Build Assets That Work For You After You’re Finished Working On Them
You won’t get rich exchanging time for money. This is because your input (hours) is directly tied to your output (money) linearly. You need to work more hours to make more money, and even then the amount of money you make is capped by your hourly wage.
To become financially free, you need to spend your time making things that work for you after you’re finished working on them. These are systems, assets, media, and code that keep chugging along with uncapped upside when you’re finished with them.
Only exchange as much time for money as you need to survive. Otherwise, work on stuff that works for you.
Most People Are Too “Busy” to Realize They Are Working On The Wrong Stuff.
I produced branded content for years - mostly in the form of YouTube videos on behalf of the company I worked for.
And I worked really hard. I just didn’t own any of the upside in what I helped create. The assets that I helped produce (video media) did work after I finished creating them, but they worked for someone else!
It wasn’t until I dived into the models of wealth creators did I realize the importance of equity and ownership in the upside of what you create.
Before that, I was too “busy” to realize I was pushing hard in the wrong direction.
A Busy Mind Is A Useless Mind.
Most people don’t stop to think about what they want their life to look like.
It’s so easy to get caught up in the “grind.” Busyness makes you feel like you’re making progress. And you probably are, but you’re making progress on someone else’s goal.
Here’s Naval Ravikant on the detriment of busyness:
“A busy calendar and a busy mind will destroy your ability to do great things in this world. If you want to do great things—whether you’re a musician or entrepreneur or investor—you need free time and a free mind.”
Free time and a free mind allow you to zoom out and ask two questions:
Do I own the upside in the thing I’m creating?
Will the thing I’m creating work for me once I’m finished working on it?
You want the answer to be yes on both accounts as often as possible. That’s how you separate input from output and give yourself a chance at financial freedom in the long run.
When You Work On The Right Stuff, It Pays You Back Later.
Assets like media and code have the power to work for you when you’re finished working on them. They can “pay you back” in the form of views or page views, impressions, downloads, and eventually sales on the internet.
The ultimate form of payback is time. If you have enough stuff working for you while you’re not working, you can convert passive income into free time. That’s what financial freedom is all about.
Accumulate Assets, Not More “To Do’s.”
James Clear has a model that cuts to the core of this idea:
“A simple rule that guides many of my business decisions: I want to accumulate assets, not responsibilities.”
Responsibilities suck time away from you, while assets give you time back. The goal is to build, create, and acquire assets that work for you.
This blog is a great example of an asset that works for me. Once I finish writing a post, that post goes onto the internet and collects visitors, newsletter subscribers, and eventually customers.
While each post only collects one or two visitors, all the posts combine collect over 10,000 page views per month. And I don’t have to do any more work for that to happen. The blog works for me.
Build Stuff That Pays You While You Sleep.
The best assets pay you in passive income that you then convert into time. This means that no matter what you’re doing - vacationing, working, exercising, sleeping - you can make money.
Here’s Naval writing about this in his blog, How To Get Rich: Every Episode:
“Wealth is the thing you want. Wealth is assets that earn while you sleep; it’s the factory of robots cranking out things. Wealth is the computer program running at night that’s serving other customers. Wealth is money in the bank that is reinvested into other assets and businesses.”
And they don’t have to only be permissionless internet assets (like my blog).
For example, I’m writing a movie script with my wife. And once that script (the asset) is finished, it works for us no matter what we’re doing. People in the entertainment industry will read it, talk about it, and hopefully consider financing it, all while we start on our next project.
We could wake up one morning with a deal to make the movie without any additional work on our part. The asset has done all the work for us.
So, take a look at what you’re working on. You want to be creating assets where 1) you own the upside, and 2) they continue to work for you once you’re finished working on them.
If you don’t have anything like that, don’t sweat it. You’re a step ahead of most because now you know how to think about it.
Get creating!