughly 45% of my income – I’m doing well on the saving and investing front.

One area of improvement I could work on is being properly insured. I chatted with my insurance agent last week and she suggested I get an umbrella policy and more life insurance. While I understood what she was selling me on, but I didn’t feel it warranted the monthly expense. I will check into this some more.

Our Recommendation for The Richest Man in Babylon

Yes, please read The Richest Man in Babylon. If you like storybooks, books written in old time language, or personal finance books, The Richest Man in Babylon is the book for you.  The Richest Man in Babylon teaches the values of saving, overcoming poor habits, such as procrastination, and getting into a mindset to take advantage of opportunities! Give it a shot. The lessons in The Richest Man in Babylon will change your financial life!

Thanks for stopping by. I’m glad I could share my thoughts with you.

Do you like story books or instruction manuals? Are you saving at least 10% of your income? What are your thoughts on umbrella policies?

Amanda Palmer is not your average person by any means. Incredibly polarizing, some love her crazy theater girl ways. Others despise her and call her a sell-out, a poser, and a scammer.

The Art of Asking: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Let People Help is an expansion of the popular TED talk Amanda Palmer gave in 2013.

Asking for help can be one of the hardest things to do in today’s world.

I think I can accomplish anything I want in my life, and I’m guessing you might share the same mindset.

What we don’t realize is how it is perfectly okay to ask for help and rely on others if we can’t do everything by ourselves.

The Art of Asking is a fascinating read into the life of Amanda Palmer, and was very inspiring and motivating.

The rest of this post includes a summary of The Art of Asking, takeaways from The Art of Asking, and a reading recommendation for you.

Book Summary of The Art of Asking

The Art of Asking is the story of Amanda Palmer. The Art of Asking goes through her early days working as The Bride, her music career, her interactions with her fans, and her thoughts on help and asking.

Amanda Palmer as The Bride

After graduating college, Amanda Palmer didn’t want a real job. A 9-5 desk job would not be for her.

Instead of going to school, Amanda decided to dress up as a bride – she wore a wedding dress and give flowers to people on the street.

She would stand on the side of a street, up on top of a milk crate, and perform for the people on the street. Over time, she was making more money by being The Bride than she was at her various other gigs, so she kept doing it.

People loved her!

At this time, Amanda was thinking about the concept of being “seen” vs. being “looked at”. Being “seen” is having someone look into your eyes and trusting your gaze – trusting you are there with them.

Too many of us go through each day only “looking at” others. “Seeing” others involves a level of compassion and empathy.

Amanda Palmer with The Dresden Dolls

After a few years of Bride-ing, Amanda started a band, The Dresden Dolls, with her friend, Brian Viglione.

Amanda was seeking “salvation through volume” with their pounding, screaming Victorian punk rock style.

After each show, Amanda insisted on meeting fans after the show for drinks, autographs, and fun times. She increased her audience through her mailing list, parties, and social media. She would organize “ninja events” by sending out a tweet saying something like “I’m going to be in this city and at this bar at 9 PM – come see me play some music!”

By interacting with her fans on a daily basis through in-person events and social media, she built a fantastic community of fans.

When touring, The Dresden Dolls regularly asked for volunteers, food, couch space, and for local musicians to get up on stage and open for them. Amanda found that asking for help almost always resulted in success. She had created a vibrant artistic community of people who were joyously looking out for each other.

Unfortunately, relations with their record label went south – the label didn’t like the way Amanda was going about promoting her music. They wanted Palmer to stop talking to her current fans to go court new ones – this wasn’t her style.

“The whole point of being an artist, I thought, was to be connected to people, to make a family. A family you were with all the time, like it or not. That was the way we’d been doing it for years, whether or not we had an album or a tour to ‘promote’.”

After many years, she broke away from the label company and tried something completely new.

Crowdfunding a Kickstarter Album

“I think people have been obsessed with the wrong question, which is ‘How do we make people pay for music?’ What if we started asking, ‘How do we let people pay for music?’”

After Amanda Palmer’s falling out with the record label, she wanted to make a solo album.

Without too much money in the bank, she decided to do something unheard of: a Kickstarter for her album.

Amanda took asking to a whole new level with a Kickstarter campaign for her new album, “Theater of Evil”.

With this Kickstarter, she broke the site’s record at the time ($1.2 million in funding), and went on to launch the tour for the new album.

As she had for the past decade, she asked for local musicians to join her on tour and play. This time, the request was coming from someone who recently became famous for getting over 1 million dollars.

Unfortunately again, she was targeted by many haters for ripping off musicians.

Even when she posted a breakdown of her expenses to prove it wasn’t all profit, the damage was done and her reputation took a hit. That being said, she still had her loyal fans and many social media followers.

Other Interesting Stories Of The Art of Asking

It would be disrespectful of me not to mention some interesting perspectives and stories told about Amanda’s relationships with her husband, Neil Gaiman, and best friend, Anthony.

When Amanda was very young, she became friends with a man in the neighborhood named Anthony. Throughout her story, she references many stories Anthony told her as a young girl, a college student, and a young adult. When Amanda is touring, Anthony became sick with cancer.

In The Art of Asking, Amanda details her struggles with Anthony’s cancer and how much she loves him.

Amanda also discusses her relationship with her husband, Neil, throughout the book. Naturally a very independent woman, Amanda doesn’t like commitment. Being married isn’t natural to her and there are numerous passages discussing her struggles with marriage.

These stories about her relationships truly highlight how Amanda is human and normal. A perfect life doesn’t exist, there will always be improvements, struggles, and tweaks to make over time if you want success.

Great Quotes from The Art of Asking

Here are three quotes from The Art of Asking which resonated with me:

• “It isn’t what you say to people, it’s more important what you do with them. It’s less important what you do with them than the way you’re with them.” – Anthony (Amanda’s best friend)
• If you love people enough, they’ll give you everything.
• It’s hard enough to give fearlessly, and it’s even harder to receive fearlessly. But within that exchange lies the hardest thing of all: to ask. Without shame. And to accept the help that people offer. Not to force then. Just to let them.

Takeaways from The Art of Asking

With every book you read, it is a must to have takeaways and actionable items to implement in life.

The two main takeaways from The Art of Asking are the following:

• It’s important to SEE people, not just look at them.
• It’s okay to ask for help, people want to help you! 

Let’s dig a little deeper into these main takeaways of The Art of Asking.

Don’t Just Look at People, SEE People

The first main takeaway of The Art of Asking is people want to be seen, not just looked at.

When you walk on the streets, people generally will have darting eyes and don’t want to look at you. This situation would fall into being looked at; your presence was acknowledged, but the other person doesn’t care to keep you in their view.

To be “seen” is to truly be looked in the eye. To “see” someone is to realize that person is unique, that person has feelings, and that person is special. After reading this book, I look people in the eye with compassion.

Where I live, in Downtown Minneapolis, there are a number of homeless people. Most walkers just pass by and don’t try to interact. I don’t always give them money, but I do acknowledge them and say hi.

A smile goes a long way 🙂

People Want to Help, Just Ask!

The second main takeaway is to ask people for help when you need help.

Guess what? People want to help, why should we stress ourselves out and try to do it all?

It comes down to trust. I love the following passage I found in The Art of Asking:

When you accept somebody’s offer for help, whether it’s in the form of food, crash space, money, or love, you have to trust the help offered. You can’t accept things halfway and walk through the door with your guard up. When you openly, radically trust people, they not only take care of you, they become your allies, your family.

If you trust people, they will take care of you and be your friend. You can’t be isolated and try to trust others; it’s not possible.

You can be open to others help and trust they can get it done.

Our Recommendation for The Art of Asking

The Art of Asking was a fantastic read. The Art of Asking gave me insight into the intimate artist-fan relationship and the music industry, and also opened my eyes to being open to asking for help.

Growth as an individual comes through challenge and growing your perspective over time. Living in an echo chamber will not lead to success.

Reading and learning about other people’s success in different areas and careers can provide you a truly strong worldview and perspective.

You should definitely read The Art of Asking, by Amanda Palmer. For me, it was a completely difference perspective on the world, but it was completely worth the read.

Are you afraid to ask for things? What’s holding you back? Have you ever been a street performer?

The rules of traditional business and entrepreneurship have changed.

The American Dream is no longer confined to the corner office or a cubicle.

People are legitimately making good incomes using the internet to run a business completely online.

Not only that, but it’s allowing them to live the lifestyle they want, on their own terms.

Think about it, no more:

• long commutes in traffic
• getting up early just to try to make it to work on time
• getting dressed in clothes you hate, just so you can look presentable.

No, the new American Dream is a business that can be run from wherever you desire – and Click Millionaires wants to help you do just that.

Click Millionaires is an idea book and provides a broad overview of the different businesses you can pursue online.

Is Click Millionaires just another “get rich quick” scheme?  Absolutely not!  This is why Scott Fox encourages the reader to start slowly, part-time, and spend as little money as possible.  What’s great about this book is that he shows you how starting an online lifestyle business is easier and cheaper than ever!

In the rest of this post, I give you a summary of the book, my takeaways, and my recommendation for you.

“The trouble with the rat race is that, even if you win, you’re still a rat.” – Lily Tomlin

Book Summary of Click Millionaires

Click Millionaires about creating a lifestyle business online.

The whole point of creating something yourself is to be your own boss – that way you have complete control over your life, including what you do during the day, your compensation and benefits, etc.

A Click Millionaires lifestyle business adheres to the following principles:

• Helps People
  • People want help with their problems.  You will provide a solution.
• Possess Credibility
  • To provide solutions, you have to be knowledgeable in your niche.
• Automation
  • There are many tools available to automate the delivery and processes of a lifestyle business
• Outsourcing
  • Are there tasks you don’t like doing? Social media management? Website design? Contract it out!
• Audience Content Creation
  • Comments, forum posts, and guest posts are all forms of audience content creation.
• Scalability
  • Scalability is the ability of a technology or business system to adapt easily to increased volume and to maintain or improve profitability without requiring significant additional resources.
• Recurring Revenues
  • It’s fine to have one-time sales and clicks, but you want to have guaranteed revenue month in and month out. Ads or subscription products are great examples of recurring revenues.

What are some of the lifestyle business types which satisfy these principles when done correctly?

The Best Click Millionaire Lifestyle Businesses

As described in Click Millionaires, there are numerous examples of online lifestyle businesses you can pursue:

Digital Publishing

• “Noozles” (Email Newsletters)
  • Do you like writing but don’t really want to have a blog?  Consider a “noozle”.
• Blogging
  • Do you like writing? Consider starting a blog!
• Podcast
  • Do you like speaking?  Do people tell you they like hearing you talk, or like your voice?  Consider making a podcast!
• Video Broadcast/Online Television Show
  • Do you like making videos?  Make a YouTube Channel!
• Social network community
  • Building a vibrant forum is a great way to get a lot of people in one spot on the internet

All of these businesses are content related and have the potential to scale over time.

Digital Download and Product Sales

Selling your own digital product, whether that’s a book, a piece of software, a game, etc.

Affiliate Marketing

Marketing other people’s products through your website or marketing channel and collecting a fee on every sale which comes from your site.

Network Marketing

Also known as Multi Level Marketing – a way to sell other people’s products via your website.

Freelancing

Utilizing sites such as Upwork, Fiverr, or Elance, you can perform data entry, graphic design, virtual assisting and content creation for various small businesses over the web for a fee.

Copying Existing Products

Do you think you could improve upon an existing digital product? There is no need to reinvent the wheel!

The best part about Click Millionaires is these examples are talked about in depth. In addition, you are given multiple concrete examples on what and why someone would do pursue one versus another.

Find Your Niche for Online Business Success

The most important thing from Click Millionaires was to consider in creating your business is finding something you are passionate about.

If you aren’t passionate about a topic, you probably won’t be excited to work on your business each and every day.

An example from Click Millionaires was a person who lived in the United States, but wanted to learn French and travel to France. She started a french vocabulary blog to start learning French and over time, built a strong following and made friends in France!  What a story!

“There is only one success – to be able to spend your life in your own way.” – Christopher Morley

Takeaways from Click Millionaires

With every book I read, I’m always looking to implement actionable steps and provide takeaways. Reading Click Millionaires confirmed my belief that what I’m doing with my business and my blog is the right thing to do.

This website is certainly aligned for success and we have set up the business satisfies all of the principles above.

Going forward, maybe we will get into leveraging the internet through information products, digital products, and with different automation strategies.

Our Recommendation for Click Millionaires

Click Millionaires is a fantastic idea book with actionable advice. Scott Fox does a great job of bringing in concrete examples to help explain each of the business models he discusses.

While this isn’t a complete “how to” book, it does provide a broad overview of the different businesses you can pursue online.

If you are interested in entrepreneurship and looking for something with a low barrier of entry, I definitely recommend you check out Click Millionaires.

Do you have a side hustle? What’s stopping you from getting out there and working online for your income? Are you looking to leverage power of the internet?

Sam Walton built Walmart from the ground up – starting from 1 variety store in the 40’s to thousands today. When he passed in 1992, he had a net worth of $8.6 billion.

Sam Walton: Made in America, is Sam Walton’s autobiography of his life and work.

Starting in the 30’s, he talks about growing up during the Great Depression, and the impact it had on his life. After discussing his childhood, he takes you on a 50 year retailing journey, from his days running his first store, to owning a national brand and a company bringing in billions of dollars a year.

Sam Walton was a nobody living in the Midwest, and became one of the richest individuals in the United States by the time he grew old.

This autobiography sheds light on his thoughts while creating the massive retail empire of Walmart, and gives insight into how to create an amazing business through serving.

The rest of the post includes a summary of Sam Walton: Made in America, takeaways from this autobiography, and a reading recommendation for you.

Book Summary of Sam Walton: Made in America

Like many autobiographies, Walton starts with a discussion of childhood.

Sam Walton grew up in the Great Depression and this time left a lasting impression on him: EVERY DOLLAR MATTERS. When money is scarce, you can’t afford to be wasteful. Whether it was food, clothing, transportation or fun, there was an opportunity to be efficient and not to waste your hard earned cash. 

Having this thought and philosophy instilled at an early age had a great impact on his life in later years when he started in business.

Sam Walton: The Retailer and Merchant

After graduating college, Sam went to work at a retail store and quickly realized he really enjoyed the role. He was born to be a merchant, he writes, but the issue was, his handwriting was horrible and the management group at the time didn’t like how he played by his own rules.

After leaving this role, he bought his first store in Arkansas – a Benjamin Franklin store.

He was quite successful for 5 years, bringing in a solid profit through his hard work and constant need for improvement.

However, due to inexperience and a lack of legal know-how, he had to sell this store and start from scratch.

While it was a great learning experience, he wasn’t going to make that legal mistake again.

How Sam Walton Built Walmart

After his legal mishap with the Benjamin Franklin store, where he wasn’t able to renew his lease, he set off to start buying more stores.

It was at this point he realized there was an opportunity for him to persuade customers from other variety stores. If he could profitable make sales by offering lower prices and passing on the savings to the customer, then he could be successful.

He didn’t understand why a retailer needed to get 30-50% margins on every single product in the store. A margin of 5-10% would suffice, and after implementing these changes, his stores took off in sales.

Learning how to stretch every dollar, working from dusk until dawn, and being efficient and customer focused allowed him to create a lean and successful business.

The customers were incredibly happy and loyal, and his shareholders were satisfied as well.

He was always pushing to become a little better, and it showed.

Over 30 years, his retail empire grew and grew and grew. There were many tough times, but all of the hard work paid off. Here are his store numbers over time:

In 40 years, he built Walmart from the ground up. 9 stores to 1528 stores in 40 years is absolutely amazing growth – especially for someone from the Midwest who Wall Street thought was nutty and unconventional!

Sam Walton’s Ten Rules of Business

At the end of the book, Sam provides us a list of 10 rules for his success in business. He had never done this before, and decided to do it for the book for the first time in his life.

Here are his ten rules of business:

1. Commit to your business
   • Be tenacious and always look to improve your service or product.
2. Share your profits with all of your associates, and treat them as partners
   • Be generous and pay your people appropriately.
3. Motivate your partners
   • Ensure your people are listened to and motivated so they give their best.
4. Communicate everything you possibly can to your partners
   • Information is power, and the more information your people can utilize, the better they can do their job.
5. Appreciate everything your associates do for your business
   • Everyone in your business is doing their best and deserves thanks.
6. Celebrate your successes
   • Stop being so serious, it’s okay to be happy for your successes and give yourself a break.
7. Listen to everyone in your company
   • Everyone is unique and has great ideas.
8. Exceed your customers’ expectations
   • Providing immense value to your customers will give them no choice but to choose you as their store of choice.
9. Control your expenses better than your competition
   • The leaner your organization, the easier it is to manage tough times.
10. Swim upstream
    • Don’t be afraid to go against the grain.

Unfortunately, Sam passed away in the 1990’s, and cannot pass on his wisdom anymore. These tips are incredibly beneficial for someone in business, looking to start a business, or interested in creating an empire like Walmart.

Takeaways from Sam Walton: Made in America

With every book you read, it is a must to have takeaways and actionable items to implement in life.

The main takeaways from Sam Walton: Made in America were Sam’s focus on the customer, Sam’s focus on frugality and efficiency, and Sam’s tenacious approach to self-improvement.

The customer comes first in business (and life). Adopting a philosophy in which the work, service or product you put out should be geared to satisfy your customer at the highest level.

By focusing on making the customer experience the best it can be will bring you great success.

Putting tougher a piece of crap product won’t bring you pleasure or success – and it certainly won’t make the people giving you money happy.

Second, frugality and expense management is crucial in business and life.

Sam, worth billions, flew coach and drove his truck until his passing days. He didn’t feel the need to live lavishly because it didn’t make him happy.

Being able to save and make strategic moves when necessary allowed him to live comfortably and build his brand.

Finally, Sam’s tenacious approach to self-improvement, and the daily improvement of his business spoke volumes to me.

Consistent efforts WILL lead to massive results. 

He flew around the globe looking at other stores, figuring out what was working and what wasn’t working, and implementing the great ideas in his stores to ensure future success.

Daily disciplines added up over time will help you reach your goals. Sam Walton knew this intimately and his results showed.

Our Recommendation for Sam Walton’s Autobiography

Sam’s story was incredibly inspiring, and shed light on a true American entrepreneur. This businessperson autobiography motivated me to become better as an individual, and as a business owner.

Sam constantly was looking to improve a little bit each and every day. He studied the competition ruthlessly, and wanted to ensure the customer was experiencing the maximum benefit from Walmart’s service.

It wasn’t enough to do something right once, and then have an amazing finished product. No, you have to do it each and every day.

You must look to make an impact on your customers, readers, clients, or whoever you are serving. 

If you are an entrepreneur, or a student of business or American history, I would recommend giving Sam Walton: Made in America a read. Walmart and Sam’s Club are 2 iconic storefronts still prevalent today after many years. There is always something to learn from successful people and companies.

Readers: do you focus on providing your customer a great experience in your work? Are you inspired reading about incredibly successful people?

Save

Save

Are you someone who is looking to climb the corporate ladder, but struggling? Why does it seem like others magically can get promotions, and you aren’t having the same luck?

You put in long hours, you get things done on time, you show passion in your work, and you are emotionally invested in the company. Why haven’t you been promoted yet?

Why does your co-worker who seemingly does less work get the promotion? What skills and strategies are they using which are helping progress their careers?

In Stealing the Corner Office: The Winning Career Strategies They’ll Never Teach You in Business School, by Brendan Reid, explores the dynamics of career advancement in Corporate America.

Stealing the Corner Office is a fantastic guide for advancing through the ranks in Corporate America. Reid, a seasoned executive, offers a collection of controversial yet effective tactics and strategies for people who want to learn the real secrets for moving up the corporate ladder.

The rest of the post includes a summary of Stealing the Corner Office, takeaways from Stealing the Corner Office, and a reading recommendation for you.

Why does it seem your manager is so incompetent? What did they do to get them to where they are? What strategies are they using that we can replicate and employ to take control of our career?

Book Summary of Stealing the Corner Office

Stealing the Corner Office is a playbook and how-to guide for advancing through the ranks in Corporate America.

Reid spent 15 years of his working career in middle management. During his time, he became frustrated with his lack of progression. Why was it that people who seemingly were less smart, less “hard-working”, and less reliable moving up the corporate ladder and not him?

He was practicing all of the conventional career tactics:

• Being passionate about his work and ideas
• Working to the point of exhaustion
• Vocal and anxious to debate topics vigorously
• Driven to deliver quarterly results
• Emotionally invested int he company
• Demanding of his employees and co-workers

He started to wonder, why wasn’t he the one being promoted and advancing in his career?

It turns out, conventional wisdom is not what will get you to the top of the corporate ladder – we must be tactical and smarter about your career goals and the strategy to achieve those goals.

In Corporate America, there are three players:

• Incompetent Executives
• Smart-but-Stationary Managers
• Poor Souls

The Incompetent Executives are the people we loathe, but seemingly can’t crack the code of how they got to where they got.

Stealing the Corner Office uncovers the strategies of the Incompetent Executives, and how we as Smart-but-Stationary Managers or Poor Souls can change our daily actions at work to set ourselves up for advancement.

The 7 Tactics of Stealing the Corner Office

The majority of Stealing the Corner Office are the 7 tactics which can help you advance in your corporate career.

The 7 tactics of stealing the corner office are:

• Never be passionate about your ideas
  • Your managers have other plans than to entertain your ideas.
• Embrace the change everyone else hates
  • Your managers have a plan, and to be promoted, you’ll need to implement their plans successfully.
• Learn to promote your products
  • Sales and marketing techniques can be used to sell yourself!
• Avoid the farce of results orientation
  • Quality is usually more important than quantity.
• Don’t be part of the herd
  • Be unique! Standing out will allow you to get noticed by upper management.
• Find big problems to solve
  • If you can solve a $1,000 inefficiency, or $50,000 inefficiency, which help more to convince your manager you are able to take on more responsibility?
• Don’t hold people accountable
  • Your work is your work. If others aren’t helping enough, this is their problem

These tactics are unconventional, and this is exactly the point. The traditional methods aren’t working today, and so it’s important to try alternative methods.

Reid walks you through different scenarios and stories which touch on all of the tactics listed above. While going through these scenarios and stories, you can relate and put yourself into the shoes of the managers and employees he describes.

Stealing the Corner Office is a great learning tool and guide to understanding the principles of advancing your career.

Takeaways from Stealing the Corner Office

With every book you read, it is a must to have takeaways and actionable items to implement in life.

The main takeaway from Stealing the Corner Office is how advancing in today’s corporate world is possible by working smarter, and not necessarily harder.

Trying to solve big problems, and falling in line will result in bigger and better responsibilities and promotions.

A secondary takeaway is how important it is to have a positive attitude, and look to be unique in your interactions and work. If you don’t try to stick out, someone else will pass you up for the next level role.

Our Recommendation for Stealing the Corner Office

Corporate and career success will not happen over night, but over time you can improve your situation and reach your goals. By staying consistent with your learning and reading, you will be able to achieve success.

You are in control of your destiny. You can cultivate a winning mindset which will lead to achievement and getting what you want.

If you are struggling to advance your career in Corporate America, I’d recommend you pick up a copy of Stealing the Corner Office.

Stealing the Corner Office will help correct your actions which are holding you back and get you on the path to management. I truly believe the strategies in Stealing the Corner Office will help you get to the next level.

Readers: are you looking to advance your career at work? Are you a natural leader or follower? Do you get frustrated by incompetent managers?

Why do some messages persuade and other don’t persuade? What makes sales and advertising organizations successful? When are the principles of persuasion and influence most successful, and when do these principles not work?

Pre-suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade, by Dr. Robert Cialdini, is an incredible book about how you can create situations which will increase the chances of persuading your audience.

In Dr. Cialdini’s Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, we learned about the 6 key principles of persuasion, and how to salespeople use these tactics to try to get you to buy their product or service.

In contrast to Influence, Pre-suasion looks to discuss the scenarios and situations where the odds of persuasion can increase.

Pre-suasion looks to answer the question, “What can someone who wants to persuade do before they start to present their message, product, argument, etc.”, whereas Influence talks about ways to connect during a discussion or sales pitch.

When making a decision, who we are can affected by where we are emotionally, physically, etc.

Through extensive research, Dr. Cialdini has found a number of factors which can be used to sway an audience to become more receptive to your ideas and goals.

For anyone interested in psychology, sales and marketing, and leadership, Pre-suasion is a fantastic book to read.

The rest of this post includes a summary of Pre-suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade, takeaways from Pre-suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade, and a reading recommendation for you.

Book Summary of Pre-suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade

For many years, social psychologists focused on what strategies could be employed to persuade in the moment.

In Dr. Cialdini’s other book, Influence, he lays out the 6 principles of persuasion in detail:

1. reciprocity
2. scarcity
3. liking
4. authority
5. social proof
6. commitment/consistency

While these are very important and beneficial to understand, what else can affect a message and interaction? How can we improve the odds of our message being received in a positive light?

Are there any other things to consider in addition to these principles of persuasion?

In Pre-suasion, Dr. Cialdini looks to answer the question, “what can communicators do before they speak to get their message accepted?”

Through research and investigation, Dr. Cialdini shares with us his discoveries and a number of tips to apply in life when trying to persuade others.

The Importance of Attention in Pre-suasion and Influence

When looking to communicate, the first thing that should be considered is framing your argument and the attention of your audience on a specific perspective.

If something is readily able to be thought of, then it will be easier later on for those thoughts to come out.

One example in the book talks about how in the 2000s, the media focused more on the troops and army who were fighting in the Iraq War vs. the strategy and politics surrounding the war.

Because of the elevated attention and focus on how great the troops were and everything they were doing, there was less focus on some of the shortcomings of the campaign.

In terms of public perception of the war, since the media wasn’t producing as much content on these shortcomings, the public thought the war efforts were worthy of support.

Along these same lines, if you can connect with your audience and help them imagine and feel the benefits (or consequences) of a certain situation, you can get buy in.

This has happened many times with false accusations during investigative interviews.

Over time, the interviewers will slowly guide the interviewee into constructing a story of being guilty of the crime.

By making assertions like, “do you recall doing X to the victim?” and then if the interviewee answers, “well I don’t remember, but I can imagine doing this”, following up with “Yes, well you can imagine, maybe you did end up doing this act”, this can be very potent in getting a confession of guilt.

How to Gain and Hold Attention

Now that we have established the importance, how can you gain and hold attraction when communicating?

First, there are a few things which will always gain a person’s attention:

• sex,
• violence,
• and the unique

However, these things need to be aligned with both what your audience’s needs are, and what your message is.

For example, it wouldn’t make sense to show a violent clip and then ask for someone to buy diapers. This is not congruent and definitely would not be a way to persuade someone to want to buy diapers.

Instead, there are certain types of information which will hold an audience’s attention:

• the mysterious,
• the unfinished,
• and the self-relevant

Cliffhangers work because humans will naturally be curious and want to know more. If you are given everything in one go, then you won’t want more.

By employing these thoughts, you can gain the attention of your audience, keep it, and then work to deliver your message using techniques described in the next sections.

The Effect of Association on Pre-suasion and Influence

When looking to persuade and influence, association is incredibly powerful. Both language and imagery can be used to affect our thinking positively, or negatively.

Similar to using affirmations to change your internal thought processes, association is very powerful when used to connect ideas and feelings to guide a conversation.

However, it’s important to note that using the right associations are how you can bring about change.

One of my most favorite examples from the book was how a health care organization does not use any language related to violence.

Instead of using the word “target”, they use the word “goal”. Instead of using the phrase “beat their competition”, they use the phrase “outpace their competition”.

Since they are a health care company that looks to help others, violence should not be a thought on any employee’s mind.

In addition to language, geography and someone’s physical location can affect their thinking.

If you are trying to work on a project which requires a lot of creativity, being in a room which is very boring could be a negative.

Likewise, if you are trying to do something problem solving intensive, then it might not be optimal to be distracted with many colors and noises.

Using Pre-suasion to the Fullest

As I mentioned in an earlier paragraph, pre-suasion is all about how to connect with your audience before going into presentation.

Once you have drawn attention to the appropriate pieces of information, and used association to further guide your audience, then Dr. Cialdini says you should then use the six principles of persuasion to further guide your audience.

Again, these six principles of persuasion are as follows:

1. reciprocity
2. scarcity
3. liking
4. authority
5. social proof
6. commitment/consistency

These principles are so powerful that they generate substantial change in a wide range of circumstances.

One last point which is discussed in the book however is the importance of unity.

Embracing unity when looking to persuade involves tapping into the fundamental behavior of human beings.

There are two ways in which unity can be achieved: in being together, and in acting together (and these can happen at the same time).

One example is when dealing with family members vs. strangers – I’m guessing you would rather help your family member because they are “one of us” and of the same bloodline.

You also can see this in fans cheering for their favorite sport teams; total strangers can become best friends for a few hours at a game.

Unity and the want to feel together with others is fundamental to humans, and is another way we influence an outcome.

Depending on the context, suggesting you are on the same team, by experiencing similar experiences, and connecting through a past living situation, birthplace or birthday, can influence and attract others to your message.

Is Pre-suasion Ethical?

Using the strategies of persuasion and influence to gain an advantage in communication can be used for good or bad.

In the context of this book, Dr. Cialdini devotes an entire chapter to discussing the ethics of pre-suasion.

His argument is that pre-suasion should only be used for good, and if used for bad, at least in the area of business, then there will be negative consequences for those bad acting businesses.

Dr. Cialdini hypothesized and proved that through experiments that if a business is unethical, then these businesses will suffer from:

• Poor employee performance
• Employee Turnover
• Employee Fraud

At the end of the day, pre-suasion can be used for good or evil, and we need to be aware of this fact.

As consumers, we need to be aware of these tactics when looking for products and services, and as communicators, we can be aware of some of the strategies we can use to attract others to our message.

Takeaways from Pre-suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade

With every book you read, it is a must to have takeaways and actionable items to implement in life.

The main takeaway from Pre-suasion is how you can change the frame and narrative of a situation by using different language or imagery.

By changing the way you approach a situation with certain statements, actions and questions, you can guide a situation towards a result you want.

Funnily enough, I experienced pre-suasion first hand the other week at the bar.

I was talking with a girl about finances, how she is a Dave Ramsey enthusiast, and how she was paying off debt.

One area of personal finance, which is more on the travel and lifestyle side of things, is credit card hacking. With credit card hacking, you look to hit a certain level of spending ($2,000 in the first 3 months for example), and after hitting this “minimum spend”, you will get cash back or airline miles.

At the bar, there was a “minimum spend” for using your card to pay.

When she said she needed to get another drink to meet the “minimum spend”, I got excited because I thought she was talking about credit card hacking!

Instead, she told me she uses a debit card and she just needed to get to a $10 purchase to use her card.

What a face palm moment for me, ha!

This situation proved and showed to me it’s entirely possible to be susceptible to prior discussion when thinking and making decisions in the future!

My takeaway is pre-suasion is not only possible, but very potent.

Pre-suasion should be used for good. By reading this book, I now know some more ways to get buy in from others.

Our Recommendation for Pre-suasion

Pre-suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade will help you gain a better understanding of the human mind and human behavior.

If you are in sales, deal with clients on a regular basis, or are involved in presentations towards people you need to get approval from, Pre-suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade is a must read!

Even as a consumer, or as someone interested in psychology, Influence is a fantastic book. Influence will open your eyes to some of the tricks and techniques of big corporations and sales companies.

By reading Pre-suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade, you will learn how to set yourself and your message up for greater reception, and discover ways to align your audience the right way before you start your pitch.

After reading, you’ll learn how to become a skilled pre-suader, and know how to gain attention in the right way.

In my pursuit to improve my thought process when encountering new situations, I decided reading Think Like a Freak, by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, would be beneficial. What I’m finding, as I read more, the same concepts come up over and over. Think Like a Freak has many of the same concepts and stories I encountered when reading Decisive (book review) and Originals (book review).

For example, in Think Like a Freak, they discuss the story of Zappos, a shoe company, where during the training program for new employees, they offer everyone the chance to leave the program for $2,000 cash. If a person wants to leave, they will get $2,000. If not, they will continue to be trained in and be an employee of the company. Zappos offers this chance to take the money and leave because they want to weed out anyone who is looking to make a quick buck. By weeding out potentially bad employees, they save money in the long run. This story was also shared in Decisive as a way for a company to “ooch”.

Takeaways from Think Like a Freak

While there is some overlap with other books, there was some new information that I took away from Think Like a Freak about how to improve my critical thinking. One of the major keys to critical thinking is allowing yourself to say “I don’t know” and then searching for the answer.

I’ve started to apply this in my day job, and I believe it makes a person look better when asked a difficult question. Obviously, you don’t want to say “I don’t know” to every question. When you say, “oh, I didn’t consider that”, or “okay, I was overlooking that point and will go and search for the answer”, your manager will be much more receptive and open to any shortcomings. If you try and fib and beat around the bush, your manager may not appreciate that.

Never Stop Experimenting

Another key takeaway I have from Think Like a Freak is the need to experiment and try new things to gain experience. I’m at a very interesting point in my life. Currently, I’m in a great financial situation for my age group. I’m trying to build on that, but in the mean time, experiences are extremely important as well.

One thing I want to keep working on in the coming months is striking up conversations with strangers and trying to connect with them as fast as possible. I will try to take them out of their normal daily routine and try to inject life into their lives through my easy going-ness and ability to make people feel comfortable.

Remarkable Quotes and Passages from Think Like a Freak

Some other notes, quotes, and takeaways from Think Like a Freak:

• First and foremost, always try to be aware of your knowledge and what limitations you have. It is perfectly acceptable to say “I don’t know.”
  • We really don’t know ourselves all too well. We make false assumptions about our abilities and we fail to acknowledge what we don’t know.
  • “Making grandiose assumptions about your abilities and failing to acknowledge what you don’t know can lead unsurprisingly, to disaster.
• When solving problems, it might be best to put away our moral compass.
• The key to learning is feedback. Use experiments to get feedback.
  • “Knowledge is not mastery. Execution is mastery.” – Tony Robbins
• Ask the right questions to get a full view of the problem. It is important to not just focus on your own issues.
  • Redefine the problem. Ask a question like: how can we simplify this?
  • Seek to view problems from a new angle. Try to figure out how the world works.
• “It is the brain, not the heart or lungs, that is the critical organ.” – Roger Bannister
  • Artificial barriers are made-up. Ignore them and break through them.
• Have fun, think small, don’t fear the obvious.
  • Find the root cause of the problem. By finding the root cause, we can understand the problem at the lowest level and build from there.
    • Think small, think detailed. By examining the smaller issues, we can start to understand the big issues.
  • As long as you can tell the difference between a good idea and a bad one, generating a boatload of ideas, even outlandish ones, can only be a good thing.
  • Don’t be afraid to ask about the “obvious”.
• Understanding incentives of all players in a given scenario is a fundamental step in solving any problem.
  • Figure out what really matters to other people, not what they say they care about.
    • Don’t listen to what people say they want; watch what they do.
  • Try to shift the frame and mindset of the other person from adversarial to cooperative.
  • Never ever think that people will do something just because it is the “right” thing to do.
• Our behavior is enormously influenced by our environment, mindset, and circumstances.
• If you want your argument to be truly persuasive, it’s a good idea to acknowledge not only the known flaws, but the potential for unintended consequences.
  • Consider the other side’s argument to gain credibility.
  • Tell a story; stories capture our attention and therefore are good for teaching.
• “Let go of conventional wisdoms that torment us. Let go of the artificial limits that hold us back – and the fear of admitting what we don’t know.”
• Our resources are not infinite; you cannot solve tomorrow’s problems if you aren’t willing to abandon today’s dud.

“Let go of conventional wisdoms that torment us. Let go of the artificial limits that hold us back – and the fear of admitting what we don’t know.”

Our Recommendation for Think Like a Freak

Overall, I would give Think Like a Freak 3/5 stars. My major takeaways from this books are that it is okay to say “I don’t know”, to try different things and experiment, and the fact people are driven by various incentives.  Think Like a Freak is a quick read with some interesting stories and good thinking points.

If you are looking for a book on how to change your thinking, I would recommend Decisive (book review) and Originals (book review). Both of these books are more comprehensive and will help you change your thinking, decision making, and outlook on various situations.

Have you read any of the books by Levitt and Dubner, such as Freakonomics or Super Freakonomics? What do you think of books like these? Do you try to improve your decision making process?

Many elite competitors believe success in their sport is 90% mental. Having a strong mental game is equally as important as being technically strong (if not more).

How can we work on our mental abilities for success?

In With Winning in Mind, Lanny Bassham, Olympic Gold Medalist in Rifle Shooting, provide us a framework for improve our mental strength.

Early in his career, Lanny Bassham realized all the practice in the world wouldn’t matter if he didn’t have the right mental management system in place during competitions.

Once he started focusing on his mental game, he won multiple gold medals and proved his strategy of mental strength worked.

Over the years, Bassham has trained multiple athletes and professionals. Through his methods, he has produced many winners. I was interested in With Winning in Mind because I’m consistently looking for an edge in life, and also want to develop a strong mental game to complement my other skills.

In this post, I’ll share with you a book summary of With Winning in Mind, some takeaways from With Winning in Mind, and my book recommendation for you.

Mental management is the process of improving the probability of having a consistent mental performance, under pressure, on demand.

Book Summary of With Winning in Mind

In With Winning in Mind, Lanny Bassham starts by describing the three parts crucial for mental performance.

The three parts critical for a successful mental game are the following:

• Conscious Mind
  • The Conscious Mind is what you use when you visualize or think during a competition.
• Subconscious Mind
  • The Subconscious Mind is utilized when you become proficient, the concept of “not having to think about a task”.
• Self-Image
  •  A person’s Self-Image is how you think about yourself. If you believe in yourself, you have a positive Self-Image and are able to succeed at a high level.

By working on these three areas, you will be able to become stronger mentally and perform better.

Lanny Bassham’s Mental Management System

Over the years, Bassham reformed his methodologies and strategies and has came up with a system, The Mental Management System.

The Mental Management System looks to grow each of the 3 parts of Mental Performance.

When the Conscious Mind, the Subconscious Mind, and the Self-Image are in balance, you will have your best performances. If any one of those are out of balance, your performance will suffer.

In With Winning in Mind, Bassham gives you concrete steps to get you to the next level of mental performance.

The Nine Principles of Mental Management

With the framework of the Conscious Mind, Subconscious Mind, and the Self-Image in place, Bassham talks about the Nine Principles of Mental Management:

1. Your Conscious Mind can only concentrate on one thing at a time.
2. What you say is not important. What you cause yourself or others to picture is crucial.
3. The Subconscious Mind is the source of all mental power.
4. The Self-Image moves you to do what the Conscious Mind is picturing.
5. Self-Image and performance are always equal.
   • To change your performance, you must first change your Self-Image.
6. You can replace the Self-Image you have with the Self-Image you want, thereby permanently changing performance.
7. The Principle of Reinforcement: The more we think about, talk about and write about something happening, we improve the probability of that thing happening.
8. The Self-Image cannot tell the difference between what actually happens and what is vividly imagined.
9. The Principle of Value: We appreciate things in direct proportion to the price we pay for them.

The most important principle is #5: your Self-Image and performance are always equal.

If you don’t believe you can do a task, then you won’t be able to do it. If you have a positive Self-Image and know it is “like you” to be able to do something, then you will do it with ease.

Tap into the Power of Affirmations

Many people lack in the Self-Image component of the three mental components.

With this said, it’s possible to grow your Self-Image. Through affirmations and visualization, you can grow your Self-Image. You can improve your situation and replace your current Self-Image with the one you want.

If you want to become a world class athlete, tell yourself you are one. Tell yourself you can lift heavy weights, run fast, and are agile.

It is important to reinforce the positives vs. focusing on the negatives. If you focus on the errors, you reinforce that it is “like you” to make errors.

Focusing on the positives and saying, “It’s like me to be successful and it’s like me to be able to do it”, you can accomplish whatever you put your mind to.

Mental management comes down to focusing on the task at hand consciously, having and trusting your ability to perform the task subconsciously, and knowing it is “like you” to do the task.

By having a balance between your conscious and subconscious minds, and your self-image, you can succeed in anything you do.

Takeaways from With Winning in Mind

With every book you read, it is a must to have takeaways and actionable items to implement in life.

The main takeaway from With Winning in Mind for me is the power of affirmations and the importance of a strong Self-Image.

If you don’t believe in yourself, then you won’t reach your goals. If you believe in yourself, you can accomplish anything you want in life.

Another takeaway is the power of visualization. The brain cannot tell the difference between what is occurring in reality and what is occurring in your imagination.

If you visualize yourself acing an interview, crushing the competition, or negotiating a raise, you can trick your brain into actually believing you did these things successfully.

Having a strong mental game is as important as having any other skill. It’s important to work on your mental abilities and tap into your full potential.

Our Recommendation for With Winning in Mind

With Winning in Mind is a must read for you if you want to improve your mental game.

You will be presented a strategy for mental performance which is concrete and attainable. With Winning in Mind is not your typical self-help book, and will help you complement your existing self improvement practices.

If you are struggling with the mental side of competition and are looking to improve your current mental game, I’d highly recommend picking up With Winning in Mind.

Do you ever struggle in competitions with your mental game? What do you do to re-focus? What are some of your goals for this year?