Wealthy individuals often maintain a distance from the outside world, displaying a deep sense of indifference. They establish the rules of the game and attract countless participants, ultimately reaping the rewards. For instance, diamonds being equated with love is a rule crafted through extensive advertising. If you don’t follow this narrative, your expression of love may seem less “pure.” As long as the majority of people buy into the same idea, it becomes a widely accepted norm, and this consensus gives rise to enormous business opportunities. Wealth then accumulates rapidly, but the wealthy rarely disclose this truth. After all, once ordinary people become aware, they might realize that many of the so-called “needs” in life are not as essential as they seem.
This is why very few beneficiaries of such norms will attempt to disrupt them. Instead, they will work tirelessly to uphold them. If you want to break free as an ordinary person, you must learn how to create your own rules. Simplify these rules and use them to attract your own users, ensuring they are willing to pay for the value you provide.
One crucial aspect of financial freedom is the speed at which you earn, or in other words, your labor efficiency. Take, for example, a bestselling author. An hour of their work could equal an entire month’s salary for a regular worker. The two are not in the same league. After several years, the author’s accumulated work might far surpass what someone could earn in a lifetime. Ultimately, making big money comes down to one thing: finding ways to exponentially increase your labor efficiency.
Poor people often believe that hard work leads to wealth, but true wealth isn’t built through effort alone—it’s built through judgment. Those who are bold enough to take risks within acceptable limits, and who possess a unique resolve, naturally find more opportunities to accumulate wealth.
Many times, poverty becomes a maze—an emotional and cognitive trap, fueled by our genetic instincts. If you aren’t born into wealth, it’s easy to stumble into this maze from adulthood and spend a lifetime trying to escape. The environment is incredibly powerful. When you are surrounded by a world where making money is difficult, it’s easy to internalize the belief that poverty is a fixed and unchangeable reality. But this isn’t the truth of society. If someone can choose the right direction earlier in life and dedicate themselves to it consistently, their wealth will accumulate far faster than the average person.
The best way for the underprivileged to rise is to fast-track their life, reduce wasted time and effort, and understand the rules of the money game as soon as possible. By doing this, they can wake up to the realities of the world earlier and start playing the game. Armed with knowledge, persistence, and execution, success will follow naturally.
At this moment, which money game are you playing? The level of wealth you achieve depends on your level of expertise, not on how hard you work. The more specialized your money-making skills are, the clearer you become in understanding the frameworks and systems of wealth accumulation. For example, a person who earns $100,000 a year follows a fundamentally different profit model than someone earning $10,000. You can double your income from $50,000 to $100,000 by working harder or getting a promotion, but it still involves trading time for money. However, if you want to jump from $100,000 to $1 million, you need a different system altogether.
Consider a content creator with hundreds of thousands of followers. They have multiple revenue streams: ad clicks, brand partnerships, and product commissions. These influencers aren’t just trading their time for money—they are selling attention, influence, and their personal brand. This creates a huge disparity in income.
Remember, working hard and pulling all-nighters might raise your income from $10,000 to $12,000, but after a certain point, your income model breaks down. You need to enter a new game to break through your income ceiling. Once you recognize that the current game you’re playing cannot help you achieve true wealth, and that another game is necessary, you will develop a new perspective on business and life. You’ll start designing your own life strategy.
Don’t worry about maintaining every relationship while making money. On the path to wealth, many of the relationships you believe in are illusions. You can judge people by what they say, but you can never know their true intentions. Trust is often based on mutual benefit, even in close relationships like those with family or a spouse. If you lose your value, you become a burden to others—this is the harsh reality of the world.
Never reveal your true thoughts or show all of your resources, or you might become a target for those who seek to take advantage of you. In this world, only the balance in your bank account will never deceive you. Regardless of betrayal or loss, as long as you have capital, you have the potential to make a comeback.
Life is about constant growth, self-reinvention, and the pursuit of wealth. The journey is long, full of highs and lows, but the only things that will always have your back are your savings, knowledge, and skills. Your value is everything, and human relationships begin and end based on that value. There is no betrayal or loyalty—only the exchange of value.