Hello Believe Nation. I started the Mentor Me series with the goal to try to learn from people who’ve done a lot more than us. And by hanging around them a little bit longer, hopefully some of their attitudes and mindsets, their belief, seep into us to help us become the best version of ourselves.
So today, we’re going to learn from Dave Ramsey. Mentor me, Dave.
And as always guys, as Dave is talking, if he says something that really resonates with you, please leave it in the comments below and put quotes around it so others can be inspired as well. Enjoy.
#1: Choose To Be Hero
A lot of people that want to argue that opportunity is gone in America, the core reason that they want to argue that it can’t be done today, is because if they admit that it can be done today, then they also simultaneously would have to admit that they haven’t done it.
If I admit that you can go become a millionaire today, and I’m not one or I’m not on a track to go get that, then it means I’m not doing what I need to do. It’s convicting to them when I say that.
“We want you to be the hero. We want you to take life by the horns, grab it, and shake it and make life behave.” – Dave Ramsey
Because it just puts a mirror in front of them that says, “You ought to go win.” And then they go, “Well I’m not winning.” And, “I feel bad about me for not winning.” And, “Nobody gave me a participation trophy this week. “
And so, I’ve actually got to get up “and you mean I’ve got to go do something different “than I’m doing now?” And they become convicted, and then they become very angry. “Oh, yes it is, yes it is, yes it is. “Yeah, the economy is rigged.” Of course, the more liberal, you know somebody’s a real liberal if they say, “There are systemic problems with the economy.”
If they use the work systemic. Because it makes them sound sophisticated for being a victim. And you can be a sophisticated victim or you can be an unsophisticated victim. In either case, you’re just a victim. And, what we challenge you to do here is be the hero.
We don’t want you to be the victim. We want you to be the hero. We want you to take life by the horns, grab it, and shake it and make life behave. Is it going to be perfect? No!
Are you going to run into problems? Yes! Are you going to be oppressed by fools and people that don’t agree with you, that discriminate against you?
Yes! Count on it! 88% of America’s millionaires are still first-generation rich. And only 1% of them are actors, athletes, and rock stars. Most of ’em are small business owners. They’re in sales, something like that. They’re just folk.
They just decided to live different than normal people who spend everything they make and act like they’re in Congress. They made a decision to live differently. Now you can choose a victim mentality due to your liberal politics, due to your shame about your position. You can choose a victim mentality.
But I can 100% guarantee that you will not win choosing that mentality. I want you to choose the hero. I want you choosin’, in spite of the obstacles, in spite of the people that put you down, in spite of the people that tell you it can’t be done, in spite of your sixth grade teacher or your mean mother-in-law. In spite of whoever it is, go do it anyway! Go win anyway!
#2: Bother To Care
If you bothered to care about your career, you’d be at work 10 minutes early, stay 10 minutes late and actually work while you at work and get off the freakin’ Facebook.
I don’t know how you people get anything done between your Twitter account and your Facebook account. Try workin’ while you’re at work. You’ll stand out, ’cause nobody else does.
Try working, telling the truth, and smiling while you’re at work. You’ll get a promotion in a month. ‘Cause you’re standin’ among a bunch of cows, and all of a sudden you’ll stick up and you won’t look like a cow anymore.
Moooooh! Moooooooh! Moooooooooh! How do you stand out from the herd? Tell the truth, smile, and work while you’re at work. Wow!
What a culture we live in that it’s that easy to be a big dog. You do that for 15 years, you can change your whole family tree. You do it for 15 days, people will start noticing it. You do it for 15 weeks, you’ll be runnin’ the whole place. Alright, you know what I’m talkin’ about!
“If you bothered to care about your career, you’d be at work 10 minutes early” – Dave Ramsey
If you take that piece of information, I can drop you in the middle of any city, let you get any menial job at any little stupid thing you do, and pretty soon you’ll be running the place or owning the place.
Just ’cause you’re intentional.
You do become what you think about. Bother. Bother to care. Tell your money what to do. Don’t be sitting down and looking at your tax return and going, “We made $85,000. “Can somebody tell me where it went?” Well you lost it because you pissed it away.
You had no idea what you were doing. You were lost as a ball in tall weeds. You watch 38 hours of television every week. You know exactly who got thrown off the island, but you don’t know what happened to your $85,000.
How’s that for stupid? That’s stupid, America! It’s stupid! And then sit around and whine and act like a victim and act like somebody did something to you. Nobody did anything to you.
Roll up your sleeves and be a grown-up. Adults devise a plan and follow it. Children do what feels good. If you will bother, you can have a fabulous marriage. You can have great kids. You can have money and a career. Isn’t that neat?
#3: Be Hungry
One of the sayings I use all the time, is if you’re sick and tired of being sick and tired, then you’re ready to change. People only change their lives when they finally say, “I’ve had it.” That’s a Les Brown quote.
And he used to say something else. That if you’re going to win in any area of your life, and just generally in your life, you have to be not hungry, but hungry. That was the way he said it.
And I like that ’cause it’s a little more visceral, right? You have to be hungry. You have to have this desire to win. And I’m just reading a book by a friend of mine, Patrick Lencioni, The Ideal Team Player, when you’re hiring team players.
They need three virtues, three attributes that they have when you’re hiring them. One of them is they need to have this hunger. They need to be hungry. You got to be hungry man.
“hungry means you’re going to do what it takes to win.” – Dave Ramsey
And let me just tell you, people that intellectually want to change things, they’re think tank goobs, they don’t get anything done. People that intellectually want to change their lives, they don’t change anything.
But when people get viscerally involved, their emotions and their soul is speaking. They hungry. That’s when they change things. And this is what I want to challenge you to do with your money.
The people who get out of debt, the people who are able to build wealth in the culture today that we live in, they’re everywhere. They’re everywhere. But one of the characteristics, one of the virtues they share, just like an ideal team player shares this virtue, is they’re hungry. Being hungry is a decision.
It’s a work ethic thing. But it’s a motor that’s running down inside of you. And I will not be denied the kind of thing happening inside of you.
And so when you lay out your get out of debt plan, when you lay out your budget with your spouse. And if you’re married or not married, you lay it out in single.
When you’d lay out your plan, you got to get hungry. And hungry means you’re going to do what it takes to win.
This debt is goin’ down. We’re going to amputate the Tahoe. We’re going to sell so much stuff, the kids think they’re next. We’re going to put the dog on eBay, and the cat on Craigslist. I mean there’s stuff going to move around here, ’cause I’m hungry! Something’s got to change.
Something’s got to move. My life is not okay. I got to change some stuff in my marriage. I got to change some stuff in my physical condition. I got to change some stuff in the way I attack at work and the way I get things done and the level of, “Bring it,” and ownership I have at work. The level of, “Complete a project with excellence “and a smile at work.”
The way you do things, you got to be hungry, man! And when you do that, it changes everything. Now I’m not saying you have to be fired up and runnin’ around with your hair on fire all the time, but it’s a thing down inside.
It’s a heart thing, it’s not a head thing. And people who are high performers in anything, any area of their lives, we call them successful. They’re hungry. And you know what?
You can just decide today to be hungry. Be hungry, startin’ right now. Go for it, baby. That’s how it’s done.
#4: Take Responsibility
The reason they check your receipts at Costco and Sam’s on the way out the door, is not to make sure you didn’t shoplift, it’s because it’s federal law you spend $200 or you’re not allowed out.
I think it’s easy if we sit here and discuss it a minute to think about $100. Now, $100 is a lot of money. But $100 invested every month, every month from age 25 to age 65 averaging 12% in a good growth stock mutual fund or Roth IRA, is $1,176,000.
So if you’re listening to this show, and you are under 40 years old, and you don’t retire with a million dollars, that’s no one’s fault but yours. IT’S YOUR FAULT in this country, if you retire broke. It’s your fault! Because you made a freaking fortune in your working lifetime.
You work your BUTT off your WHOLE LIFE, and you have NOTHING to show for it. NOTHING! It’s ridiculous. It’s absolutely ridiculous. America, it is way past time for a renaissance in the art of personal finance.
It is way past time for you to get your freaking act together. For every one of you listening to not retire a millionaire, is absurd! It’s ABSURD! Average household income in America today is $50,000.
If you save 15% of that, that’s $7500 a year. If you do that, and deduce it in your 401K with no match, into Roth IRAs, into good growth stock mutual funds, you would retire with around seven and a half million dollars, if you save 15% of your income. “I don’t know if I agree with your set of assumptions.” Well, shut up!
Unless you do something about it. Because my set of assumptions have made me rich. So why don’t you use my set of assumptions instead of your set of assumptions, ’cause you’re sitting on your assumption doing nothing.
It’s time for you to get up off your assumption and go save some money. Way past time! Don’t you think?
So, maybe I’m wrong. Seven and a half million. Let’s say I’m half wrong. Say you end up with three million bucks. SHUT UP!
#5: Stop The Stupid
Have you ever done something really dumb and you just wake up feeling like the fool that you are? (laughing) I guarantee you, I have. I’ll guarantee you I have.
I have a PhD in D-U-M-B. I had one of my detractors, and there are many of them on the web, especially these days. And I think a lot of them use Twitter as a hobby. But saying the other day that, “So Ramsey, what are your qualifications “for teaching what you teach? “You’re not qualified.”
Yeah, right. You don’t see all the scars, buddy. I got a PhD in D-U-M-B, man. I’ve done it all. I have made every stupid mistake that can be made, except I never bought a timeshare.
That’s the one I haven’t done. (laughing) But I think I’ve done every one of the other ones, it was dumb. I mean, credit cards, man I had ’em. I used to get credit cards to get credit cards. Literally, I got credit cards to get credit cards.
I would buy subscriptions to financial magazines because they would sell their list to pre-approved credit card companies and I’d get pre-approved credit cards. I was an expert at getting pre-approved, I had a bazillion credit cards. I actually bought several houses on credit cards. I used credit cards to buy a house, one time. I was buying and selling real estate and this idiot in one of these zero-down financial, or zero-down real estate weekend seminars convinced me and wrote the rest of the audience or some of the rest of the audience that you could buy a house on a credit card. So I did it. I went and got enough credit cards, I bought a house on a credit card. A series of credit cards. I just took cash advances on ’em, closed on the house. That’s how dumb I am. I better say it differently. That’s how dumb I was. And you know the idiot teaching that thing? The only bigger idiot was the one in the room, me. He was stupid for teaching it, but I was dumber than him. I actually went and did it. (laughing) I tried to lease a car one time. You all remember those old cars? I don’t even know if they make ’em anymore. Peugeot, a French car. I don’t know what was wrong with me I had lost my mind, I think.
And I decided I needed a Peugeot. So I tried to lease a Peugeot, and they laughed me out of there because they pulled up my credit and saw that I had millions of dollars borrowed on all these houses and all these credit cards to buy houses, and all of this stuff I was doing. And they’re like, “Dude, the last thing you “need’s another payment on it.” Dude, I got payments, that’s why I got money. I’m rich. (laughing) And they’re like, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.” They basically ran me off the car lot and I ended up talking to my banker and he loaned me money to buy a Jaguar. And so, that was the difference. That’s how stupid I was. Man, I have done so many stupid things with money. I actually, when I got out of school, one of Sharon’s old, she was a fraternity, or what do you call it? A little sister to a fraternity. So this fraternity guy that she knew came and called on us and sold us a whole life life insurance policy. I bought a whole life policy, you all. That’s how dumb I am.
I had credit cards, I had car loans, I had a boat loan, I borrow on anything, man. And then I lost everything because of that. I was foreclosed on. I was sued. I was sued so many times the little guy bringing the lawsuit papers, we were like on a first-name basis with the old boy. I mean, I was sued, and sued. I didn’t just go down, I went down in flames. The fire was so big, it made the newspaper. Boy wonder-child, 20-something millionaire goes broke. You talk about bein’ shamed, and then ashamed. Being humiliated and then being humble. You ever been there? Maybe you didn’t have to go down that big. Maybe you weren’t as stupid as I was. But you’ve done some stupid stuff, too. The question this show is about is, what are you going to do with the mess you’ve made? What’s the next chapter in your book? Are you going to keep doing the same thing over and over again, and expect a different result? Are you going to keep eating like you’re eating and expecting your waistline to change? Are you going to keep spending like you’re spending, not communicating with your spouse, leasing cars using a stupid credit card, buying whole life policies and timeshares, and then scratching your head and wondering why, in the richest country in the world, you’re still freaking broke? Are you going to keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect a different result? The 12-steppers say that’s the definition of insanity.
You keep doing what you’ve been doing, you’re going to keep getting what you’ve been getting. You plant corn, don’t be shocked corn grows. “Look at that! “Where’d that corn come from?” You dummy, you put it in the ground. You plant poison, you know what grows? Poison. Don’t be shocked. “Where’d that come from?” You planted it. The Bible says we reap what we sow. That’s all that means. We live in a cause and effect world. When you go around doing stupid, your life’s going to look desperate and broke all the time and your life’s going to look like a dad-blamed country song. I know, I’ve been that country song. I know exactly what it looks like. Keep the dog out of the street, he’s going to get hit next. I mean, there’s something going on out here. A three-legged dog named Lucky. I mean what’s, really. Seriously. But we live our lives this way and you walk around acting like everything’s okay carrying that purse, wearing those shoes, driving that car, going on that vacation, and you’re just plain stupid. And inside, you know it. The thing is, I’m trying to tell you you’re not any different than anybody else. Most people are stupid when it comes to money. That’s why most people are broke. They look good, they’re driving nice stuff that they can’t afford, they’re going on vacations they can’t afford, they’re living in a place they can’t afford, they eat out every freaking night like they don’t have a stove. At least learn to use a dad-blamed microwave.
I mean, seriously, when are you going to change? You work your whole life, for what? An illusion? A facade? Why don’t you work your life right, and become wealthy? You make enough money to become wealthy. But you got to take stupid out of the equation. And you got to take fakin’ it out of the equation. One of the biggest benefits of me going broke was I no longer care what you think. It’s really freeing. I drive a really nice car now. Some people don’t like that. I don’t care. When I was driving a junk car, people made fun of that. I don’t care. I don’t drive a car for you, I drive a car for me. You ain’t ridin’ in my car. So shut up. When you don’t care what people think, it changes everything you guys. So what are you going to do about you? See, you can win. You got this. But you got to stop the stupid. It’s time to unplug it.
Thank you guys so much for watching. I hope you enjoyed. I’d love to know what did you like most about this video? What lesson did you take that you’re going to apply to your life or your business somehow? Please leave it in the comments below. I’m going to join in the discussion. I also want to give a quick shout-out to Steph. Steph, thank you so much for picking up a copy of my book, Your One Word, and making that awesome YouTube video about it. I really, really, really appreciate it.
I will, with this, I’m going to start 2017 rocking my new year. So thank you guys again for watching, I believe in you. I hope you continue to believe in yourself and whatever your one word is. Much love, I’ll see you soon. (dramatic swooshing) (ricocheting bangs)
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