Why do I make a big deal about taxes? Let me tell you something I'll bet you've never thought about.

There are only three types of people in this country.

Poor people, the people in the middle, and the wealthy folks.

How many of you think taxes are going to go up? Me too!

When that happens, how many of you think they're going to raise taxes on the poor people? Nope! Hint, they don't have any money!

How many of you think they're going to raise taxes on the wealthy people? Really??

Guess who's left to pay the tax bill? Right smack in the middle where the most people are sitting.

You've got only two ways to avoid being in the cross hairs of the IRS. Move either up or down. Your choice.

Choose Up!

I hope you said yes! If you did it means you still have hope. If you said no, you are basically saying it's just luck.

If you believe that, you are done. Game Over!

If you don't know the process to getting wealthy, it's not your fault. Unfortunately they don't teach this in school.

Unless you had me as your Professor, you probably didn't get much training on how to get rich.

Most of school is designed to teach you how to get a job and be an employee.

Now it doesn't mean you can't get rich as an employee, but they certainly didn't teach you how to do it. I will.

Do you think there is a process to surfing, or does it just come naturally?

Imagine you are at the beach watching the surfers glide through the water on a beautiful sunny day. You decide that you'd like to surf.
Now, do you suppose there is something between "I think I'd like to..." and doing that?

That something is Knowledge!

I'll bet one of your first steps would be to find someone who knows how to surf, and would be willing to teach you. Or, at least wrote a book or did a video that could teach you.

Imagine after they teach you the process of surfing, you are out in the ocean sitting on your board, bobbing, and waiting. Possibly looking for sharks too! (I just saw Shark Week on the Discovery Channel)

What are you waiting for? Waves. Probably "the Big One."

How many of you feel this is pretty similar to real life? Just sort of been sitting, bobbing, and waiting for your finances and career to take off.

So once you've paddled out and started waiting for the wave, what does the process of surfing look like?

This is pretty much how all of life works.

Identify what you want. Understand there is a process to follow.

Learn from someone who's done it. Have guts enough to take action.

Start preparing before the wave gets there!

Think about all of your major accomplishments.

They all followed the same basic process. Right?

Here is an example of some of mine.

Now make your own list...

Part of the process for each accomplishment was also that you found someone who
already knew how to do what you were trying to do.

Right?

You found a teacher/mentor/coach/books/courses etc. to lead you down the correct path.

Really think about this...

Would you agree that learning to make more money is a good thing?

Is it fair to say that it's never a mistake to learn to make more money?

Will this ever change?

Regardless of how long you think about it, learning more about money and success will be a good thing. Right?

Isn't that a great book? It's the Gold Standard.

It's like the Bible of Success.

It was written in the 1930's, so it's been around.

For those who haven't read the book, Napoleon Hill wanted to study the wealthiest man in the world, Andrew Carnegie and 500 of his richest friends.

Now it would probably be someone like Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Elon Musk, or Jeff Bezos. How would you like to sit down and pick their brain for a few days?

Hill wanted to study wealthy people with one thought in mind,

"Do wealthy people have similar characteristics?"

Hill spent his entire life studying this question, and when he finished his study, he came to two unique discoveries.

This is a big deal. It means that they were not smarter than me or you.

They weren't lucky!

They weren't all born rich and successful.

It means the rest of us have a chance too!

It means someone like me who grew up poor in Central Wisconsin, with a Dad who was paralyzed with MS, and a Mom who couldn't work because she took care of him 24/7;
neither of my parents graduating high school, but I could figure out how to get a PhD in Finance,
advance to the top of my career, and successfully start a million dollar business!

Let me give you a little taste of his conclusions. Of those sixteen characteristics, five are so important I want to cover them right here:

1. You must have a Burning Desire

Do you think you are going to have obstacles on the way to your goals? Of course!

Your burning desire is what will allow you to fight through the obstacles.

This is what will motivate you to pay the price. Put in the 10,000 hours to become a star.

2. Specialized Knowledge

He found that these people were really, really good at least one thing.

Not everything, but something!

You need to figure out the specialized knowledge that will get you to where you want to go.

Once you find it, you consume it until you get the results you are looking for!

3. Discipline

Are most people supportive of your dream of success?

Most people seem to be trying to hold you back. Don't they?

If you tell your friends that there is a process to becoming wealthy, and you plan on learning the process and become rich, what type of response will you generally receive?

They'll laugh at you! If you don't believe it, try it.

Do you have the discipline to ignore the negative people and keep on driving forward?

4. Are Decisive

Have you made the decision to succeed financially?

Have you made the decision to excel in your career?

Have you made a decision to start a profitable side-hustle?

Successful people are decisive.

They gather information, analyze the information, then they decide on a course of action and stick to it!

How many of you were taught to sleep on it before making a major decision? How much money did they have?

While they were sleeping, someone else is jumping on the opportunity.

Early in my investing career I seemed to always be a little late and missed a lot of good deals. Then I paid $5000 to attend a Millionaire Guru event and he taught me a priceless bit of advice.

Here it is:

Most People: "If I can work out the details, I'll take it."

Successful People: "I'll take it, if I can work out the details!"

The exact same words, but the order reversed. He basically said if it looks promising, jump on it. Take action. You will still have time during the due diligence period to check out the details and back out if necessary.

If you go the other way, by the time you check everything out, another investor grabbed it, and you missed out.

This one tip, changed everything.

It's funny, everyone is afraid of making mistakes.

But, I find that as I look back on the mistakes I've made,

I don't really regret the decision I made that turned out bad. I learned a lot from these mistakes that helped me later.

I find that what I regret is all the times I decided not to do something because I was afraid to pull the trigger.

I always wonder how would that have turned out? Think of the opportunities I let go.

5. Mastermind Team

No one does it on their own.

Remember, most of these wealthy people were really good at only one thing.

They needed others to fill in all the necessary gaps.

Part of the process is to build your team along the way.

One of the biggest changes in my life came when I quit hanging around people with loser mentality and started hanging around those with a winning mentality.

You can always tell the difference when a new idea comes up.

If they start telling you everything that is wrong with it versus everything that's good about it, you know they are of the losing mentality.

It's an easy way to test people to see who qualifies to hang around you.

There is:

The Wealth Formula has Four Parts.

If you understand and implement the four parts

YOU WILL GET RICH!

It works if you do it!

I always get a kick how people who have no results will tell me all the things that will not work!

Every semester I teach a Real Estate Investment class, and some students are very negative and absolutely sure that what I am teaching won't work.

But almost every semester someone applies the knowledge and get great results.

One semester a single student bought 13 separate rental units.

Another semester a student flipped a couple of houses for a $35,000 net profit during the semester.

What's the difference? Successful people actually do what they are taught!!!