A Wealthy Life in Practice

The Five Principles of A Wealthy Life are being Clear about what you want–because without clarity, there is no roadmap and there is no direction. Next: being in Control. For me, that is very much about financial control, so when you are fully in control of your finances, maybe what you want to do is get in control of your mindset. And when you’re in control of your finances and your mindset, the next time round, you might be more in control of your business and your investments.

Next, it’s very much about understanding the Resources that you have, the assets that you have access to and the assets that you can control without ownership, because then you are looking to leverage them. So you have Resources–these are your assets and Leverage – which is where you are making sure that those resources are working for you – and, ultimately, Legacy – the meaning you wish to give to your life and memory; the “why” behind your wealthy life.

I’m going to share with you very briefly, two stories of clients that I’ve worked with so you can get a sense of a wealthy life in practice. These clients particularly benefitted from reevaluating their Clarity and Control and had amazing results.

The first person I want to write about is Susie. Susie was a social worker when I met her, and she was living an extremely stressful life. Her home life was great. Her work life – quite awful. She came to me wanting initially to invest in property so that her husband could retire, so that they could replace his income and he could scale back and spend more time doing what he enjoys.

The irony is that if we now come forward, say six years, I would say Susie’s got six properties that she has managed for a number of years. And these properties have enabled Susie to give up work. As soon as the income from the properties kicked in their whole financial situation changed, and it was Susie who stepped back. She’s gone from an exhausted social worker to being retired and loving time with her grandchildren. And this is the interesting thing about Clarity.

She was very clear why she wanted to invest in poverty. but having gone through the process, her Clarity is completely different. She initially wanted to help her husband to retire, but in fact has retired herself. Now, this doesn’t mean that going through the exercise of Clarity is pointless because the end result won’t be what you start with; if you don’t start with something, then you will never get set on the journey. Because Susie was very clear about what she wanted, she took those steps forward. The irony is that she got more than she bargained for at the other end. The outcome was even better than she thought.

Now let me give you an example using my client, Ross. Ross came to me, as many men do, saying things like “I want to give up work. I don’t see my children.” He commuted to central London for a very intense job. Yes, he might have liked his job, but he realized that his children were getting older and he was missing out and there were family stories where they would say “we did this, we did that!”

But daddy wasn’t there. He was missing out. After we created a strategy and a portfolio, here we are eight years later, and he has got five properties, a mixture of different kinds. Interestingly, what he thought he wanted to do, which was give up work altogether, shifted and he actually changed jobs and took on another demanding role for a while. Now, though, he has finally given up work completely and created his own business. So, not only has he got his property portfolio, but he has now created another business on the side and he feels like he’s in control of his time.

So, his Clarity was “I want to give up work.” It turned out a bit different than he had imagined, because he’s given up a job and now created a new business – he is still working. But what he’s got is Control of his time, the feeling like he is setting his own destiny, which he didn’t have before. So, Clarity is very important. You might start with it, you might come to it halfway through, but it’s very definitely a principle that puts a magnifying glass on everything. And that magnifying glass brings your priorities and dreams into focus and speeds up the process.

This week’s lesson is that addressing Clarity – really getting clear on your goals and on your dreams as early as possible – is invaluable as you build your wealthy life. That being said, things do change. My clients knew they wanted a change, they knew they wanted more freedom. But, in the end, how they achieved that and what that ultimately looked like surprised them a little bit. Get clear, but stay adaptable.

If you are interested in learning more about creating a wealth plan, make sure you listen to my podcast A Wealthy Life, and look at the free resources I offer like the Readiness to Retire Wealthy Audit. For more impactful wealthy life tips, please visit my website www.vickiwusche.com, listen to my podcast here and here, or schedule a free call with me.