et this black circle represent $1,000,000

This is what ten million dollars would look like

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This is what one hundred million dollars would look like

and this is what 1 billion dollars would look like

Jeff Bezos the founder of Amazon has a net worth of 117 times this number

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and then: There's you.

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You're probably working a job right now, one that you obtained with the degree you studied for in university. You probably don't have much in savings; your living expenses seem ridiculously high, and you feel as though you're not paid enough. You have credit card debt that needs taking care of. Maybe you're a student studying for a degree that can land you a job, that you hope it can bring in some good money. You probably don't have any savings, only a pesky student debt hanging above your head. Wealth, getting rich—those seem like distant dreams."How did they do it?" you ask yourself, seeing all those millionaires and billionaires, especially the ones who got there at such a young age. It baffles you, makes you angry; "they got lucky," "they were born into wealth," "they cheated their way to money," "that money doesn't make them happy," "money is evil anyway," "you're not smart enough," "I'm just unlucky."

Questions and thoughts that everyone has had at some point, and the more you think, the more those dreams of buying that mansion, your favorite sports car, paying off your mortgage, and traveling around the world seem further away. And they'll forever remain that way—just dreams. Nothing more, nothing less. You come to the harsh realization. It's a rigged game, it's been a rigged game from the start. And you? You're on the losing side of it. But what if I told you you were wrong? What if there was a way of getting there, an actual equation to wealth; a science behind the way money works? What if you didn't have to abandon those dreams of paying off your parents' mortgage or traveling around the world? Would you call me a liar for saying so? I promise that I'm not, and by the end of this article? Well, you'll understand there's a side to the coin that you're not being shown, but I warn you, the road is tough. It's filled with struggles, ups,and downs. It will require swallowing some difficult truths about the school system and society,as the school system and society haven't told you about it yet. Let me be clear; there are many of you who will not make it to the end of this road. But for those of you who swallow their ego, at the end of this road lies wealth beyond what you thought you could attain. At the end of that road lies the freedom of never having to worry about money again. So, are you with me? If so,let's not waste any more time.

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The Lies You've Been Fed

What do you really think about money? Is this something you work for, or is it earned or inherited? Is it the root cause of all evil? Are you desperate to have more of it? Have you been chasing it most of your life? The truth is, most of what you think about money has been influenced by your upbringing and environment. If you were born into a family that didn't have much money growing up, then you're more inclined to believe that you too will not grow up to have much money. Alternatively, you might have gone to the complete opposite end and decided to make as much money as you can so that you will never be in that position again.The fact that your school didn't teach you much about this subject doesn't help things, and because of this, most of you are going to have false beliefs about money, and that isn't going to help you on this journey. Now, stick with me here because we're gonna have to change the way you've been seeing money your whole life.
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Hollywood has always had a habit of depicting the wealthy and rich as evil, backstabbing,entitled, or corrupt individuals. The question is: Have you been born into that stereotype? A recent report released by Wealth-X showed that of the world's ultra-wealthy, those with a net worth of 30 million or more, 68 percent of them were self-made, and it seems like every other study backs up this conclusion. Warren Buffett, a self-made billionaire. Howard Schultz, born in poverty. Oprah Winfrey, born in poverty. Jeff Bezos, a self-made billionaire. Elon Musk, a self-made billionaire. Sara Blakely, a self-made billionaire. What is it that these people know that you don't?
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The truth is, your equation is all wrong. Here's the 2-dimensional equation that you've been taught: Money = Salary earned from a job. Past a certain point, the prospect of getting a job becomes the sole purpose of your education. So what's wrong with that, you ask? I'm gonna assume that if you're reading this, you want to make money, a lot of it, and in as short a time as possible. If that is your goal, then this equation for generating money will never get you there.We all have a precious resource, the most important resource for all of us, and once it's gone,there's no way of getting it back—that resource is Time. In a standard job, the amount of money you earn is dependent on the amount of time you put into that job. If you earned $20 an hour and worked 40 hours a week, it would take you nearly 24 years to reach a total of 1 million dollars. But that is without subtracting any taxes or expenses that you will incur over 24 years,and let's not forget that inflation would make your 1 million dollars less valuable in reality.Is that on a salary of $20 an hour? You can only really be a millionaire at an old age by living frugally, and most of that precious resource known as time has slipped through your fingers.You traded all that time for money, and it wasn't even a substantial amount either. So again, you ask yourself, "How is it then that there are self-made millionaires and billionaires at such young ages?" "What makes them so different?" The truth is they have a better equation than you; they have a way of understanding money that you haven't quite grasped yet.

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The Truth About Money & Wealth

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Pay very close attention now: Stop chasing money. In a capitalist society, the rules of the game are as follows: You are paid in proportion to the perceived value that you have, and the people who perceive your value are the market, the consumers of the economy. The market includes you, your friends, your family, your neighbors, and your country. People complain that football players are overpaid, but for players to be paid millions, there has to be a market for the football industry in the first place. People have to see the value in football for them to want to spend money on matches and merchandise. If the market shows high demand for football, guess what happens to the players who are at the top of their game? They are paid generously. It's not about how hard you work. A cleaner who sweats and tires himself out every day is paid far less than the accountant sitting behind a desk. Why? Because the market perceives the value of what the cleaner does to be far less than the accountant. As harsh as it may sound, the cleaner can be replaced by anybody. It isn't difficult to learn how to do his job, and therefore, the market will not pay him more than the accountant—the person who spent years studying numbers,saving clients thousands on their taxes.
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But even so, we just discussed how getting a job is not the right equation for amassing a great amount of wealth in a shorter period of time. So then, how can we increase our perceived value? What is it about people like Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos that makes their perceived value so high? The first step to this wealth equation is quite simple: if you want money, solve problems. If you take a second to digest this statement, you realize that just about all money stems from this basic premise. If a solution solves a problem, money will be thrown at it. If it's a million-dollar problem, then the solution will make you millions. If it's a billion-dollar problem, then the solution will make you billions.
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Think about all the problems that a site like Amazon solves: the hassle of going to a store, the wait for delivery, cheaper prices, and more. Not to mention all the other companies that Amazon partners with and the problems that those companies solve. Jeff Bezos helped solve a billion-dollar problem and was also rewarded favorably for doing so. If you've been chasing money,then you've been doing it all wrong. It sounds almost paradoxical, but if you want money, it isn't money that you should be looking for; you should be looking for problems and, more importantly, solutions to those problems. Once you find that solution, create a business around it.
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"Wait, so that's it? Just solve problems, and money will appear? So, I'm gonna have to create the next Amazon for me to be rich or the next Facebook or Google? You've got to be kidding me, right? I mean, I don't even know how to code, I don't even have the money to start something of that scale, I don't even..." Hold on. The more you want and think that way, the more you're going to fall into old patterns of thinking. Start with a problem. Always start with a problem. Listen to the market, the people around you. What are people saying they don't like?What are people saying they wish existed? What are people saying frustrates them? Is that a problem that you can solve, and is it a problem worth solving?

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A Problem Worth Solving

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The final step of this equation to wealth is finding a scalable solution to the problem. Your solution needs to affect a magnitude of people. Starting a restaurant? That's not scalable.You're constrained to the local area and the footfall of that area. But a franchise? Now, that's more scalable. Is your solution a piece of software? Then that means once that software has been built, you can scale it infinitely online without needing to worry about things like production or shipping costs, as it's all done virtually. Good luck finding infinite scale with a job, but be careful—does your solution require your time to generate money? Let's say you were a yoga teacher that charged $100 per hour. Congratulations, you only made yourself another job disguised as a business. There's only a certain amount of lessons that you can feasibly do in one day, and therefore your income is time-bound. But if you created an online yoga class that ran 24/7 with lessons you only had to create once? Now that is scalable scaling.
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Your solution is critical here, so do not get lost on this point, as automation also plays an important role. Systems and processes will keep your business running like a smooth machine if implemented properly. If there is something in your business that you can outsource to somebody else or hire an employee to do it for you—assuming it financially makes sense for you to do—then do it. Tasking yourself with everything is a bad thing, as much as you may think you're the best; there's someone out there that can do a better job than you. Once you've found a solution, it's your job to make sure that solution can be accessed by everyone in your market. It's not about your ego, and it's not about what you're passionate about. The market doesn't care about your passions. So now that you have your profitable business running with the right systems and processes in place, it's time to move on and reap what you sow.

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The Reward

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There are two likely paths you're going to face at this point: either continue your business or cash in and sell it. This is the acquisition, the moment someone buys the solution that you spent years building a business around. This is Instagram being acquired by Facebook for 1 billion.This is PayPal being sold to eBay for 1.5 billion, of which 165 million went straight to Elon Musk's pocket, and the countless other liquidation events that happen across the world. This is where all the effort that you put into building your company comes to fruition.
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If you choose to continue running your business, well, there are a multitude of reasons for wanting to do so. Maybe you love the company that you built and want to stick with your baby.Perhaps you think you can add more value to the company and sell it down the line for more than it's currently worth. Maybe that business runs passively in the background so you don't have to do much to keep the wheels turning. Or perhaps it's a combination of these three things. Either way, you did it. You solved a problem that the market wanted solving, and it rewarded you favorably for doing so. All parties are happy; you got money, good clothes,learned valuable skills, met fantastic people, and overall, you feel financially secure.And so, now I ask you:

"For what was it all for anyway?"

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Your Money or Your Life?

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For most of you, it was never about the money. Money is just a piece of paper, a number on a screen. Its value is only backed up by our belief in its value. From the very start, this was never about the money. Paying off the mortgage, buying your dream car, traveling around the world,never having to worry about your financial situation— it's the freedom that you were looking for.Your destination wasn't anything monetary related. It was a feeling, a sensation: the ability to do what you want whenever you wanted without ever having to cast the thought towards "can I afford this?", "have I used up all my holidays for the year?", "How am I going to pay the rent?","Will I be able to live off my pension?", "What dreams will I have to sacrifice because I can't afford to pursue them?
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The most important lesson from this article was never about the nature of money. It was about the one valuable resource that we all have, the one resource we will never be able to reclaim:Time. Is giving up a large chunk of your time towards a job that you probably don't like worth it?Is your life settled on working, coming home, watching television or other social media, sleeping only to wake up the next day and repeating the same cycle until you retire? How many more hours of your life do you let slip through because of this pattern?
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Or perhaps you're fine with that reality; perhaps you have no other choice but to follow that path for the time being, and if that's the case, there's nothing to worry about. The most you got from this article was a little entertainment and maybe a change in perspective. But there are those of you that understand the other side; those of you that have the desire to never need to worry about money ever again. And so, I feel the need to remind you again: Stop chasing money,chase problems, and find the solution to those problems. This is the equation through which all money is found. If you desire liberty through never needing to worry about money ever again,then let solving problems be the meaningful struggle in your life. It doesn't mean you'll be happy at the end of the road, nor does it mean you'll feel fulfilled. But if your struggle is meaningful,then perhaps it's worth pursuing.

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