Reunion in Spain: Quality Time
I am still writing to you from Spain this week where I have the full gang together again. Harlie is back, and it’s great to be spending time with her as, between her getting older and me moving to Dubai, we don’t spend nearly as much time together as I would like.
But it is very much quality over quantity with her – so I am making the most of our time here. She’s an avid reader and learner at the moment (hopefully it lasts for her life ahead) so we had a bit of time on our own together a few days ago where we headed to the beach to chill out and read our books together.
Beach Day: A Lesson in Simplicity
For me, it was the only time in as long as I can remember when I almost switched off from work and connectivity. I told a few people that morning I would be out of contact for a bit, and when I got to the beach I threw my phone in a bag and ignored it.
We also went to a different beach area than normal as the place I normally like was full. I am a bit of a subbed snob and normally gravitate to big, comfy, expensive day beds! As we were only going for a few hours I didn’t fancy paying the £150 for the ones I usually like, and as it was late in the day most places were full and our options were limited.
So we ended up at an area of the beach I had never been to before and got a couple of little, old, green beds for £15 that were slanting down to the sea and I couldn’t even get my full body on them!
I lay there, closed my eyes, and thought…
‘I feel so relaxed and happy here. This £15 bed is just what I needed. I don’t need or want anything more so have I been going to the wrong places up until now?’
It really made me realise that we spend too much of our time chasing things we don’t really want, buying things we don’t really need, doing things to keep other people happy, and chasing a goal that when you get there doesn’t actually provide the life that you really want.
So the thoughts and lessons of today are: SET YOUR GOALS CAREFULLY AND BE SPECIFIC ABOUT WHAT YOU OPTIMISE FOR
You need to think hard about what you really want, and then look to reverse engineer it to make sure that actually happens.
Behind The Scenes
Think about what you really want. Not what other people are doing, or have, or what you think you should be doing because other people (or social media) say so.
I know many people look at my life and wish they could change places. To swap with what looks like a life of glamorous locations, fancy restaurants, exciting business deals and the toys of wealth & success.
But if I told you that I can’t ever remember doing less than 12 hours of work on a weekday, that I can’t watch a movie without having my laptop in front of me to do something, that if my phone is away from me for more than 5 minutes I get some kind of disconnection mental disorder and that I lay in bed every night struggling to sleep thinking about deadlines, my responsibilities to investors, the staff I want to kill and a million and 1 other problems, would you really want to swap with me?
Doesn’t sound as much fun as you thought does it?!
Re-evaluating Life Choices
The truth is that I didn’t think it through and I blindly followed a path in my early years that I have carried on unchecked. Maybe I had different aspirations back then. Maybe I just didn’t know any better because I was young and had no one to learn from.
I have followed a path that instead of creating exactly what I really want now has actually just built a rod for my own back.
Freedom Over Wealth
But the good news is it isn’t too late for me to make changes and correct my actions and path.
If you asked me what I really want, what would really make me happy, the answer is actually very simple. I want to be able to go to bed each night without having to ever set an alarm clock, I want to be able to turn my phone off for 24 hours and it does not make a difference to my life, and I want to play a shit load of Padel tennis and backgammon whilst doing it all with only the people I really want to hang out with.
The Power of Flexibility
You will all have your own versions of this goal, but I think the simple translation of it is that my goal is total FREEDOM, and therefore to create it I need to optimise for maximum INCOME.
And whilst I am not telling anyone else what they should want or do, I think creating a blueprint for income solves most problems and allows for most goals.
Don’t worry, I am not getting all woke and airy fairy on you! I still love business and always will. I love doing deals, love making money – but I want to do it all on my terms. (Or as much as is realistically possible). I have to ask myself why I am doing everything I do, suffering the headaches and the stress, if the end result isn’t what I truly want.
Laying on my shitty, green sunbed really made this hit home. I don’t need the expensive sunbed because it adds no value – what is making me happy is reading my book, lying next to someone I love, with my phone turned off and no problems on my mind.
I NEED TO OPTIMISE FOR INCOME
And most importantly, it needs to be income produced with the minimum of stress and the maximum of organisation. An organisation that can make me almost redundant. So if I want to turn my phone off, or go ‘dark’ on an excursion or holiday somewhere for a couple of weeks, nothing will change and I won’t be missed.
Having businesses, and owning assets may be ‘wealth’ but if those assets consume my time, cause me stress and don’t generate income then they aren’t helping me achieve my goals.
Let Me Give You an Example
I have 3 main residences and a boat that collectively have circa £5m of equity in them. As great as that may sound from a ‘wealth’ perspective, when you consider the servicing costs of any mortgages and running expenses it probably costs me over £500k a year to keep them all ticking over.
That’s £10k a week I have to find, no matter what else I have going on, to keep and maintain those assets. A huge commitment, plus no flexibility as I have the properties sitting there even if I don’t want to use them when my plans or geography change.
So owning fancy properties and assets in glamorous locations may sound good. It may tick boxes to flex on Instagram or perpetuate the myth about home ownership, but it isn’t contributing towards my goal of freedom and flexibility.
In fact, it is actually working completely against it.
If I am wanting to set myself up for less stress and pressure, and more flexibility and freedom, then I should be:
- Not tying up large amounts of capital and tying myself to large outgoings and expense
- Renting not buying
- Generating income not looking at potential capital gain
If I sold the properties and got rid of the boat it would free me up the £5m I have tied up in them, and immediately put an end to the 500k of outgoings.
I could then invest the $5m at circa 15% a year and be producing myself an income of £750k from it.
I can get 15% with my eyes closed! Almost no risk and certainly little to no stress.
750k rent a lot of houses! And it comes with the total flexibility of being able to hand the keys back on each one at the end of the month when I fancy something else instead.
A simple change in methodology and a completely different outcome. FREEDOM. FLEXIBILITY. NO STRESS.
I am not sure how Elena would feel about me selling our homes but the logic is clear to see!
The Importance of Clarity
Now to be clear, I am not here preaching to you to tell you to sell your cars and sell your houses, never buy Starbucks and join a monastery! I don’t care what you do. Do what makes you happy.
But if your actions and behaviours don’t create outcomes and results that help you achieve your goals – then something must be wrong, right?
We tend to build lives based on other people’s rules, ideals and opinions on what is ‘normal’. People who, by the way, are rarely happy and are full of their own problems. We consume media without a thought. Take advice from people with no right to be giving it. Take direction from people who are lost themselves. And then we wake up 1 day and wonder how the fuck we got to where we got to, and where the last 30 years went!
I know I am doing some things wrong – and if I make some changes I can get a lot closer to the outcome I want.
And I know you are too.
So go away this weekend and think hard about this. Be honest with yourself and think about what changes you could or should make.
And if you are feeling brave then send me an email and tell me about some of the things you are doing wrong and how you could make changes for the better. I would love to hear that this has resonated with some of you and that just 1 of you has made positive steps towards the life you actually want.
Until next week, enjoy.
