Friends have started to realize that I’ve managed to make a little money in my life. As such, I keep getting asked about topics like passive income, investing, budgeting, and paying off debt.
What I try to explain is that the way I see it, if you want to actually change your financial life, you first have to change your mindset. If you want to start a business or chase passive income, you have to know that it takes time. And if you’re just starting down the road of investing or paying off debt, it’s not going to happen overnight.
Whenever I was asked about these things I would try to rattle off everything, which would of course make my friends eyes glaze over. Ultimately, I sat down to make a list of resources that have helped me along this path. I hope this helps you on your journey to financial independence.
Starting a small business and making it profitable:
Smart Passive Income – Look under Free Resources. Both the blog and the guides are what helped me create my smart home affiliate website. Pat is actually a disciple of Tim Ferris who “found his muse,” and I have more on Tim later. I followed a lot of Pat’s getting started guides about ten years ago. He has a lot more content these days, but this got me started. After I set up my site, I started making side money after two years and 100 blog posts.
The Million Dollar Weekend – I’m in the middle of reading this. It’s a good blueprint on how to come up with business ideas and then launch. This isn’t exactly necessary, but maybe helpful to get ideas.
The 4-Hour Work Week – Tim Ferris and this book were huge motivators for me when I was stuck at a dead end job. This is what got me on the work from home path and pushed me towards the passive income idea. There are so many great tools and ideas in this book that I leave it sitting out just to flip through for motivation.
r/JustStart – A great Reddit sub to get ideas and to push yourself to just start a blog or YouTube channel. These days there are far too many people posting about their success instead of trying to help others, but it’s been a decent resource nonetheless.
Think and Grow Rich – Another book that helped me get out of the dead end job funk. This was the inspiration for The Secret. To save a lot of time, the secret is to believe in yourself and leverage your talents to make money. Napoleon Hill is actually one of the worlds most successful con men because of this book and his other schemes, but it’s still inspirational.
The War of Art and Turning Pro exist between starting a business and cultivating a mindset, but I’ve only read summaries of them. They’re on the list for Fall.
Money and mindset
Dave Ramesy’s Total Money Makeover – This is THE book, and THE plan on getting out of debt and staying that way. Putting the religious overtones aside, Dave has helped millions of people, some of which didn’t even know they were in bad financial situations, shore up their lives. I followed Dave’s plan for years, although after I got rid of the first few debts I switched to the debt avalanche method. I use Dave’s calculators on his website to forecast things all the time. He also has a YouTube empire and many content creators on his staff covering everything you can think of.
I Will Teach You to be Rich – Ramit is the “Fuck saving on latte’s, go make more damn money” guy. He’s also written the blueprint to automate your finances, something I followed many moons ago and still use today. Ramit also has a blog, a website full of resources, a YouTube, and sells classes that I’ll probably never pay for. He’s all about “spend ruthlessly on the things you care about and cut mercilessly on the things you don’t.”
Rich dad, Poor dad – Another “get me out of this dead end job” book and also great inspiration to start a business. Take this at face value. There’s a lot of controversy around Robert Kiyosaki. Many people discount this book because it’s been proven to be largely fake, but the teachings are sound. Kiyosaki has also gone on to be a huge proponent for going into massive debt, and may have gone a little nuts in his old age. I’ll leave it for you to decide.
The Millionaire Next Door – Totally changed the way I view the world. This book is at the foundation of almost all personal finance books ever written after. This is a look into the real lives of America’s millionaires. If you’ve ever heard that most millionaires drive Toyota Camry’s you can thank this book.
Your Money or Your Life – Another foundational personal finance book that makes you consider how much of your life you really trade for all those things you buy.
Die With Zero – This is what you read after Your Money or Your Life. Bill Perkins lays out a ton of great ideas on how to live a fulfilling life while also having a lot of money. Of course he also made hundreds of millions trading natural gas stock, so it’s easy for him to say. Like he probably didn’t need to include the story of his 40th birthday where he flies all of his friends and family to a private Caribbean hotel and then has a private Natalie Merchant concert for them (he flew her in too). I’d been living a pretty frugal life for about 12 years when this was released and it really, really messed with my head. It made me remember that the time between now and my goals is my life.
The Money Guy YouTube – These guys slot in after Dave Ramsey. Dave is the “get out of debt” guy and they’re the “make your money make money” guys. Brian and Bo can be pretty cheesy at times, so prepare yourself, but I really do love their show and it keeps me going when I’m feeling lost. If you’re not excited about this, trust me, Bo is.
Investing
JL Collins – His stock series is all you really need to be an investor. Collins is responsible for the “VTSAX and chill” mentality. It’s basically Jack Bogle repackaged, but he’s great. As a bonus, Collins remade a scene from The Gambler about FU Money.
The Psychology of Money – This could also be a mindset book, but it’s super interesting and explains a lot of investing mistakes through stories.
Ben Felix YouTube – If you need to get deep on money topics, this is the guy. He dispels a lot of nonsense and explains very complex concepts in an understandable manner. The best thing about Ben is that he brings the data to prove what he’s saying.
Get Rich Slowly, Mr Money Mustache, and The Mad Fientist – These are three of the original pillars of the FIRE community (Mad Fientist came later but he showed up early). They have all moved on to another phase of life today, but they created a lot of the first big content about becoming financially independent.
r/financialindependence, r/fatfire, and r/personalfinance – These are all great resources that are basically a ton of people on the path to getting out of debt and being financially independent. I’m a participant in all of them and it’s a great way to stay motivated and get (often negative) feedback.
Graham Stephen – He made his first million in real estate in his teens and has since created a YouTube where he distills deep financial concepts down to 10 minute videos. He’s taken a bit of a step back lately, but he’s fantastic if you need a quick hit on what’s going on in the world of finance.
I don’t really look at a lot of independent contractor or small business owner stuff, but Alex Hormizi is a great resource for that and for Marketing. He’s a total meathead in appearance but he’s brilliant. Patrick Bet David also used to make a lot of content on small businesses and marketing, but he doesn’t focus on it today. And I keep an eye on Noah Kagen (author of Million Dollar Weekend) on YouTube as well as the My First Million channel for inspiration.
Even with all of the resources above, I felt that the best business, the best passive income, and the lowest barrier to entry was buy and hold investing. I was able to easily set milestones and predict future income, and it’s easy enough to automate so I don’t have to think about it. It’s not a sexy side hustle, but it also demands zero time from me and returns quite a bit of joy and security.
What are some of the resources that you’ve used on your financial journey?
Freed by 50 