The Build Your Own Brand Retreat was such as lively and thought-provoking experience that I had to share. It was so good that I made it into 2 parts. This is the second part of the article. If you haven’t read Part I, check it out here.
Scared Money, Don’t Make Money
In the “How to Create Systems” panel, the speakers discussed the mistake people make when they don’t want to invest in themselves. Instead of making an investment to grow, they strive to do everything themselves in order to save a dollar. In fear of spending any money, they take an exorbitant amount of time to do everything themselves. An example is spending years to learn a skill when there are courses and coaches available to help you accelerate your growth.
While it may save a dollar here and there, you must recognize and accept that it may take longer than necessary to accomplish your goal. You must be willing to invest in yourself and feel confident that there will be a return on your investment.
Scared money don’t make money.
So, if you are scared to invest your money, it will be scared of you. Drop that energy and prioritize investing in programs to learn a skill or integrate systems to accelerate growth. While there is no guarantee for investments, what is true is what you put in, you will get out. You choose.
How This Applies to Wealth: Take the time to invest in educating yourself about wealth creation activities. There are several low-cost investments you can make with books, YouTube, online courses, or in-person events. There are also opportunities for in-person or virtual coaching. Stop being scared to spend money on the investments that will have the greatest return.
Make Gratefulness a Habit
Another powerful tip that Dia Simms noted during her discussion with Andrew was how she has trained her mind to start the day with gratefulness. With all the distractions going on in the world, it’s easy to be consumed by the multiple to-do lists, the traffic, and the next endeavor, but before all of that, how about pausing to reflect on the things and experiences that you do have.
While you are still striving to get to the next level, it’s important to pay respect and gratitude for where you are now because someone wishes they were in your position. Someone is praying for the opportunity and ability to read this article now. You have the opportunity, so give thanks and be grateful.
How This Applies to Wealth: No matter where you are on your financial journey, you should give thanks.
Give thanks for the bills because that means you experience a benefit. Don’t believe me?
The electric bill means you have lights and AC. The water bill means you have water to bathe and cook. Student loan bills mean you had an opportunity to further your education. Car note means you have transportation to get you to and from where you want to go. Should I go on?
Give thanks for all of it.
Gratefulness is the foundation of abundance. You must learn to appreciate what you have before you can receive more.
Because what you appreciate, appreciates.
The Mirror Effect is Real
Have you considered the reason that what you want is not showing up in your life, is because of you?
Could it be that your environment is reflecting who you really are? Pause. Say what now?
That’s what Gamal Coder, E-Commerce business coach, discuss what he called the Mirror Effect. Maybe the things we want aren’t showing up in our lives because that is not what we are putting out into the world. You get what you give.
It’s a hard pill to swallow because most people do not want to accept accountability for their lives. It’s just easier to blame an external circumstance or someone else for our status in life.
Similar to Gamal’s statement, Auntie Oprah echoes that
“You are responsible for your own life.”
Once we recognize and acknowledge that we are where we are because of how we showed up in this world, the faster we also recognize that we have the power to change it.
How This Applies to Wealth: You must take accountability for where you are in life at this moment. You must accept the good and the areas that require improvement. This means that you must acknowledge and accept your current financial situation and determine what thoughts and behaviors lead you to this moment. Acknowledge the decisions that have been made to date.
Once you acknowledge what has led you here, decide what behaviors and characteristics are required to get you where you want to be. Focus on those things and watch your environment change.
Collaboration Over Competition Wins
The entire weekend fostered collaboration between creatives within various industries amongst newbies and experienced professionals alike. It was all about collaboration over competition. We all can win and we can get there faster if we work together. This was a major key that I took away from the conference. There is more than enough to go around so you don’t need to hoard information to get ahead.
Collaborate with people who are in a similar position. Create your team from where you are. Don’t feel like you only need to work with someone that is more far ahead than you, look to your left and right. Find out how you can help each other.
How This Applies to Wealth: Collaboration over competition also wins with wealth building as well. In school, we learn to compete against our peers for the best GPA. We learn to take the test alone without leveraging the skills of those around us. However, that isn’t an effective strategy to create long-lasting wealth.
To create sustaining wealth there must be collaboration through partnerships and group economics. Partnerships allow you to leverage the skills and talents of others to accelerate growth, generate more ideas through a mastermind and reduces risk exposure for a solo entrepreneur. With more capital and more brainpower, you can assume greater investments.
In addition to partnerships, you can use collaboration for group economics – the intentional decision to buy and sell within a community to sustain and secure themselves.
To make this a reality you must eliminate the scarcity mindset and focus on abundance because WE ALL CAN WIN.
Final Thoughts:
As you can see from the article, the key takeaways that were for budding entrepreneurs can apply to you as well, regardless of what industry to you are pursuing. It all aligns to wealth. Take the lessons learned from this conference and apply them to your wealth-building journey.
While I have translated these lessons into wealth building principles because that is the focus on this blog, this can easily be done for other areas of your life such as building confidence, career-changing, and finding your purpose.
Take the lessons you learn from daily challenges, meetups, and conferences and apply them in multiple scenarios. Look past the surface statement and determine how the message can be used for various situations you may encounter.