| (...Continued
From Prosperity 7 secrets Pt 2)
The Rockefeller Rules
As I said earlier, money is
a game. If you know the rules, you win. And if you don't know
the rules, you don't win. Warren Buffett, who became the world's
wealthiest stock market multi-billionaires has two important
rules. Rule #1. Never lose money. Rule #2. Never forget rule
#1. And here are some other simple rules to the Money Game..
Every dollar is a money seed.
You can grow rich on the money
you're now wasting.
You can't make poor decisions
today and expect to be rich tomorrow.
The longer you wait to get
started the steeper the climb.
A dollar squandered today
destroys a hundred thousand future dollars.
And since you are planning
on spending a lot of time in the future, it would be nice
to have plenty of money there waiting for you when you arrive.
Wouldn't it? So if valuing money is skill #1. What are the
other 6 skills? Let just say, that a couple of the skills
are hidden in the following quote from a book called Kids
and Cash about the Rockerfeller family. Let's see if you can
pick them out.
According to Nelson Rockerfeller,
the one time Vice President of the United States, his father
John D. Rockerfeller, Jr, gave each of his five sons an allowance
"We got 25 cents a week, and had to earn the rest of
the money we got." To earn part of that extra money he
raised vegetables and rabbits..."We always worked. All
the boys were required to keep personal daily account books.
They were required to give 10 percent of their income to charity,
to save 10 percent, and to account for all the rest."
They had to balance their account books every month and to
be able to tell what happened to every penny they earned.
(From the book, Kids and Cash Ken Davis and Tom Taylor 1979
Oak Tree Publications)
The Rockerfeller kids were
taught a specific pattern for dealing with their money. I
call them the Rockerfeller rules.
Work for all you get
Give away the first 10%.
Pay yourself the next 10%.
Live on the rest.
Account for every penny.
Isn't it interesting that
Rockerfeller made his kids learn the habit of work? But why
do you think Mr. and Mrs. Rockerfeller taught their kids to
give the first 10% to charity? Now, if you're an atheist or
an agnostic, or in any way squeamish about the subject of
God, you'd better skip over this section. It's just going
to make you all grumpy. But if you believe there is a Supreme
Being, then, read on. The Rockerfellers, like almost all of
the great American billionaires, looked upon their wealth
as a sort of spiritual stewardship. They believed that God
gave them the money. It wasn't theirs...they just were caretakers
over it. They felt a duty to manage it for the betterment
of others...while thoroughly enjoying it themselves, of course.
If every dollar they received was a gift from God, they were
glad to pay 10% of it back. (Andrew Carnegie gave all of his
wealth away before his death.) You'd be surprised how many
very successful and very wealthy people today and throughout
the past 200 years have felt the same. God, for them, was
always the best silent partner. And they didn't do too badly
for God and his children, either. Today, the Ford Foundation
gives away hundreds of millions of dollars PER YEAR to various
charities. The Rockerfeller foundation gives away almost 50
million dollars.
I wonder if God knew this
was going to happen. Looking down on the earth in the late
1800's did he say to himself. "To whom shall I give the
idea for the automobile? And which lucky person is going to
end up with the concept of oil? Hmmmm...let's see. There's
that Rockerfeller fellow. He's going to end up pretty decent.
And most of his money is eventually going to go to help others.
I think he should get a big chunk of oil. There's that scrappy
Henry Ford down there in Michigan. He's got a few glaring
blemishes but eventually, the money he makes with this idea
is going to belong to his foundation and will bless millions
of people. Let's give him a big chunk of the automobile."
How did Bill Gates end up
with the computer? Or Andy Gove with the silicon chip? Or
the guy (what was his name anyway?) who started Amazon.com?
These days, billions can be made and lost in a single day
in the stock market. Who's going to get the next billion dollar
concept? Do you deserve to get it? What would you do with
it if you got it? Could God trust you with it? Would you squander
it? Or would you be a wise steward over it? Would there be
anything left to bless the lives of others? Tough questions.
I would encourage you that, no matter what your financial
circumstances, invest 10% right off the top in your favorite
charity or church. If you don't know where to put it, follow
your heart. One day, all the money in the world, will not
keep your heart beating. Sharing 10% with others will remind
you that God owns everything and we're transients here.
Now, after you pay the first
10% to your "Silent Partner" you need to pay yourself
next. In the classic, "The Richest Man in Babylon,"
George S. Clayson tells the story of the wise investor whose
primary rule was, "A part of all you earn is yours to
keep." (If you haven't read this book yet, buy it today
and read it.) And then, when these two items are taken care
of, Live on the rest. Make the decision that, starting today,
you will no longer go into debt to support your lifestyle.
You're going to live below your means...no matter what. It
may take you months to turn your spending patterns around
(for an oil tanker to change course 180 degrees takes many,
many hours and hundreds of miles to accomplish...you're like
that tanker, it will take time to turn your financial bad
habits into good ones...so be patient with yourself.
And finally, Account for every
penny.
This is the part that all
of us seem to hate so much...accounting for every penny. I
remember when I was doing my initial research, I looked, in
vain, for a way out of this requirement. It seemed every successful
money manager I interviewed was scrupulously meticulous about
knowing where every penny went. And, of course, this was the
exact opposite of my personality. Although my father was an
accountant, I just didn't seem to be blessed with the same
genes. I knew how to spend money really well...but I couldn't
save a dime. One day I woke up and realized that in my business
career I had literally gone through millions of dollars in
profits and royalties. If I had religiously saved 10% of that
income...if I had lived the Rockerfeller rules...I should
have had a bank account filled with millions of dollars. But
I didn't. I asked myself...of all the millions that had gone
through my life, couldn't I have lived on 10% less. Of course,
and that's when I started to live this rule.
Now, I know that the subject
of budgeting and saving and penny pinching seems tedious to
most Americans (as it did to me for most of my adult life),
yet, I can also attest to the fact that these skills or habits
must become part of your life if you ever hope to achieve
any measure of financial success. Don't give me your old excuses.
I used all of them myself at one time or another and not one
of them every made me richer. Don't you dare tell me you're
not good at math, or that you hate to balance your checkbook,
or that you don't have a head for numbers, or that you never
went to college, or that you don't know how to work a calculator,
or that your spouse takes care of that stuff, or that you
don't have the time, or that life is short and that you'd
better enjoy it while you can. Odds are, you're going to live
to a hundred years old...that's thirty five years past retirement...
and you must plan for it by taking charge of your finances
NOW.
You can't delegate this to
anyone. You've got to do it. Truth is, nobody can watch over
your money like you can. (Farmers have a saying that the best
fertilizer is the farmer's own shadow.) Strangely enough,
when you make the commitment to watch every penny, the dollars
start to add up quicker. If compound interest can make a single
dollar bill grow into a million dollars...then it can also
make a single penny grow into a million pennies... and that's
ten thousand dollars. From a single penny? Have you ever walked
by a penny on the sidewalk and not picked it up because it
was just a penny? The truth is, that hidden beneath that penny
is a pile of a million pennies. Pick up that penny and invest
it right.
(Continued
in Prosperity 7 Secrets Pt 4...)
(Continued
in Prosperity 7 Secrets Pt 5...)
(Continued
in Prosperity 7 Secrets Pt 6...)
Authors Details: Robert G. Allen -
Prosperity, 7 Secrets.
His colossal bestseller Nothing Down established Robert
Allen as one of the most influential investment advisors
of all time. Also the author of 'The One Minute Millionaire' |
|
