Episode #76 – Chapter 2: Finding Treasure in the Abyss

 

Are you ready for Chapter 2 of “Building Indestructible Wealth: The Six-Figure Earners Guide to a Multimillion Portfolio? In “Finding Treasure in the Abyss,” I share the less pretty parts of my personal and professional journey to wealth. Mistakes are made. What I learned from those mistakes is what I want to share with you in this episode and how you can use those lessons to protect, grow and multiply what YOU value.

Are you interested in snagging your pre-release copy of the book AND being one of the first readers? Tune in to find out how. Do you have a question you would like me to answer on the podcast? Follow me on IG: @indestructiblewealth and send a message, or visit me at www.MyIndestructibleWealth.com for more resources.

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Listen to the podcast here

 

Chapter 2: Finding Treasure In The Abyss

I hope you enjoyed chapter one, the sneak preview of my new book, Building Indestructible Wealth. Here’s chapter two. This is the last chapter I’m giving away. You have to buy the book. It’s going to be very affordable for your budget versus the value that it’s going to offer you. The value is $10,000, $20,000, or $50,000. It’s not biased at all, but remember that you can get a free digital copy of the book. You will also get a free audio version of me reading it.

All you have to do is go to Apple Podcasts, give a five-star rating and review, take a screenshot, and email it over to Jack@MyIndestructibleWealth, send it on Instagram, text it, or hand it to me. I don’t care. Show me that you did it, and I’ll be sending you right over as soon as it’s ready, which is going to be any day, the final copy for you to be one of the very first readers. Please help me, and I’ll help you. Here you go, chapter two of Building Indestructible Wealth: The Six-Figure Earners Guide to a Multi-Million Dollar Portfolio. Thanks so much for reading. I appreciate you.

Chapter two, finding treasure in the abyss. Is this book for you? The method I’m about to share is the product of a very dark moment in my life, which is also when I learned an important lesson. In September 2000, in less than five months, I lost $25,000 of the $50,000 I hustled to save. Every day, I looked in the markets and watched my money evaporate.

I graduated with a degree in Marketing from Hillsdale College, a small liberal arts school located in rural Southern Michigan. I had, for the most part, studied hard, at least up until my senior year. I had to because Hillsdale being so small was probably the only college on the planet that had professors meet with parents each semester. My parents met with all of my professors every time.

In this time before Facebook and Google, my parents were somehow still able to track my every move. Hillsdale also had very strict dorm rules. Male students such as myself were allowed to have visits from girls on two set days in time blocks. What was I thinking when I applied? Lord only knows. In addition to that workload, I began working as a distributor for a direct sales company at the tail end of my freshman year.

My work habits were strong. Despite a rocky start, I caught some momentum and started producing some decent cashflow. By the time I graduated, I had saved up the $50,000 I mentioned at the beginning of this story. I had visions of turning that into millions by the time I was 30. In the late ’90s, tech stocks were cranking and rising by 40% multiple years in a row. I was afflicted with a severe case of FOMO, which is the fear of missing out. My cash was sitting in the bank and making squat.

I met with a financial advisor whose office was next to my apartment. He pitched me and told me that stocks go up over the long term. I entrusted him with my hard-earned cash. I had no idea what I was investing in. He told me I could afford to be aggressive because I was young. With that one quick decision, I had knowingly opened a vein into the veritable shark tank. I could chalk it up to bad timing. Certainly, there could be an argument for that.

Anyone who did the same thing I did after 2008 would have had a very positive outcome. Nevertheless, I made three major mistakes. Number one, I had no idea what I was buying and therefore, what the value was. Number two, I was betting that past performance indicates future outcomes. Number three, I hyper-focused my principal capital on risky assets. This typically only ends one way. That way was not at all what I wanted. Being a poor investor, I sold when the stocks crashed.

You can tell a poor investor from an average or a great investor by what they do when their investments drop in value. A poor investor, not knowing what they have bought or the value of it, panic sells. An average investor holds on. A great investor, knowing the long-term value of their asset, buys more because they understand the value of what they bought in the first place. Now, it’s on sale, meaning they can buy more at a cheaper price, thereby lowering their average cost.

 

I wouldn’t be surprised if Amazon were in that basket of tech stocks. That would be additional punishment. I’m glad I can never find out. Despite this early setback, this is a comeback story. I want to share it with you. By applying the strategies and thinking processes I’m going to teach you in this book, I’ve more than recovered. I have 21 streams of income with multiple millions in net worth.

I want to teach you everything I know. I can’t do that necessarily in this book but we can make a nice head start. This book is written for those that want to financially retire young. Note that I didn’t say retired from work. I said, “Financially retired.” There’s a huge difference. I can’t see how a human can be happy, fulfilled, and living a life of meaning doing nothing but living for themselves day in and day out.

For me, however, success comes from what I get and fulfillment comes from what I give. I could retire but if I retired from work, I would struggle to find fulfillment and meaning. To live for yourself for a short period of time because you’re burned out trying to figure out your next move, or you have personal issues to deal with is an entirely different story.

I took several months off, much needed, and just played. I went on bike rides and played catch every day with my two sons. I took them on fishing charters. I watched a ton of Netflix with my wife. All she does is fall asleep early. I went golfing every day. I found an incredible high-stakes poker game that gave me an outlet for competition and a bit of trash talk. It was much needed and calmed my spirit down so I could figure out my next move.

During that time of deep introspection, I came to the realization that I’d been living a life chasing success. In the book, The Second Mountain, the author pointed out that we spend multiple years climbing the first mountain or the success mountain. Eventually, we get knocked off, swept off, or plucked off and moved to the second mountain, which is going after purpose and meaning.

This was a change I badly needed. During those several quiet months, I traced back and searched for the most fulfilling moments of my life. I discovered there was only one common denominator. My best and most fulfilling moments in my adult life were spent mentoring young men and women. I recommend uncovering the same thing for yourself. What truly fulfills you?

It may take you a long time as it did for me. I’m 44. There’s no rush, but if you don’t start asking the question, you will never discover the answer. Great achievers separate themselves from others because they constantly ask better questions. Better questions lead to better answers. Once I knew I wanted to help develop the next generation of wealth creators, the big task was to figure out how to do it.

I have a ton of life experiences and success and failure in multiple arenas. Along the way, I’ve learned that it’s nearly impossible to gain any traction, at least initially, without focusing on one thing. During this time, a teacher of mine said, “You’re in the best position to help the person you used to be.” Who did I use to be? If I could go back in time and teach my younger self the solution to a problem I had been, what would it be?

Without any doubt, I enjoyed all aspects of money, yet I struggled with it. I wanted to build wealth so badly. I wanted a future of adventure and experiences with my family. If I’m being honest, there was some ego involved too. I wanted to win and prove that I was successful. Here are the building blocks of financial success. There are four parts to achieving financial success. Make money, protect it, grow it, and multiply it.

I was always pretty decent with the make-it part. You must be too, or you wouldn’t pick up a six-figure earner book. I have had a lot of problems with the keep-it and grow-it parts, however. I suspect you may fall into the same boat. You’ve figured out a way to make good money but there are still so many challenges stacked against you, hidden forces that want to separate you from your hard-earned cash, and forces that you aren’t even aware of or were too naive like me to believe that are out there.

I’m going to teach you how to stack the odds in your favor. If you do two things right even as an average investor, you will over the course of a long lifetime see some incredible net worth. Number one, live on much less than you earn. Number two, invest the difference into things you understand. Those two things done consistently over time will create magic. You can make multiple mistakes like me and still create a multimillion-dollar portfolio.

Live on much less than you earn and invest the difference into things. Click To Tweet

If you can create a strategy or even better, implement a proven strategy like the one I’m going to give you, you will be utterly unstoppable. You will create indestructible wealth. Here we meet our first important lesson. All investments are a result of how they were designed, whether that design took place on purpose, by accident, or through reaction and lack of guidance. The returns you receive from your investments are based on the assets you purchased.

This is by design. The up and down cycles are a product of what you designed into your portfolio. The results you get, the amount of stress the investment causes, and how you will be able to do it are all symptoms of the system you create. Your investments don’t care if you design them on purpose or by accident. They can only provide you with the fruits of your design and what you created.

Early on, I made a mistake that many investors make relying on a financial salesman and extremely risky assets to build my wealth. I bought whatever I was told to buy without any semblance of a strategy or any idea of what I was buying. Note, there is a time to take on risk and swing for the fences. That time is not with your first $50,000. From the outside looking in, I was living the charmed life of an entrepreneur.

I was generating a strong six-figure income for various private businesses, which put me in the top 1% of earners in the world. I had the dream house, luxurious vacations, an amazing wife, two boys to share daily sarcasm, and good friends. What I didn’t have was peace. I lacked the peace of mind that comes from knowing your financial future is secure and protected and having a strategy that wasn’t reliant on the whims of the market.

I knew that if anything were to happen to my business income, my family would be forced to quickly and massively downgrade our lifestyle. I did the only thing that I knew at the time. I hustled harder. I became addicted to the hustle and the struggle. The long 12 to 15-hour days became normal. The stress became normal. Waking up tired and loading up on stimulants became normal. Like all addicts, it took hitting rock bottom before I became wiser.

I’ll spare you the details but know this. The path of hustle and grinding has no happy ending. There’s only pain, sickness, depression, and relationships pushed to the brink of failure, waiting for the hustle-harder crowd to come home. I was fortunate to find great mentors who taught me how to develop a wealth-building strategy, which evolved into the Indestructible Wealth method before I gave up on the idea of systematically and intentionally building my financial future.

I was able to wise up before my kids grew up with a workaholic father. I was able to create a plan to build a financial wall around my family. I was able to reduce my stress levels, take control of my results, and return to peak physical health all due to the strategy outlined in this book. There were three specific improvements I made by implementing the strategy in this book.

Number one is reliable investments. My investments became more predictable and reliable and required less guesswork. I can tell you how much income will flow into my accounts each month from a multimillion-dollar portfolio with many diverse assets. Can you do that in your portfolio? I cannot predict the values of those assets but each time income flows in, my risk continually lowers.

For example, if I purchase a property for $100,000 and I receive $10,000 in rental income, my cost of ownership dropped to $90,000. If the market drops 10%, I’m still even. The same concept can be applied to stocks and crypto. Number two is safer speculation. As a result of the income predictability, I can take that income and speculate with it to swing for the fences.

I can buy asymmetric investments, which are assets where your downside is the cap but your upside potential is enormously higher than what you can lose. Early-stage venture capital investing can create huge jumps in wealth if they work out. If they don’t, your income replenishes, and you take another swing again and again. Most of us want to do this type of investing because it’s exciting but it’s super risky if you do it with your principal capital.

Number three is cashflowing assets. One of the most powerful things you can do in your wealth-building plan now is to buy assets that allow you to enjoy the fruits of their production now, not in 40 years when you’re old and potentially not in good health. Buying cashflow-producing assets allowed me to buy a $10,000 ticket to the World Series of Poker, a dream that started in my college dorm room playing for quarters.

One of the most powerful things you can do in your wealth-building plan now is to buy assets that allow you to enjoy the fruits of their production today. Click To Tweet

It allowed me to buy a $4,500 ticket to watch the Cleveland Indians take on the Chicago Cubs in a historic World Series battle. Cashflowing assets provided funding for my $15,000 two-night 40th birthday party complete with live bands, an open barn, and an amazing spread of food for my friends and family. The best part is the income replenished within the month that I was left with amazing memories, experiences, and no guilt.

Once you finish this book and put it into action, you will steadily gain more control over your most precious resource, your time. The ultimate goal of the Indestructible Wealth method is for you to wake up in the morning and have 100% control over three things, what you want to do, when you want to do it, and who you want to do it with. The ultimate lifestyle is complete freedom of choice.

Above all else, it’s my sincere hope that by taking the time to read this short book, you will see a path forward to not only more financial freedom but also more peace. What’s the point of being wealthy if you can’t enjoy it now with the ones you love and the way you want? This book is specifically designed for six-figure earners or those of you who have accumulated at least six figures in investible dollars. If you’re not there yet, feel free to read on to get a vision for your future, and also keep in mind that my next book is already in production to take the beginning investor to where you want to be.

Whether you’re an employee or an entrepreneur, or you happen to hit the lotto with an inheritance, you will be able to take action on most or all of these ideas now instead of waiting a decade or even several years to be in that position. If this isn’t for you, I’ve created other assets for those getting started in their financial journey. Plug into my episode number one to get started.

 

Important Links

• Building Indestructible Wealth
• Apple Podcasts – Indestructible Wealth
• Jack@MyIndestructibleWealth
• Instagram – Indestructible Wealth
• The Second Mountain
• Episode number one – Previous episode