Keys To Building Wealth

Building wealth and prosperity is one of the most powerful things we can do to leave a legacy for ourselves and the ones we love. To achieve our destiny requires it, to be fueled by consuming goals and actively envision the steps we have to take in order to create it, is the very threshold of the global capitalistic system that has consumed for the most part, all the nations of the Earth. 

However, this article is not what you believe. True wealth is not materialistic, but rather the quality of our lives and experiences and our true immersion in what really matters. 

Emotional & Spiritual Wealth 

What really matters to human beings? In the end it's not money, it's the quality and meaning of our relationships with each other. It's family, it's a good marriage, it's lifelong and fulfilling friendships and it's learning about ourselves and having a spiritually intimate relationship with the universe at large. This is many things to many people. 

• Make relationships a priority, as part of your road-map to personal fulfillment. 

A Happy Wife is a happy Life

• Invest and plan having your dream family early in life. Envision it and create it, plan it as much as possible so when it happens you will be prepared to be the best parent you can be. 
• Cultivate meaningful friendships, keep in touch and acquire new friendships at every state of life. 
• Go out of your way to do kind acts in your community, to strangers and pride yourself at serving the ones you love. 
• Volunteer, give to charity and always think about giving more back to the world than it has given to you, if that is even humanely possible. 

Experiential Wealth 

• Cultivate a lifestyle where you are passionate about things outside of work alone. Develop lifelong hobbies of intrinsic value that strengthen and add dimensions to your identity that are rewarding in themselves. 
• Fully experience inner travel (books, spirituality, meditation, philosophy, self-introspection) and outer travel (travel, knowing others of different cultures, community involvement, learning foreign languages). 
• Pursue an art form, that manifests beauty and your inner soul qualities. It could be anything: drawing, painting, music, writing, poetry, dance, gardening, knitting, cooking, sculpture, etc.
• To experience life fully, you will have to maintain a healthy body, a sound mind and a joyous heart. To make choices that are detrimental to either of these, is pure self-sabotage and should be done only at your own risk & grave peril.  

Economic Wealth 

However, know that it is impossible to lead a self-actualized lifestyle, without a solid economic foundations. All of the above is difficult, if not impossible without adequate financial planning and making the highest ROI of the major financial decisions of your life. Be the CEO of your own life: 

• Find a financially compatible spouse, someone who shares the same values on spending, saving and investing, that you can work together equally and ambitiously who values a similar financial strategy in life. 
• Debt is a poor economic life habit, unless it is absolutely necessary, do not take on debt, loans, credit card debt or otherwise any unsound debt that you may regret. Work tirelessly to extinguish all debt, mortgage, student loans, etc. 
• Choose a career that will have a high profit margin now and in the future, even if it requires more work, more hours studying and a longer work week, this will mean more hours later of leisure in the 2nd half of life. 
• Make sure the jobs you choose are roles, positions and in domains & industries that you enjoy (if not love), that will set yourself up for the best possibility of succeeding. If you enjoy what you do, you will already have an advantage over 80% of people. 
• Change your relationship with $ money, realize that it is just a symbol to provide you with what you need & require, not a power to get what you want or objects/status/prestige you wish possess. You cannot truly possess anything, as in life, everything changes and you will die one day. Try to see money as a means to more cultured ends, not as a means in and of itself.  
• In the informative age, it's great to value your labor and have a strong work ethic as one of your commodities, but don't be fooled, it's ideas, innovation, planning and strategy that can make you a good business person. It's social skills and truly caring about the world that will make you a good leader. To be an obsessive workaholic won't necessarily make you a success. 
• Challenge yourself to not be motivated by overcoming inferiority, greed, power, influence or fame, but by higher values like self-growth, social progress, team-building, collective-utility and humanistic leadership. It's great to have a nose for profit, but remember its empty profit if its only motivated by self-interest. People respect others who have integrity and money is attracted to people that others respect. Promotions will come easier, coworker relations will be better, and mentors will come knocking. 
• In every organization and in every interaction, always attempt to give more value than you take. It's golden and it leads to high level reciprocity and empowerment. This means, focusing on others in a positive light. 
• Be disciplined, be courageous and task risks. Have an entrepreneur spirit, for some opportunities come literally only once in a lifetime. If the world makes you an offer, don't gamble too hard, but don't be stingy and take the beaten path too often either. Make tough choices, for a high probability of better rewards. Weigh the pros and cons of every ROI. 
• Avoid conspicuous consumption, consuming will not fulfill you. We live in a world of disgraceful proposition of inequality. Have a conscious and not only spend within your means, but be humble and live with dignity, don't embellish simply because you can, while many others around have to go without. Capitalism that thinks never-ending growth is normal is not actually functional. 
• Wealth builders delay immediate and short-term gratification to follow a long-term strategy. Train yourself to save more than you spend, it's really that simple. Invest your savings smartly and surround yourself with people who live like you do. 
• Leverage your time, network, knowledge-base and personal resources optimally so as to enable you to work smarter, rather than harder. We have to work for 55 years, it's not a race, it's a lifestyle and it represents the chief investment of our lives. 
• Treat your wealth like a business, identify your competitive advantages and the unique selling point of your wealth generation and wealth retention strategies and stick to it. Be sincere with your wealth, as you will have to be your own CEO, CFO, COO and CMO at all times.