Pressing the Reset Button

As the editor and owner of Think Like A Rich Guy, I’m really glad our readers have been patient with the slow pace of growth of this website. I’ll explain the delays briefly, but spend more of this post telling you instead where we are going with it. TLRG began its life in mid-2017 as an idea for a money blog that focused less on practical money skills (because there are a lot of those already), and certainly not a personality blog (again, there are millions of them), but more about the study of money and how it interacts with us psychologically, spiritually, and yes, practically. But beyond that, how to finally master it. But my day job is as a financial planner and advisor to real people with real financial issues, so my constant attention had to be focused there first. Plus, in early 2017, we moved our family and my financial practice home to Denver, Colorado after living for a decade at the Texas / Mexico border in Brownsville. The transition took much longer than I anticipated. Getting old clients okay with virtual meetings, and new clients comfortable with an advisor who (at least early on) works from a home office, took much more time than I expected. And that part isn’t even finished yet, but thankfully, I’m really fine-tuning what I want my financial practice to be about, who it will serve, and how. Life likes to throw us surprises just to keep us moving forward.

Speaking of life’s surprises, in late July 2017, my family and I were involved in a very serious auto wreck that left me in the ICU for about 48 hours and recovering for weeks afterward. I had 3 spots of brain bleeding, two broken ribs, a broken jaw, internal bleeding in my left abdomen, and some very loose front teeth. Recovering alongside my wife a few weeks later gave me lots of time to reevaluate the direction of not only my life, but my professional ambitions, and how I wanted to best serve my “audience”, whether they be readers of this blog, clients of my financial firm, or friends, family and neighbors with whom I had the opportunity to bless.

So here’s what’s going to change here at TLRG:

First, I detest vanity. I’m writing this in blue jeans and a t-shirt on a Friday afternoon. I don’t want this site to be all about me. I have a lot of financial advisor friends and colleagues who marinate in their own egos, and about every financial blogger, podcaster, and TV guru is always all too interested in telling you all about how wonderful they are – how smart, how put-together, how successful they are (even when much of it is so much bullshit, whether it’s about their own success, the advice they give, or the money they’re making.) Some even try to dumb down their vernacular to make themselves seem “edgier”. (One very successful but increasingly cartoonish blogger even starts his emails with “HEYOOOOO”. I won’t be doing that lampoonish nonsense anytime soon.) Many blogs aren’t even written by the people who claim to be the authors. That’s not me, and that’s not what I want for this blog. I want it, instead, to be authentic, hard-edged, and most importantly, all about YOU. After all, you’re only reading this now because you want (or need) insight, practical tips, and coaching for your financial life and your success at work, family, faith, and friendships. In short, readers of this blog instinctively know they need to get their house in order. So I won’t spend much time trying to persuade you of that. What I will do, however, is show you practical, useful ways to get there. Most of you are going to be staunch do-it-yourself-ers, and I’m fine with that. In fact, I’m tailoring this blog to you. Along the way, however, you may decide it’s better to outsource some of the more involved parts of growing rich (it can be an all-day and very emotionally exhausting thing to watch your investments, for example). For you who decide to “tag” in some expert help, I’ll also give you resources for that. (Shameless plug and fair warning – sometimes the expert I promote will be me.) Sometimes I will recommend a product or service for which I have an affiliate or solicitor’s agreement. Most blogs do this to self-fund the cost and time to run an online presence like this one.  So, we’ll do that. But I have a day job, and I don’t need this blog to pay my bills. I just expect it to pay its own. One thing I do promise is that anything I suggest or recommend will either be something I personally use, or something that in my capacity as a professional financial planner (and legal fiduciary), I’d tell my own clients to use. As for the material you’ll read here, we’ll tackle this money challenge in several broad categories:

• Thinking Like a Rich Guy – Mindset and personality changes needed to really succeed. Essentially, how to get out of your own way.
• Reading Like a Rich Guy – Book, blog, video and podcast recommendations to help give you a needed kick in the pants, help you tackle a subject in detail, or provide expert advice that matters to our readers, but is beyond the scope of my experience and expertise. This will eventually turn into our very own Book Club.
• Working Like a Rich Guy – From tearing it up at work, to side hustles, to savvy small business ideas and more.
• Saving Like A Rich Guy – How to finally spend less than you earn, how to save it correctly, and when enough is enough.
• Spending Like A Rich Guy – We’re doing this, obviously, to better our standard of living and better the quality of life for our loved ones. We’re NOT doing this to impress the neighbors or so that we can hang in the appropriate social circles. Fuck that.
• Investing Like A Rich Guy – Rich Guys understand that they have to put money to work for them so they can stop working for it. We’re going to help you learn how to do that – – – to a point. Then I’m going to tell you to give your serious, “can’t afford to lose it” money to a professional to manage, so that you can keep working on the rest of your life.
• Growing Like a Rich Guy – Giving back, making an impact, taking care of what matters to you. Developing your sense of self not by looking inwardly, but by doing outwardly.
• Living Like a Rich Guy – Our play place. A chance to explore world-class vacations, actually accomplish our bucket lists, etc.

We’ll also be launching our new podcast, “Think Like A Rich Guy”, in January 2019, so check the site and make sure you’re subscribed to receive updates. Eventually, all of this material will be molded into a series of webinars and training materials we’re calling the “Think Like A Rich Guy Pro System”. And sometimes, there will be Guest Articles, from reputable sources on matters closely related to success and money. Sometimes their site and ours will each exchange an article, and other times I’ll post it just because I think it’s valuable to my readers. So there you have it. A new, hopefully very fresh idea in personal finance and success blogging. I’d love your feedback as we begin, so please leave your comments below each article, or drop me a line personally at jeremy@thinklikearichguy.com.