Wealthy people focus on the long term.  They make decisions today based on their Financial plans for the future while poor people focus on the short term which creates Financial problems.   This is why it’s important to keep your Vision of where you want to be Financially in the future in the forefront of your mind.  Building wealth takes time, and you’ll start building wealth immediately as you start to focus long term.

Don’t worry reader, this doesn’t mean you’ll have to make huge sacrifices today so you can be Financially abundant 5 or 10 years from now.  You’ve probably seen examples like this before, but simply putting away about $3 per day starting at age 21 to age 65 will give you over $1 million dollars in cash.  Anyone can “sacrifice” $3 per day, but they don’t … and many people retire in poverty.  Develop this small amount of discipline into your Financial Action plan because it will create dramatic improvements in your future. 

I use a similar strategy reader for several areas of my life.  For example, I put away a small of money each month just like a utility bill (broken down into weekly “deposits”) so I don’t even feel it.  I forget about it – it doesn’t exist so there’s no “borrowing” from it, and every couple of months there’s enough money to take my wife and I on a nice trip to some place local that we’ve never been before.  Nothing big or fancy, but it’s like a free mini vacation several times per year.  For our last trip, we went white water rafting and zip lining – and we had a blast!

Another obvious strategy for Financial abundance is to simply make more money.  We’ll talk about this deeply in your Business & Career category.  That category and your Financial Life are very connected, yet very separate from each other.  You can have a great Career, but at the same time have a disastrous Financial life.  You can find examples of this everywhere from MC Hammer to Mike Tyson to a whole list of other people who made millions and millions of dollars in their career yet were broke Financially. 

In a small way, this is similar to my situation.  I went to bed a multi-millionaire and woke up with nothing.  Although, it was out of my control, the reality was the same – my Financial abundance was gone.  Thankfully, due to my Abundance Blueprint, it was only a temporary set back.

You can also find many examples of people with very modest Careers, such as Janitors, who retire multi-millionaires and live in luxury.  Imagine how your life will be reader when you take control of both!

It’s also important that you create a Financial mindset of saving more and spending less.  Again reader, this doesn’t require huge sacrifices – just a little bit of discipline.  Financial abundance can be attained by just about anyone who can save 10% or more of what they earn.  This simply means you “Pay Yourself First” before anything or anyone else.  This isn’t a new concept, I’m sure you’ve heard it before, but vary few people actually do it.  The key here is to make this a MUST in your life reader, and not a SHOULD.  When people are faced with a “should” in life they fail.  However, the vast majority of times (I don’t want to say 100% of the time though it very well could be?) when people are faced with a “must” in life – they succeed!  

It’s the concept of “If you want to take the island – burn your boats” which creates a MUST in your life.  More than 2,000 years ago, Julius Caesar had ventured out to conquer England.  In the event that Caesar and his soldiers decided to retreat, they would have to sail back across the channel.  Caesar saw his Generals directing the ships and securing them in a way that if they were in need of a hasty retreat they would be able to do so quite successfully.  Caesar made up his mind in one instant, and ordered his men to burn the ships.  The Romans burnt every single ship sending a strong message to both his own men as well as the enemy.  Caesar had no intentions of sailing away from the island without conquering the land, and as long as the ships remained in sight, Caesar knew there would be moments of weakness when the men might think of retreat.  With the ships burnt, there was no option but to fight with 100% commitment – Caesar and his men had no other option than to fight with 100% commitment and succeed or face certain death.  Caesar and his men succeeded against the much larger and stronger enemy.

So reader, learn to live on 90% of your income – you can do this – it means your Financial freedom!  set up an account and put 10% of your income into this account before anything else, and never touch that account.  Even if your current Financial life is in trouble with debts and you barely make enough to pay the bills as it is, there’s always a way to do this, and your job reader is to find that way.  It can be easier than you think. 

Take a close look at your life reader and see what can you cut out without decreasing the quality of your life.  What do you buy that’s not really important.  I’ve seen people spending over $100 per month on Cable TV and save absolutely $0.00.  Remember, the difference between Financial abundance and poverty can be as little as $3 per day.  Take a look at how you spend your money – are you spending it wisely or are you wasting it?  What expenses do you have that are needless and don’t add to your happiness.  You have to eliminate the urge that most people have of spending everything they make, and then some.  Managing money well and controlling expenses is how a Janitor becomes a multi-millionaire.  You can probably find more efficient ways to spend less money while even improving the quality of your life.