It’s hard

For over a decade now I have been training and mentoring people in the journey to developing leveraged and passive income, using the same business model. An email I received recently encouraged me to reflect on this experience.

To give some background, I like to use Robert Kiyosaki’s ‘cash flow quadrant’, where on the left hand side of the quadrant you have ‘E’ for employee and ‘S’ for self-employed. The Es have no control over their work or leverage income. The S have control over their work but no leverage. On the right hand side you find ‘B’ for business people, and ‘I’ for investors. They both have leverage, however the ‘I’s have passive or residual income. The great divide is leverage. On the left hand side there is no leverage. On the right hand side there is leverage.

So what’s so important about leverage? Your income is not limited to your personal exertion!

I know it’s not easy for humans to change, and moving from the left to the right hand side of this quadrant is change. In the last decade plus I have watched thousands put up their hand to ‘cross-over’ the entrepreneurial divide. They don’t all make it. That’s life. That’s human nature.

Yes, it can be hard work – developing new skills, new habits, and new beliefs. However let me share what I think is really hard.

Having a fixed income and watching cost of living rise. I think that’s hard.
Having little ability to raise your income and receiving unexpected large bills come in. I think that’s hard.

Having to turn up for work at times and places determined but other people – I think that’s hard.

Having to work with people you don’t necessarily like – I think that’s hard.

Not receiving income when you don’t turn up for work – I think that’s hard.
Worrying about the fact that if you miss days of work you will not receive income – I think that’s hard.

Falling behind on the bills because you did take some days off work – I think that’s hard.

Having to go to work knowing you are doing little more than paying the bills – I think that’s hard.

Spending more time with strangers in the work environment than with your kids or those you would prefer to spend time with – I think that’s hard.

Living with the regret you were not there at the crucial times for your kids when they were growing up because you had to go to work – I think that’s hard.

Realizing that if something were to happen to you your family would not be financially looked after because you can no longer go to work – I think that’s hard.

Getting older and realizing you will not be able to work for as long as you are alive, and wondering how you are going to support yourself and or your family in your ‘golden years’ – I think that’s hard.

Living in poverty during the final 10-30 years of your life because you can no longer work in the way you spent your life working and now there is no income – I think that’s hard.

Waking up one day to realize your adult life to date has been built on a flawed economic model – I think that’s hard.

I have also concluded that it would be lot easier to simply give seminars on how to become an entrepreneur and walk away after the 2-5 days course. After all, most do this, and the majority are conditioned to believe that this is the way to go. They go to a course on ‘business development’, and walk away with ‘all the information’ they need to succeed.

I note with interest listening to John C. Maxwell (US business leader, speaker and author) in a live presentation recently agree with my conclusions on this point – that staying with people until they achieve their success is a lot harder than giving them a course in how to do it for a few days and then walking away.

However the short term gains of taking someone’s money for a few day entrepreneur / business seminar are outweighed by the long term success of sharing the true financial success of your student.

So yes, I find some things hard also. However like most things in life hard is on a continuum. And I find ‘working for a living’, ‘working for money’, harder than creating a purpose based life for yourself and your family through entrepreneurial development which includes guiding others to share your entrepreneurial breakthroughs.