The #1 Strategy For Becoming Financially Wealthy
Alfred North Whitehead said, “Civilization文明，文化 advances by extending the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking of them.”
Becoming financially successful requires producing better results without consciously有意识地 thinking about it.
One such strategy is literally automating a certain amount of money that goes from your bank account into an investment account, weekly. It doesn’t matter the amount you start with. Here’s what will happen, though:
- Because that money will not actually sit in your bank account, you’ll pretend in your mind it doesn’t exist
- Your income will adapt to whatever amount you set
- You’ll adjust your expenses开销，开支
- Overtime, you’ll have invested a huge amount, which you would have spent in less effective ways
We all have a psychological心理的 “base-line” for where we feel comfortable financially. For some people, that means having $100, for others $100,000, and for others millions.
Here’s what’s cool about automating your saving/investment — you will increase your income to bring yourself back to your psychological baseline. So if you start investing a few hundred or thousand dollars per week, you’ll no longer have access to that money, which you once relied on or overly spent. Not having that access will lead you to seeking more ways of creating money. You’ll subconsciously下意识地，本能地 need to get back to your baseline, and you will.
As the historian历史学家 Will Durant said, “The ability of the average person could be doubled if it were demanded. If the situation demanded强烈要求，需要.”
Set it and forget it.
Every time you increase the amount of your “weekly auto-invest,” you will increase your confidence. You’re making a bold大胆自信的;敢于表白情感的;敢于冒险的; power-move toward your future self. Investing in your future increases your commitment here-and-now.
Adjust wisely, but also, push yourself outside your comfort zone. And when things start to feel a little tight严格的；严厉的, don’t stop you’re auto-investing. That money doesn’t exist to you, right now. Find new ways to make more money.
If you do this strategy, your income potential will skyrocket. But also, over a period of time, you’ll have invested a large amount of money which is now working for you — which money you would have likely spent or just let sit if you hadn’t invested it.
Not only will you have a lot of money which you would have spent in less powerful ways, but you’ll have learned to make more money to compensate弥补；补偿 for what’s now being invested. You’ll also learn to adjust your spending, because much of what you’re spending your money on isn’t supporting your future self.
If you’re not doing this, then you’re not making as much money as you could be. If you’re not doing this, then you’re not experiencing the compound复合的 effect. The longer you wait to experience the compound effect, the less profound知识渊博的；理解深刻的；深邃的 will your future be. Einstein even called the law of compounding the 8th wonder of the world. I’ve literally seen my income increase by hundreds of thousands of dollars per year by applying this principle — by putting more away weekly and finding ways to bring my income back to my psychological baseline, and then, increasing that baseline.
Putting your future before your present improves the quality of your present. It acts as a forcing function — increasing your urgency, strategy, and actions here-and-now.
The longer you wait to experience the compound effect, the less profound will your future be.