I became a millionaire at age 27 and actually sucked I'm going to share with you all the mistakes I made through building and selling three multi-million dollar companies and how to avoid them this is everything from losing all my friends to some controversial opinions that most business owners shy away from so these are the six reasons why making millions can actually suck the first reason is money doesn't make you happy but this will so when I became a cash millionaire at 27 years old I was working 100 hours a week my health was at risk and I got to a point where my relationship disintegrated in front of my eyes I felt like a freaking loser my whole world imploded in on itself it got so bad a doctor told me I had to walk around with an anxiety rock that I would squeeze anytime I felt the pressure of the situation on my chest it was like an elephant was literally standing on my chest and I couldn't fix it people think it's about making money but having all the money in the world will not make you happy I know it's easier said than done some of you guys like well test me out wire me the money people say if I won the lottery I would go on a beach and drink my ties trust me I've done that and it gets old really quick it's been long proven that retirement actually increases the risk of mortality interesting right humans are built to create not stagnate our default being is expansion a child is born and grows seeds are planted and grows people go I just want to be happy you know what happiness is happiness is progress that's why today I live by the 5 FS framework to build a life of unlimited creation I never have to retire from the first one is Fortune yes having wealth allows you to have optionality it gives you resources it's required because without that you're always stressing out about not being able to just live but the rest of them are actually more important number two is family having people around you that love you for who you are that you feel like you're investing in that you can spend time and go on these experiences with what's the point of going on a beach all by yourself not being able to share any of it number three is Fitness and I've learned this unfortunately the hard way I used to weigh 265 pounds I struggled with my weight my whole life and I know that anytime I was sick I might have had the day before A Thousand Dreams and goals but the moment I was sick I had about one and having my fitness my energy my health it just changed everything number four is Faith and I believe that every human is born to have faith we're here to believe in something way bigger than ourselves and if you do everything for yourself and it's all driven by ego ego stands for edging God out not having a relationship with a god actually makes life really hard the fifth f is fun which we'll talk more about later in this video but my whole life is designed around making money in the funnest way possible so at 27 I became a cash millionaire I was very successful had all the accolades people were looking up to me asking me for my advice but I wasn't happy my life was actually in shambles which brings us to number two which is money exposes your real and fake friends when the news broke out on the local paper when I sold my first company I had friends from high school reaching out for help current friends dissing themselves from me because i' change you're different I mean honestly it took a real toll I didn't know how to say no to some stranger that I just happened to sit next to in math class I was like stressing myself out like why are they asking me for money don't they have parents don't they have friends that can help them out and then the people that I thought were my real friends they ended up like talking crap about me why because I did the thing that they all wanted to do and had success and all of a sudden now I'm different than in them so I want to give you a tool that I use today there are the five signs that I look for that tells you if you have fake friends number one is they only talk to you when they need something I have a friend that I grew up with some would have called him my best friend and it was really tough for me because he would only text me or call me if he needed something other than that he never checked in he never asked me how I was doing and I realized for myself I had to create some space this is not somebody I want in my life like you just got to ask yourself is this a good friend what do you consider a good friend do they have these habits these traits this character and if the answer is no they got to go number two is they make you feel inferior it's an interesting one because I've had friends over the years where initially I might have looked at them as like peers or mentors but the way they spoke over me never felt good I felt like every time I talked to them they look for the thing I was doing wrong and would criticize me it was almost like they were trying to Peg me down and I couldn't figure it out it's like why are they doing this the truth is once I just decided to stop talking to them stop seeking their advice stopped spending time with them my whole life felt a lot better because I didn't have that negative energy of somebody that was almost like jealous of me if they make you feel inferior they got to go number three they don't celebrate your success I got to tell you I've had friends over the years that for whatever reason when I have a win and they ask me what's new and I just tell them they get really awkward they get really weird some of them make this face I can't even explain it's kind of like a confused face and I'm not trying to confuse them it's almost like they don't understand like how are you having this success and then I have other friends like my best friend Marty the day I interviewed Dana White I have it all on video cuz we recorded it for the Vlog he was the first person I called as soon as I got off stage and that guy has been my biggest cheerleader since day one he's eager to hear what I'm up to so he can celebrate it with me he tells me I can't believe where you come from what you're doing now Dan did you ever believe this this is so great what are you going to do next that's somebody you want in your life if they can't celebrate your success they got to go number four is that talk about you behind your back now this one is a big no no and I'll be honest with you the first time this happened to me it hurt my heart I remember a friend of mine called me up and he says hey man I don't even know how to tell you this but your friend was at of dinner and he was telling other people about you and he was saying things that honestly I don't understand why he would say those things about you and I didn't know how to approach it like my heart sunk into my stomach and I knew I had to say something and I reached out to him we had a conversation the crazy part he admit to doing it but he actually admitted it to a completely different dinner so he thought I was talking about this other dinner and I was talking about this one so it told me that it wasn't the first time here's the thing I'm all about Redemption and giving people a second chance but if it happens twice you can't be around me do those people talk crap about other people to you if your friend is talking crap about your other friend when they're not around they're probably doing it to you if they do that they got to go number five is they had falling outs in the past this one's fun I remember nval Ricon one of my mentors he said if somebody is always getting into legal issues give it enough time and their litigious ways will eventually end up on you your past history is a great predictor of the future so if you're somebody that has a history of falling out with friends from the past there's probably a good chance that they're going to do it to you what I've learned over the years is that some people come into your life for a season a reason or a lifetime and if it's a reason teach it to me and I'll move on if it's a season I'm okay and I won't stress if it's a lifetime that's beautiful let's invest in it which brings us to number three which is it's easy to make money hard to keep it when I sold my first company at 28 I became a multi-millionaire now I had something to lose and I started to invest in other startups thinking that hey I know what I'm doing I made money in the past and very quickly I lost over $850,000 and that's when I reached out to one of my mentors who explained to me the simple concept when you make money the goal is to take 50% of what you make and put it in lowrisk very Safe Money Vehicles like the S&P index funds lowrisk real estate bonds things where you know for the most part you're not going to lose all your money the other 50% is what you use to invest in your next thing but you got to do it in a way that's fun which I'll talk to you about in The Next Step when you build a new thing it may fail cuz it's not guaranteed and you don't want to lose it all making money is actually very easy it's keeping it that's hard because some people are Risk Takers and they just keep throwing it into the next thing the next thing and they keep resetting Warren Buffett said it best said rule number one don't lose the money if you just keep resetting yourself there's no compounding growth that's going to happen entrepreneurs do this all the time because they don't go all in then are they really taking risks they read these stories like Elon Musk putting 250 million into Tesla and Solar City and SpaceX they think well I need to be an Elon mus if I'm not invest in all of it then do I really believe in the idea I'm not saying you don't believe in it it's just don't be stupid just understand there's risk you could lose it all would you be okay losing it all probably not so don't do that 50% goes safe 50% goes into the next thing which brings us to number four which is it's not how much money you make it's how you make your money at 31 years old I sold my second company flowtown but I had to keep working there for 12 months to get my final check what's called your earnout but honestly I hated showing up to work every day it sucked the energy out of me it was like this soul sucking work nobody wanted to create anything everything worked really slow and even though I pretty much blocked out my calendar to vest in peace and just go to coffee shops to visit friends it was tough being there and then I had this new idea for a new company that I really wanted to pursue and I felt like a fraud and after some soul searching and some tough love for my wife I decided to walk away I'll tell you what happened in a sec but here's the big idea it's not how much money I make it's how I make my money so here's my core framework on how to build a life you don't grow to hate and makes you more money number one is you got to audit your activities look at everything you've been doing for the last 2 weeks and ask yourself does this give me energy or does it suck my energy it's why I wrote a whole book called buy back your time to understand how to reinvest your time number two is renegotiate your commitments if you have things in there that you don't want to do anymore that you should have said no to put yourself first and have those conversations at your job at school wherever it is number three do more of what lights you up and makes you more money think about it if there's something that you love doing that you would do for free but yet people pay you the most for stop doing the other stuff and double down on that that's how you end up building a life that you don't grow to hate a second ago when I talked about walking away from my earnout in the company that acquired us to pursue my new idea it wasn't guaranteed that any of it was going to work out but I just made a commitment to myself that I'd rather bet on me than stay for a guarantee 12 months later it paid off not only did I raise 1.6 million for my new startup at a $6 million valuation but the company who bought my company got a acquired for $600 million which meant that everybody who had stock accelerated and I got my earnout in essence I got both here's the big belief that I now have since that happened is the world rewards courageous decisions so focus on building a life you love which brings us to number five which is don't be a prisoner to your wealth it wasn't until age 36 that I finally allowed myself to buy a superar even though I was a millionaire at a very young age it took a while for me to accept or give myself permission to allow myself to buy nice things it's so crazy I had been a millionaire for over 9 years at that time but never allowed myself to enjoy my wealth getting my first McLaren changed everything when it comes to money money can actually make you a prisoner here's a quote for you to live by if every decision you make the primary reason is for money then you're just a prisoner of your money it should be a consideration but not the primary reason so here's how not to be a prisoner of your money number one tell you're worth it see a lot of people when I tell them they should get a coach or buy a book it's almost like there's a hesitation because I don't think they feel worthy of investing in themselves what I learned a long time ago is that my transformation happens at the transaction the moment I wire the money to hire a coach to invest in me it doesn't matter what it is a parent coach a fitness coach a business coach a media coach the moment that I pay not only do I start paying attention but the transformation occurred because I just told myself I am worth it number two is return on investment versus return on lifestyle I know too many people that are so tight with their Pur strings because it's not going to make them money or it's not going to hold value they don't realize tomorrow is not guaranteed the experience has value the value of a boat the value of vacation property the value of a trip I remember one time I was talking to my buddy Deacon about telling his friend to put a pool at his house cuz I was like don't they not make money he's like they may not give you Roi on the house but the return on lifestyle is immeasurable number three you can't bring it to the Grave every person in the cemetery has the same thing a tombstone so none of it comes with you after the fact why would you keep saving all the way till the end and then not use any of it to create experiences there's an incredible book called die with zero by Bill Perkins he Maps it out he gives you the math how to accumulate wealth and then as you've built it up then start deploying it so you understand when you have the go- go years the slowo years and the no-go years some people are waiting for someday maybe to do something nice for somebody else when the best time to do it is right now don't let money make you a prisoner start using it as a resource which brings us to number six which is avoid wealth preservation mode when I was 32 years old I had one of my mentors invite me to this fancy Dancy dinner on a private golf course with literally a Runway that went through it and jets were Landing with people that were invited to this dinner it was 100 Millionaires and billion from all over North America and I remember I was sitting there listening to these conversations and honestly I didn't enjoy them all they were talking about is how to skimp and save on taxes or get a good deal on something or something the government was doing or the news and honestly boring life insurance policy type stuff it wasn't entrepreneurial or exciting and I remember telling this to my mentor cuz he asked me how it was and he replied he goes ah he goes you just discovered the difference between wealth preservation mode and wealth creation mode and those people have trans ition into wealth preservation mode they're not trying to make more money with what they have they're trying to keep what they have so they don't lose it see I believe being a millionaire or somebody that's expansive has to do with your mentality not your actual economic situation you want to continue being in wealth creation mode all the way till the end because you're expanding and you're creating so here's my philosophy to avoid living in wealth preservation mode and be Allin on wealth creation number one is work like you have nothing to lose become addicted to your expansion don't set up shop as you climbed this mountain of success cuz you had a little bit of success continue to grow continue to invest continue to be more of who you are number two don't build a life you grow to hate which we just talked about you know I had a client of mine Brad and he was looking to sell his company and ask him why and he said well I've just got like a lot going on and I'm a little stressed out and my health isn't good and my wife's kind of giving me a hard time and there's some things I want I feel guilty and I go well you could sell now but it's a little early if you delayed it 3 or 4 years you'd be be able to get maybe five times more for it all he had to do is pay himself a little bit more to improve his situation to delay having to need to sell his company so he can get way more money in the near future number three focus on abundance not scarcity you cannot save yourself to a fulfilled life fulfillment comes from investing opportunities expansion some people think well I'm just going to save on my lot and I'm just going to scrimp and save over here and I'll eventually be full of abundance no that behavor avior tells you that you don't believe there's more available to you in the future and because of that it'll never show up and that's how we avoid getting to a place where we have stuff that we're worried we're going to lose and get into wealth preservation mode or we stay in the place of expansion and growth and we keep reinvesting in ourselves in our future if you want to learn the 44 cheat codes I wish I knew in my 20s click the link and I'll see you on the other side