⚽️Football Finance💸

How to win in the sport of life🎯

In my early 20s, I read a bunch of personal finance books that perhaps weren't the best choice for me at the time. These put me in a frugal mindset. While I was saving money, this led to an overall feeling of scarcity, like a turtle sneaking back into its shell. In circle(s) of influence, this is what I meant when I said even the types of books you read could impact the direction of your life. So, it’s prudent to choose your influences wisely.

Let's take a football (soccer) analogy with the World Cup🏆going on. In sports terminology, I was playing defense.

You can't win a game playing just defense. If you ever watch a game where both teams are playing defense. It would be, well, quite boring. Nothing would really happen. It's kind of the same in life.

What I was missing was an offensive strategy. You need a strong offense to be able to score some goals and win the game. But you can't ignore the defense, either. If you have a strong offense but weak defense, while the game would be pretty exciting, you can easily get caught off guard, frustrated, and possibly even lose if the other team is using a more balanced approach.

A strong offense for me is the sport of entrepreneurship. I am using this to build my own app startup as well as build this newsletter, which is a revenue-generating product. I can use these to increase my income with variables I can better control. Entrepreneurship is what put me in a state of abundance and also gave me a sense of purpose. In fact, long before I even launched anything or made my first sale. And unlike football, there's no limit to how many goals you can score. And each goal scored can be worth a lot more.

A strong defense is what builds the safety net. It's the investments, savings, and assets you can use to protect (and grow) your income and build a buffer, or a launchpad for your creative endeavors, startup, or side hustle. While this might not be the most efficient strategy for creating wealth, you need this to avoid getting caught off guard by unexpected expenses or unforeseen events. A strong defense gives a sense of security, which is one of the fundamental human needs, after all. Can't leave home without it. Well then, perhaps all those years learning how to play defense came in handy for me after all! A quick reminder to always be grateful for how far you have come :)

And if we continue with the football analogy, you'd also need a solid middle to pass the ball around. The middle is the glue between the offense and defense. It's having the cash flow from the two ends of the pitch and understanding how money works and the best way to allocate it. It would also involve enjoying your wealth and not hoarding or splurging it all (I’ve sampled both ends, and it ain’t fun). It's the balance or harmony, or the overall sense of stillness or calm that everything is working like a well-oiled machine.

I've found it's wise to have all three to live life by your own rules in the long term. It's worth analyzing the balance every now and then to ensure your team in the game of life is functioning optimally.

Then you can focus on scoring as many goals as you want.🔥🥅🔥

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But wait! There’s more …

As a bonus for premium subscribers, here are the books I wish I had read instead. These would have helped me build the three pillars of a better strategy instead of just ‘parking the bus,’ as they say.