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It has been a rough ride for me up to this point. I mentioned before as a child, maybe in my first 5 years I lived a comfortable life with my mother, she comes from a wealthy family so I remember the private school, the cook and made we had, but most importantly I remember my mom being happy.
I was almost six when I moved to the states with my mom and brother. It was then that my life or our lives changed dramatically for the worst. Now, I can go into a lot of detail, but it might get a little dark and well I don’t want this post to be a sad one. I want to talk about how I moved through my life. So, I will leave it at we went from living nicely to pretty much living on the street when we came to the states. During my childhood we were definitely poor, and the only thing that kept me going was that I simply wanted to get me and my mom out of the situation, and I know money can’t buy happiness, but it sure can take away hunger, keep a roof over your head, put clothes on your back, and make life easier.
So, as I watched my mother struggle day in and day out, at the time I did not know it was a problem. I mean as kids we simply get up, eat, go to school or a friend’s house and come back home eat dinner, and sleep. The problems that adults have; a child does not comprehend. I mean there were a few times my mother had to go to the back of a Safeway and look through the garbage bins to find our next meal, and there were days we had to sleep in our car, but as a kid, I just did not know. It did not sink in I mean I thought it was normal.
It was until my mother passed away when I was 19 years old, I was left all alone, I had no clue how to rent a place, purchase furniture, buy food, balance my bank account, I mean I was completely helpless. Everything from that day on was on a learning day-by-day basis. For example, the landlady came by and gave her condolences, but then she asked if I was going to stay. I was like, yah. She then told me I had to sign a lease agreement since my mother passed away. I had no clue what she meant, and I simply signed the paper. The good thing is that she was kind enough not to raise the rent, but that was my first contract. Each day I had to learn something new, it is amazing but grocery shopping isn’t as easy as it seems. I mean you need to remember the ingredients for three meals, and not go over a budget. A lot of things were new and scary, but I made it through.
I was going to community college and working at night and I remember one day coming home late and turning on the TV and seeing this commercial, but back then I did not know it wasn’t a commercial but instead, it was an Infomercial. The guy talked the talked and made whatever he was talking about like the way to financial freedom. I stopped and stared and said this sounds easy and not too costly – I think I can do it. That was the first time I started a small business or what I thought was a small business and guess what it was – Placing little ads in newspapers. Yup, Don Lapre. Over the years I was fascinated with all the ways people could make extra money back when the internet was not even a thought. Bought a vending machine route, and sold it. I did trading commodities with the Ken Roberts course, yah I was all over the place. I did some paper trading to learn the methods and started trading. It was about 8 months and I started to make some money, not a whole lot. One day when I was 21 or so I went to this conference about note flipping. I sat right in the front, had a note pad and looked like a kid at the candy store. Next to me was a man in his 50’s and I am pretty sure he was from Texas. He glanced over to me and said, “Is this your first time?”. I looked over and took a deep swallow and said yes. He smiled and said that note flipping is a good business, and that he made 50 thousand in one transaction. Excitement took over every part of my body. I set it all up, made the connections, and placed my first ad in the newspaper, and low and behold I closed my first deal. The thing is no one explained to me about retirement accounts or investing in other things like stocks. My money was all in my savings account. So, I worked and did some side things, saved, and kept going. I ended up in a new job, where they offered a retirement account and that is where I was introduced to Fidelity. I quickly moved over my money from my savings and started to contribute from my paycheck to this retirement account. Now, since then social media, apps, and so many online or on the smartphone investment options have popped up. There are many options to invest in, being careful is the trick here. Now, I have heard of affiliate marketing, Shopify, amazon programs, pre-built e-commerce sites, cryptocurrency, social media influencer, YouTuber, and well a whole lot more right, the trick is trying to get one of them off and running – hmm.
All my life I have worked hard, and sometimes smart but I still have a lot to learn and a ways to go. I know that maybe I won’t get to the point I was as a child before moving to the states, and I am not looking for that, all I want is to retire comfortably. I don’t need caviar; I just want cheese on my burger. As you can see I have dabbled a little here and there, but I still need to work and maybe someday something will give and when that happens I will be sure to blog about it.
Thanks for reading, please have a wonderful day or evening. I leave you with this thought; whatever your dreams are, keep at it, don’t give. Some days will be tough, but push through and don’t give up – you are not alone.