Today we celebrate! We celebrate our freedom from the tyranny of the workforce. No longer do we have to grind five days a week, 22 days a month. It was a long road to get to this point, and most of us didn’t make it out.
The few who survived and can call themselves financially independent can rejoice through the halls of victory. They now have the time and money to live free lives, away from the hustle and bustle of the human meat grinder: work.
Being a free person has been a completely different experience than being an indentured employee. To gain my freedom, I had to learn the ways of passive income and create cash flow. Going to school did not teach me these principles; I had to research and study these techniques independently.
Living a free life doesn’t mean that I do not have income; in fact, it’s the exact opposite. I have even more revenue coming in and from more diverse places. I have dividends coming in from my stock market investments, rents coming in from rental properties, royalties from my books, and interest from cryptocurrency investments.
I wasn’t always a financially free person; it took a long time to get here. The path was long because I did not have the education, not for any other reason. Financial education is the key to getting on the road to wealth and abandoning the path towards the meat grinder (or rat race).
To clarify, I still have a day job. I happily go to work each and every day. I am so happy because I do not need to work. When I retire, I will have my military pension and my passive income. These income sources can more than provide for my family.
More importantly, once I retire, I will have time to become rich. I will have time to build out my writing career. I can pursue some of my passive business ideas, such as a passive Airbnb business, an 18 wheeler truck, a dog park, or a local farm.
During retirement, I can also build my real estate portfolio if I so choose. Using my abilities to find creative financing, I can pursue single-family housing, apartments, or mobile homes.
I can also follow the stock market more intimately. I always wanted to trade options or follow commodities more closely. I would have the time. Also, finding some good cryptocurrency coins early in their progression would be amazing.
Overall, I can use the freedom of time to increase my freedom of money. So, yes, I go to work with a massive smile on my face. I do not need them—I am work-optional. I have the financial freedom to choose my financial future. My wife is in the same boat. We both can retire today and be better off.
Why continue to work? I am in my 40s, and these are my prime earning years. The more that I grind out now, the better for the long run. As much as I want to pursue real estate and business, the military is my wealth generator. I can make a lot more in the military with little to no stress. The military is low-stress because I have been doing it for 22 years, I know what to do.
Indeed, my wife and I are making a combined $180,000/year from our jobs. As much as freedom rings in our heads, we would be crazy to walk away from these stress-free jobs. Once we retire, in 4-5 years, we will have enough resources ($1 million in our dividend portfolio) to live a life of complete freedom.
I also want you to be free, especially on this Grand Independence Day Celebration. Why not celebrate your freedom from the employment tyranny as well? Let’s take a stroll down memory lane to help you replicate our journey.
The first thing we had to decide was to pay down debt or start investing. It was June 2019, and we were living a normal, stressful middle-class life. We had roughly $77,000 in debt from our cars, loans, house maintenance issues, and credit cards. It wasn’t a nightmare because we didn’t know any better. Looking back as a free man—it was a nightmare. Most of our discretionary income went to paying off debt.
We decided to start investing and pay down debt at the same time. *Spoilers* This is the best way to do it. Yes, paying down debt makes more logical sense because of high-interest loans. However, when you pay down debt, you don’t build the mindset of an investor. Building this mindset is the most crucial step on your road to wealth.
The mindset of an investor is a problem solver. Investors always want to build more revenue streams. Always. That is the job of an investor, to make their money turn into more money. So if you are only paying off debt, you do not see the bigger picture. You are looking at your paycheck and counting how much goes to paying off debt. An investor creates more paychecks.
That is exactly what we did. We started renting out rooms, and I got a side hustle teaching online for $35/hour. I began to learn about stocks, bonds, dividends, and interest. The more I learned about money, the more I wanted to learn about money. I thought I had a good grasp on everything—we were paying down debt and investing—until something happened.
I read the book “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” and all of Robert Kiyosaki’s subsequent books. This was the game-changer. I learned what financial independence was and how to achieve it. I consider that book a class on Financial Independence 101. I learned that I didn’t know enough, and I wasn’t doing enough.
So I jumped into the books, reading over 50 books in about eight months. And lo and behold, my wife and I went from that -$77,000 to $150,000 in 22 months. Now we are approaching $200,000 in liquid assets (dividend portfolio). Life is good. But on our journey, we had to learn about taxes, debt, leverage, and creating infinite returns.
The learning continues every day. I can never let my brain rest. I had written an article today, but then this idea popped into my head. So, here I am, writing more because I love it. That is the joy of being a free man; I have freedom of time and money.
Quick story. On Thursday, I was shopping at the base PX (post exchange) and just wandering around. My phone buzzed, and I checked it. I had received my monthly $13.63 dividend from AGNC (mortgage REIT). The cash drops right into my Cash App, and I could use my card at that very moment to buy something.
Right then and there, I knew the power of being rich. Passive income is the real deal. I was receiving money from the sky. I didn’t buy anything with that cash because I have tiny spending habits now. But how cool was that? I could have purchased a trinket or some fast food with that cash.
I wrote the article “How the Rich Buy Their Bling” on January 12th, 2021, when I wasn’t able to spend money like the rich. Now, being 100% debt-free and cash-flow rich, we can spend money like the rich.
If you don’t know, the rich don’t work for money—this means that they do not exchange time for money, like us. They buy real estate that pays rental income, or they create royalties. They also receive dividends on their investments.
Once they receive their rents, royalties, and dividends, sometimes called mailbox money, they use that income to buy what they want. So, what’s the difference between working a job and mailbox money? I mean, it is all cash, right?
The difference is that they aren’t working for their money, and it can keep paying them for as long as they hold the asset. Most of the time, their income continues to grow. You have to keep working for your cash. More hours, more money. Less hours, less cash. We need to free ourselves from this position of exchanging time for money.
More importantly, we need to free our children from exchanging time for money. It is a fool’s errand to spend a lifetime working to build someone else’s business, not building yours.
My wife and I still have a fantastic journey to continue. I am only 40, and she is younger than me. We have to set the kids up with businesses and real estate. Hopefully, they can manage their time and resources and can home-school their children. We need to buy our freedom; nobody else will.
An excellent resource to start your journey is an all-encompassing article titled “The Well-Rounded Millionaire.” It has all the information to get you started in business, real estate, cryptocurrency, and investing. Also, how to improve your mindset to envision a world of wealth.
Good Luck on your financial journey! Happy Financial Independence Day 2021! See you next year.
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Disclosure: I am not a financial advisor or money manager, and any knowledge is given as guidance and not direct actionable investment advice. I am an Amazon Affiliate. Please research any investment vehicles that are being considered. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it. I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
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