Do you have multi-millionaire friends?

[Mayo]

Do you have multi-millionaire friends, and if so do you know how they made it, i.e. what is their philosophy?

[moviestar]

I know one guy. He married to a millionare wife. She fell in love with him. So his philosophy was to attract rich women I guess .

[renie408]

Not friends, but I have multi-millionaire customers and have known many in the past. They have/had different philosophies depending (I think) on how they got the money. The ones that inherited always seemed to have a sense of entitlement. They are the ones that just EXPECT you to do things for them that you don't do for other people. I don't really place a negative connotation on that, BTW. Oddly enough, I found myself doing extra for them without even thinking about it. It is as if they thought they deserved more so I did too.

The ones that earned it are/were all very energetic people. I have a kid in the barn right now whose father has got to be either a millionaire or a darn good faker (huge house, four cars, 55 foot yacht at the coast). I know that he is self-made and the rest of his family doesn't have much money. He builds power plants or something like that. How you get into THAT industry, I have no idea. He always seems like a nice guy to me. He is funny, high energy, and has...I dunno...an intensity of focus? If he is talking to you, he is talking to YOU. He is looking at you, listening to you and you FEEL his attention. If he is observing a riding lesson, he is watching intensely and you can just tell that even though he doesn't ride, he is trying to understand it all. I like him. He is a cool guy. A little bit wearing to be around, but a cool guy.

The guy that owned the last farm that we leased was a multi-millionaire, but I think some of that came from his wife. She was old money. But I know that he earned a lot of their money himself because he talked about building himself from nothing. He is an oral surgeon. He put himself through school. She might have offered a good bit of support there, now that I think about it, though. Anyway, he was also very high energy. He was more of a surface likeable person, though. I noticed he was not very good with either of his kids. At first glance he was very 'aw shucks, good ole boy'. But under that he was very driven. He was very hard on his son, calling him nicknames like "'Tard" and picking at him endlessly for every little thing. That kid ended up at a boarding military academy and living two states away permanently when he was sixteen. I don't think this guy was as happy as the other guy is. Not sure being a millionaire is working for him as well as it could. But now that I think about it, he had the same kind of focus and they both had a ton of...energy. They aren't spazzes or anything, you can just tell that they are vibrating at a very high pitch all the time. In fact, now that I think about it, all of the really rich people I know are like that. Even the ones that seem laid back have this energy going on all the time. Huh. I never really thought about it before.

[Mayo]

Thanks Renie! Interesting connotations.

[Savage]

I talk to millionaires fairly regularly now, both in-person and on the phone. Most are entrepreneurs in the personal development field. Without a doubt they absolutely love their work. That pattern is crystal clear.

Money is important to such people, but it's usually secondary to other factors like enjoyment of the work and meaningful contribution. These people would not take a job they hate just to make ends meet. It's very important to them to generate abundant income doing what they love. They make sure what they do is profitable, so they can keep doing it. When they decide to leave the field and do something else, it will be their conscious choice, not something forced upon them by financial pressure.

These people generate financial abundance so that money doesn't control them. They don't want negative financial pressure, but they do enjoy positive pressure -- the excitement of what is to come.

Most are busy and have a lot going on. One of their favorite activities is connecting with like-minded people and sharing ideas. They're always taking in new ideas and staying alert for new opportunities.

These are generalizations of course, but it's a fairly consistent pattern I've seen. Overall such people are the most fun to connect with because they always have lots of things going on. It's like talking to a person who has 10 jobs and loves all of them.

[Acting Like Godot]

Originally Posted by Mayo

Do you have multi-millionaire friends,

Yes

and if so do you know how they made it, i.e. what is their philosophy?

They tend to be a little stupid. They take risks that smart people wouldn't take. Either that, or they stupidly work like dogs in lucrative careers.

A little stupidity is usually not a bad thing.

[alexb5784]

Renie, your post really hit home with me, because you focused on the energy emitting from the person in relation to their wealth.

I have known three millionaires, one I used to work for and two who are mentors. The one who inherited all his money, owns 10 cars, three houses, etc. But he isn't business savy and has recently had to sell some of his assests. While he and his wife were always kind to me, the husband ruthlessly fired honest people for years for no apparent reason. Needless to say, the employees he DID trust, stole millions from him. His energy was in sync with distrust and he attracted that into his life.

The other millionaires are an executive with a Fortune 500 company and a business owner. They're both very laid back, honest and just really great guys. They have excellent family lives and do work that they love.

I suppose it's the type of energy that's coming from the person that's the most important. You can't be happy in your job, but have a poor family life and call yourself truly wealthy.

[renie408]

Originally Posted by alexb5784

I suppose it's the type of energy that's coming from the person that's the most important. You can't be happy in your job, but have a poor family life and call yourself truly wealthy.

I am not sure how much the oral surgeon loved his job. He flatly told my husband one time that he had examined his options and that oral surgery made the most money with the least risk or emotional investment. He had originally started out aiming to be a dentist and realized he could make more money as an oral surgeon.
Maybe that was why he was hard on his son or why he didn't give off the same kind of happy, fulfilled energy the father of my current student does.

[alexb5784]

Well that guy just seems to be unsuccessful to me in ALL areas of his life. Why is there such a propensity to choose money over happiness in our society?

[Angela]

I've got about 95 extraordinarily wealthy individuals (Beverly Hills/Los Angeles entrepreneurial tycoons) whom I deal with regularly. Some are friends, some are associates, some just want things from me.

I've noticed they all have two things in common:

1) Roof-bursting energy. Just seeing how much they get done in their lives (work, family, education, community, recreation) makes me a little dizzy. These people are really in action ALL the time.

2) They all pinch their nickels till the buffalo screams. Not a one of 'em is cavalier about what I would have thought would be, to them, small amounts of money in & out.

--- one more thing: almost all (but not all) are far more expressively grateful for the abundance in their lives, including the non-money stuff, than most of the less wealthy folks I know.

[renie408]

Originally Posted by Angela

I've got about 95 extraordinarily wealthy individuals (Beverly Hills/Los Angeles entrepreneurial tycoons) whom I deal with regularly. Some are friends, some are associates, some just want things from me.

I've noticed they all have two things in common:

1) Roof-bursting energy. Just seeing how much they get done in their lives (work, family, education, community, recreation) makes me a little dizzy. These people are really in action ALL the time.

2) They all pinch their nickels till the buffalo screams. Not a one of 'em is cavalier about what I would have thought would be, to them, small amounts of money in & out.

--- one more thing: almost all (but not all) are far more expressively grateful for the abundance in their lives, including the non-money stuff, than most of the less wealthy folks I know.

I only know horse people. And while I would agree with the first two statements, I have not seen so much of that last part. I think my current rich Dad seems genuinely appreciative of his success, but when I really think about it, none of the other ones impressed me as being all that notably grateful. I have only known maybe ten or twelve millionaires well enough to have formed judgements like that, though. I would say that most of them were gracious, but I am not sure I would have interpreted them as appreciative.

[Glass Joe]

Great thread. Personally, I only know two multi-millionaires that I can honestly call friends, and that I also respect.

One guy is an MIT graduate who started an internet company back in the mid-90's, quietly grew it for about 8 years, sold his majority stake, and now he does angel investing with a group of other entrepreneurs. His wife is also a lawyer. After I graduated high school I rented a room from them in their house for a few years, and we are still friends today. It was really fortunate, because just living with them and absorbing a lot of things via osmosis helped me tremendously in my own personal development.

The other millionaire friend owns an oil prospecting business and was my neighbor while I was in high school and still living at home. I remember hanging out in his home office and talking for hours about business and philosophy. He and his wife also had a disabled son that I never met, who spent most of his life in a wheelchair before passing away in his early twenties. And I'm sure my neighbor loved his son the same way that the father in the youtube video (it was posted on this forum a while go) also loved his son.

And I agree with the comments already posted about multi-millionaires.

Some other patterns I notice with these two multi-millionaires in particular, and also millionaires/billionaires in general that I just know of indirectly (such as Warren Buffett, Donald Trump, etc.) are:

1. They use "hi-tech" more as a last resort, and not as a pillar of their business. Even the guy with the internet startup seemed to care very little about the technical details. I remember getting frustrated with him because I thought his web site was way too plain and he didn't seem to even know what his single programmer was doing half the time (he eventually had to let him go). But, looking back, I guess he knew that he couldn't do the programming himself, even though he probably could have done it better. Otherwise, he'd be stuck doing the programming all day long and not be able to do anything else.

Also, the oil prospector had the oldest ugliest monochrome computers in his office. And guys like Warren Buffett, Donald Trump, and Robert Kiyosaki, now that I think about it, seem to be very lo-tech and rarely use computers or cell phones at all, and supposedly prefer yelling across the room rather than sending an email.

2. They rarely, if ever complain. They may "complain up", that is, to someone who can actually do something about it. But I never remember independently wealthy people ever "complaining down" to people who couldn't do anything to change the situation.

3. On the flipside though, rich people aren't perfect. They still get road rage, can hold petty grudges, and can be self-righteous about certain things. I'm not sure if that sounds the same as complaining. I guess I mean that, rich or poor, we all can still carry around insecurities in certain areas and can get carried away with certain things. For example, I remember me and my roommate getting way too competitive whenever we played strategy board games together. I was 19 and he was in his mid-30's and I remember it getting to the point where it just wasn't fun anymore getting pulverized at Axis & Allies and him rubbing it in my face each time, even though I never played before and was just starting to learn. And when we played Samurai Swords together, a game we both were learning from scratch, I remember the tension getting so thick in the room if I ever got close to actually winning a game. And I remember me and his wife getting on each other's nerves about the smallest things, even though we got along great overall.

4. Not a lot of talk about personal development. I wasn't sure about putting this one down, because personally I love PD, but now that I think about it, I don't remember my roommates or my neighbor talking about personal development that much. As in "You should do this, read this, practice this, avoid this, etc..." Maybe they already internalized most of PD earlier-on in their lives, so PD just became automatic and no longer needed conscious daily attention. I remember my roommate having a philosophy about cooking where he only looked at a cookbook for about 5 minutes and then he put it away and just started cooking without it.

I guess this is kind of like Acting Like Godot's comment about stupidity. Knowing just barely enough to get started, but not so much that you *think* you can predict anything or that you can 100% control anything. Also, and I totally forgot this until now, but the only PD book my roommate ever recommended that I read was "The Tao of Pooh". I'm sure he'd recommend other books too, if I twisted his arm enough, but I thought that him recommending that one particular book to me, of all books, was really strange at the time.

One more thing, as a side note, while I was writing this post I remembered another multi-millionaire (not one of the two mentioned above), from time-to-time affectionately referring to me as Sisyphus, usually whenever I tried to rope him into some deep philosophical discussion with me. He basically said that all my book-reading, contemplation, and seeking was, fundamentally, just like Sisyphus repeatedly pushing a boulder up a steep hill, only to watch it roll back down to the bottom again.

Now I think the Sisyphus metaphor can be taken in many different and subtle contexts, but in regards to becoming a multi-millionaire, I think the basic idea he (and the multi-millionaires I know) was trying to get across is that knowing about cookbooks and knowing how to cook aren't necessarily the same thing. And that being a scholar of cookbooks (or martial arts books, personal development books, business/economics books, or even philosophy/spirituality books for that matter) is to completely miss the point.

(Unless you truly enjoy being a scholar, that is, where it's more like a hobby and not just a means to an end. )

[Narz]

I don't have any.

Who has some I can borrow?

[Nala]

Now that I think about it, I cannot think of one multi-millionaire friend of mine who talks about P.D.

I know perhaps 10-15 such people personally ... all of them are action-oriented, self-confident, and definitely not in need of Gurus. I love this Forum but I am always displeased when I see people saying things like, "Steve would say" or "Steve said this about what you are saying" ...

Forget the gurus. Steve's site is just a landing place for like-minded people.

Be your own guru. Read the books, etc. but depend on yourself and believe in your own worth and your ability to become the person you study -- in your own way and in a way that makes it better because it is yours.

[Famous Nabob]

Study and understand the PD strategies and ideas, but ACT. ACT!

The best web site, book, DVD, guru, or podcast can only help if you ACT by using the PD tools to move you on toward your chosen goal. Isn't that what you guys are saying here?

Thoughts?

[somiab1]

You know guys, I think instead of focusing on how much money you want to have by a certain time it is better to see the bigger picture. For Instance if you are an artist a writer, a doctor or whatever, it is better to focus on becoming the number one prfessional in your field, which obviously also means greater financial benefites as well. But it is improtant to go for a much higher concept rather than focusing on a certain amount of money. Our greatest poet, I am Persian, Rumi, says "Cease your search for water and seek thirst instead, till water bursts out of you from low and above."

In fact I have written an article about this poem, which I am going to publish soon, but that is of course in a political realm.

[TheColonel]

I'm surrounded by them. I didn't use to be though. I read or heard something a few years ago that stated 'your income is the average of your 5 closest friends.' So I planted the seed to get myself around a bunch of millionaires.

One of the guys I'm really fond of is worth a quarter billion. He's probably my main mentor, and he's the only one who's brought up any type of PD. When I first sat down with him, I told him about a project, and he chuckled.

Then I told him I visualized it clearly in my head, in precise detail. His eyes widened, and he quit chuckling.

In one of our few conversations about anything PD related, he accredited his success to Think and Grow Rich, which he used to run political campaigns, start businesses, build houses, etc. He basically uses it for everything except his health, which is failing.

His motto in life is: The way you react to adversity is what defines you.

Out of all of the other wealthy folks I know, the only pattern I see is long term, consistent focus. It's like everyday, they move forward an inch or two. And then one day, you look over, and they've passed everyone else by a mile.

[Thomas Jensen]

I don't have rich friends, but I meet with and talk to some very wealthy individuals as part of my daily working routine.

This one guy I was talking to last week is worth something like $500m.

Now, I won't say who this guy is. But he lives not far from me, in London, England. He doesn't even own a car. He doesn't like talking about money. In fact he is notoriously unmaterialistic. He is obsessed with technology and how to challenge the big, established companies by providing more accessible technology to the masses.

The money is just a tool to him. It has enabled him to fund his latest venture, which in many ways is simply a continuation of his first. He is on a mission in life, and there is no endgame as far as the money is concerned. It's merely a vehicle for what he wants to achieve.

[Taking Action]

Because my business is in the personal development industry, I can say that I have many personal friends and acquaintances that are self made millionaires. (The industry tends to create Millionaires)

One thing that I know for a fact about self made millionaires... They are millionaires because they are willing to do what poor people are not willing to do. That normally involves taking chances, risks, gut decisions. I love this quote, not sure who it was but I think it was N. Hill "Rich people make decisions quickly and change their minds slowly, poor people make decisions slowly and change their minds quickly". I have found this to be very true.

Any student of personal development should know they have total control over their circumstances and their results. Everyone is on an equal playing field. I know, I came from a very poor background and once I realized the power I had within me, I applied that power and and now living the life of my desire.

The Law of Attraction, intentional manifestation, the secret... they all are the same thing and they are biblical. It is our right to be rich in every area of our lives, including money.

To your success.