If you’re reading this book, there’s a good chance you are a wealth creator or an aspiring wealth creator—a passionate, intelligent, highly motivated, and creative person looking to reap material financial rewards for your hard work. You may just be starting out in a high-potential career, or preparing for such a career, anticipating great rewards to come. Perhaps you have already created considerable wealth and are enjoying the freedom, comforts, and expanded choices that the gift of wealth delivers. Or you may be a future wealth beneficiary, whether through inheritance or a sudden wealth event, like an initial public offering (IPO) or business sale. You also might be a spouse or partner of a wealth creator, experiencing a co-creator role, where your choices, emotional health, and relationships are greatly affected by the wealth flowing into your life. This book is also written with you in mind.
No matter where you are on your journey to wealth, or your role in creating or supporting the creation of wealth, your goal is to be successful: as an individual, as a couple, as a family; in your professional and your personal life. I have the pleasure of working with wealth creators every day. They are smart, talented, and driven to succeed. Through hard work and some lucky breaks, they have amassed significant wealth, and all the benefits that come with it.
What often comes as a surprise to wealth creators is that money comes with its own challenges. Through twenty-five years of advising some of the wealthiest people in the United States on both money and personal matters, I’ve come to a deep understanding that money is never simple, and success is about so much more than just money.
Wealth creators are no different than anyone else: They want to experience more happiness and fulfillment in their lives, but sometimes the intense pursuit of success can lead to a widening gap between your ideal life and the one you are currently experiencing. You may feel stuck, wishing for a different definition of success. Money may become an issue in your relationships. You may find yourself wondering, “What’s the money for?”
In cultures around the world, money is often seen as the de facto scorecard for success. Or, as venture capitalist Joel Solomon quips: “Capitalism is perhaps the dominant religion in the world today.” Many have embraced this religion of wealth wholeheartedly. According to the Global Wealth Report 2017, issued by Credit Suisse Research Institute, “The number of millionaires in the world has increased by 155 percent and the number of ultra high net worth individuals (defined as people with a net worth above US $50 million) increased by 216 percent since 2000. 51 percent of these ultra high net worth individuals reside in North America.”1
The Global Wealth Report forecasts that the United States will have the highest growth in the number of millionaires in the world over the next five years.2 We are also living through an unprecedented time, when an estimated $50 trillion of assets will be transferred and/or inherited by 2061, representing the largest transfer of wealth in history. Beginning in 2031, 10 percent of all wealth in the United States will change hands every five years. More and more individuals are going to experience both the benefits and the challenges of wealth.
Because it is such a loaded and often taboo subject, we carry around a lot of psychological baggage regarding our relationship to money. And when we experience a change in our financial situation, particularly coming into a large amount of money, we may find that everything we believed about ourselves, our relationships, and our place in the world has shifted.
There is a saying that goes, “Money can’t fix a problem it didn’t create,” and so more of it won’t help either. In other words, money isn’t the secret elixir that will solve your self-confidence problems, cure the wounds from your family, improve your marriage, make you a better parent, or even make you happy. In my experience, money will serve to amplify what is already present in your life—for better or worse. Much like putting gasoline on a fire, it will ignite the combustible material present at the time.
High material wealth can actually be associated with low psychological well-being. In a special issue of American Psychologist focusing on the mental-health aspects of wealth, David M. Buss, a professor of psychology at the University of Texas at Austin, noted that rates of depression are higher in more economically developed countries than in less developed countries.3 According to psychologist David G. Myers, when compared to their counterparts in the 1950s, “[Americans] are twice as rich and no happier. Meanwhile, the divorce rate doubled. Teen suicide tripled.… Depression rates have soared, especially among teens and young adults.… I call this conjunction of material prosperity and social recession the American paradox. The more people strive for extrinsic goals such as money, the more numerous their problems and the less robust their well being.”4
Noted for his work in the study of happiness and creativity, Hungarian psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi has reasoned that “to the extent that most of one’s psychic energy becomes invested in material goals, it is typical for sensitivity to other rewards to atrophy. Friendships, art, literature, natural beauty, religion, and philosophy become less and less interesting.”5 Wealth may bring material comfort and certain freedoms, but it often comes at a steep psychological cost.
Wealth can also be a fickle mistress. According to Ric Edelman, writing in Fortune, “the Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards says nearly a third of lottery winners declare bankruptcy—meaning they were worse off than before they became rich. Other studies show that lottery winners frequently become estranged from family and friends, and incur a greater incidence of depression, drug and alcohol abuse, divorce, and suicide than the average American.”6
There is an old proverb, “Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations,” referring to a common scenario where wealth created by the first generation is squandered and spent by the time the third generation passes. The first generation creates the wealth through passion, persistence, and hard work. The second generation sees these values but is often protected from experiencing the grit it took to create the wealth in the first place, as they enjoy a greatly improved lifestyle they didn’t earn themselves. By the third generation, maintaining the lifestyle becomes the norm, and the family values are a distant memory.
As wealth becomes an expectation rather than an aspiration, the relative enjoyment of the benefits provided by wealth tends to decrease. Just as in a situation of addiction, once individuals have strived for and attained a certain level of wealth, it becomes the norm and ceases to be fulfilling. Achieving the next level up can become all-consuming.7 Csikszentmihalyi notes that “wealth, like many good things, is beneficial in small quantities, but it becomes increasingly desired and ultimately can become harmful in large doses.”8
My experience working with clients who are building wealth has taught me that money often becomes an obstacle in their lives. At the center of the problem are trust and empathy. Successful wealth creators often isolate themselves as a reaction to their inability to find people they can confide in. They come into my office with a bagful of unspoken concerns and lingering questions, needing an outlet to discuss and process their fears. I see the palpable relief they experience simply by being heard, understood, and validated. Confidence builds as they realize they are not alone in their experience, that they have a partner and guide to show them the way forward.
The addition of wealth creates new opportunities and new challenges. You may not have to worry about paying the bills as much, or even talk about money as often, but if you lacked passion at your job before the money arrived, wealth will not cure that ailment. You may have much more time on your hands and a broader spectrum of choices due to your sudden increase in wealth. It can feel like anything is possible, which is a wonderful gift, but having too many options can be a burden for some. Freedom from having to work sounds wonderful in theory, but often boredom sets in, and a lack of purpose and identity results from not having anything meaningful to do. The fact is, wealth creators and aspiring wealth creators are largely unprepared, both emotionally and practically, for how wealth will affect their lives.
I wrote The Wealth Creator’s Playbook to help you navigate the rough psychological waters that wealth creators often swim in. Throughout the book, we’ll reconsider the definition of “success”; explore your money emotional intelligence; identify common emotional roadblocks around money, such as family and marital relationships, kids and money, and generosity and identity; investigate how your values align with your money; and explore insights into and opportunities around your highest contribution or calling. Through intentional processes, including diagnostic assessment tools and personal stories from clients, wealth creators can emerge from being stressed and stuck when it comes to money, to find hope, peace of mind, and real happiness. (Note: All names have been changed and certain details have been modified or generalized to protect the privacy of the individuals involved.)
A playbook is a set of strategies—a framework to help you think through your options, take action, and achieve a goal. This playbook will help you formulate a personalized plan applicable to your unique life and money circumstances. Certain chapters may be more relevant to your current needs, while others may simply be good information to have for the future, as your wealth grows and its impacts on your life change. My recommendation would be to read the book in its entirety to get a complete understanding of the issues and opportunities affecting wealth creators of all stripes.
I believe wholeheartedly that wealth is a gift. Calling it a “gift” may seem to devalue the years of intense effort and focused talent needed to create wealth. Wealth creation is labor-intensive and involves many sacrifices. Nonetheless, when you look at statistics around wealth and poverty worldwide, you can only feel blessed and lucky to have the undergirding of health, family, education, opportunity, and infrastructure that makes wealth creation possible.
I define wealth as more than just money: Wealth also includes my life, health, and relationships. All these are gifts—or spiritually speaking, blessings—I’ve been given by God to both enjoy and to steward wisely. When we look at wealth as a gift, we start to turn our thinking from managing the gift to maximizing it.
Wealth creators are regularly offered practical solutions to help them manage the gift, and there are many other books and resources available about creating and protecting wealth. Managing the gift of wealth and maximizing it are very different concepts. Managing the gift of wealth includes things like stock option exercise planning, asset allocation strategies, tax-efficient investment, college education savings alternatives, and insurance coverage reviews—which are all valuable, practical actions to take. However, you won’t find advice about managing the gift of wealth in this book; this is not your typical “how to get rich” investment guide.
While The Wealth Creator’s Playbook provides advice on the practical implications of money, the aim of this book is to help you consider higher purposes for the gift of wealth—in other words, maximizing the gift of wealth. At the end of your life, you will look back and evaluate whether you used this gift to pursue your passions, do the things you love, and to impact your world in positive ways. These are the metrics you will use to measure your ultimate “success.”
I’m on a mission to change your relationship with and perspective about money, and help answer the question: “What’s the money for?” My hope is that you will no longer see money as something to control and obsess over. Neither will it be an end in itself, as if having a rich, full life were completely dependent on money. I want you to win at the game of money and life. Wealth creators have a huge advantage that most people don’t have. We’ll unlock the hidden potential and opportunity for contribution that money presents.
The simple truth is, I want your life to flourish because of who you are, not because of your wealth. You aren’t your money, but how you spend, invest, maximize, and relate to it speaks volumes about who you are and what you care about. Enjoying a healthy relationship with wealth ultimately depends on understanding who you are, why you exist, and where your unique contribution lies. I’ll show you how to focus your energies and your wealth outward, to flourish and become fulfilled. I want you to have it all: a truly rich life.
Let’s jump in!