So I want to tell a quick story that I think will help you:
It was my first year teaching band... I think back in 2013 and consult as an engineer (my goodness I'm getting old now what the heck happened).
I was maybe two or three months in, so I was still learning the ropes and figuring out how to be a good teacher and an engineer.
My first paychecks had started to roll in... and I'm not going to lie - I felt freaking rich. As a teacher my company at&t would pick up the difference between my teacher and engineer salary. And on weekends I be a 'rockstar,' with mine own band.
I wasn't exactly ballin' with my teaching salary, but man that first real paycheck after college felt nice.
Anyway...
Around this time, I started to get interested in personal finance.
A good friend of my wife's (and then girlfriend's) family had kinda taken me under his wing and convinced me to pay off my $50k of student loan debt. I was on scholarship 'till my masters.
So I was throwing what I could at that, and just kind dreaming of the day that I'd be able to *really* invest and stop worrying about my debt. Is there life sfter debt?
I picked up a book called "Trading for a Living" by Dr. Alexander Elder (which I honestly wouldn't recommend for most people - the first half or so is good but the rest focuses on commodities, forex, futures and options trading which isn't my thing).
At that point in my investing "career", I was just trying to learn as much as I could. I hadn't ever learned about stocks, bonds, options, etc., so I just wanted to figure it all out the best I could.
So one night after a really long day at work, I happened to leave the book on my desk.
No big deal... right? People leave stuff on their desks all the time and come back to it later ans its still there.
But the weird thing about my desk was that it was actually in my boss's office. We didn't have enough room in the band hall for me to actually have my own office, so I shared one with him.
It was... awkward to say the least but whatever haha.
So that next morning, I walk in and he's sitting there with a weird look on his face.
And I'm like... "Um hey... Is everything ...Everything, alright?"
He pointed to the book on my desk and asked point blank:
"Are you planning on quitting in the middle of the school year? Why the heck are you reading that?"
And I look over and realize that the book says "Trading for a Living". Whoopsies. Not the best book to leave out I guess.
So I laughed it off and told him no, I just wanted to learn more about the stock market. I wanted to make more money someday and be wealthy.
And then he said something that I'll never forget:
"You're a teacher. If you start thinking about things like that in this profession, you'll never be happy."
And at first... I didn't even know how to feel about that or how to respond.
What the heck did he mean I shouldn't think about it? Why would I *not* think about something like that?
Then it hit me - he took the bribe to forget uour dreams, he had already given up his dreams, and he wanted me to do the same. Misery loves company. Hell, almost everyone I knew in the building might have already given up.
It was like realizing that I was plugged into the 'Matrix' or something crazy like that.
People just accept that they can't do more in life because other people tell them so (their parents, their friends, their priest, their bosses, the community at largeetc.)
So I made a promise to myself that it wouldn't happen to me. I wasn't going to let anyone tell me what I could or couldn't do with my one shot here. Life is a journey not a destination and all that jazz.
And that moment (along with plenty of other small ones here and there) started this whole thing for me.
I paid off my debt. Quit my job. Started multiple businesses. I travel. I invest. I even write for freaking money, now. There is life after debt, after all.
I love where I am at this point in my life, but it only happened because I didn't let my boss convince me to give up on my dreams like I easily could have done.
So if you have someone telling you that you can't do something, or that you're not good enough, or that you should just settle - don't listen to that crap. Use it as motivation to prove ti everyine, that doesn't have to be the case.
You can do whatever the heck you want. Your friends, your family, your co-workers, and the rest of society can sit there and watch while you go out and do it like they said you can't, like there is no tomorrow.
Happy day, all...
Jonnny
P.S. - If you're on this email list and thinking "who the heck is this random dude emailing me about money?", go here and allow me to introduce myself.
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---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Millennial Money Man <bobby@millennialmoneyman.com>
Date: Fri, Nov 22, 2019, 1:14 PM
Subject: Don't *ever* let this happen to you...
To: <joaoa.dsilva2019@gmail.com>
This email may contain affiliate links (gotta make that paper boo boo). All opinions are 100,000% my own.
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