Do millionaires have different habits to everyone else? They do but they’re not as dramatic as you might think. The reality is millionaires make some small but significant shifts in their habits which then yield big results when applied over time.
9 Millionaire Success Real Habits That Will Help You In Your Life
As technology evolves and information becomes more accessible, it has also become more challenging to define success. A lot of people are trapped in the rat race while trying to discover the actual formula for success.
You could become overwhelmed with what tools, techniques or philosophies to imbibe while trying to get tips over the internet. At every click and turn, there are ‘how-tos and quick-fix’ on how to become successful overnight. You will find several courses, articles, videos and books on how to achieve financial success.
But what if I tell you it doesn’t have to be complicated as people made it out to be? What if you could achieve success by merely following these 9 millionaire success habits?
1. Read for Personal Development
A daily habit I have discovered millionaire share in common is reading. For instance, if you are an entrepreneur, you need to read to become an efficient leader and a productive business owner. Reading helps you to grow and learn without going to a business school.
A research conducted by Thomas Crowley indicates about 85% of self-made millionaires read at least two or more books each month. Warren Buffett is one of these examples. He spends 80% of his day reading. In the early days of his investment career, he would read 600 to 1000 pages in a single day.
While millionaires sometimes read for pleasure, they also learn to improve themselves. They read topics on leadership, how-tos, self-help, biographies, lifehacks and also follow current events.
2. Establish Multiple Sources of Income
Another success habit I noticed about success is that they don’t depend on a single income source. Every millionaire possesses multiple sources of income. This helps them to manage economic challenges and also make more money.
They are passive income addicts. They earn interests from loans, rental income from real estate, royalties from intellectual properties, dividends from investments. They also launch a side business or run a website or sell information products.
How income is made either passively or actively is what separates the successful from the wannabes. They are always learning ways to build multiple streams of income.
3. Live on a Stipulated Monthly Budget
An average millionaire does not believe in luck and jackpot. They take the time to understand cashflow-income and expenses. Based on this, they establish a monthly budget and religiously stick to it.
The essence of the budget is to minimize unnecessary expenses. This will help you gain complete control of your financial life. Budgeting helps you to avoid overspending to achieve your financial goals.
4. Manage and Maximize Money
The most significant education for a millionaire is financial intelligence. Nobody attains financial freedom without gaining financial intelligence. This is the more reason millionaire regardless of their income update their knowledge about tax strategies.
They always seek to reduce their tax bills. One approach they employ is by living or incorporating their business in states with no income tax.
Do you know that about 60 companies paid $0 legally in the 2018 tax year? Some of these companies that ‘avoided'(note: not evaded) federal income tax include Chevron, Amazon, Halliburton, General Motors, Delta. The total income. Their total US income was totaled at $79 billion with an effective tax rate of -5%.
What’s the deal? They got a tax refund. How do they accomplish these?
An ITEP report indicated that they have the culture of throwing huge sums at tax experts who assist them in discovering creative, as well as convoluted means of paying little tax as much as possible.
5. Avoid Debt
Another habit that separates the millionaires from the rest of the world is how they manage debt.
They don’t live an extravagant lifestyle and only buy what they need and can pay for. They do not book hotels and flights by using their credit cards to pay for them.
They are conscious of the interest rates even when they use credits cards or take loans. They use those facilities for their advantage or pay with cash because of its zero percent interest rate.
6. Set Daily Goals
It does not matter if they are setting business, career, or financial projections; they have the success habit of setting short term goals. They plan daily and weekly to generate momentum in achieving their long-term goals.
Ensure you prioritize when setting daily goals. This will help you to achieve the most important to-dos on your list.
Setting priorities will help you to focus on highly rewarding activities. If you desire financial freedom, it is wise to pursue activities that earn you thousands of dollars than hundreds of dollars.
7. Don’t Act Rich
The goal is not to act rich but to be productive. Interestingly, Thomas Stanley buttressed this in his book that the most prestige brands of cars, about 86% percent are toys of the non-millionaires. People with huge fortunes tend to drive exotic cars but in reality, the largest consumers of pricey cars are aspirational.
According to findings by Experian Automotive Researchers, 61% of individuals who earn $250,000 or more rarely buy luxury brands. Instead, they buy Hondas, Toyotas, and Fords like the rest of the world. The reason is they are not ready to spend money on premium cars that tend to drop in value in a couple of years as it would cost money. Millionaires invest in assets that appreciate.
8. Own or Buy Businesses
In Robert Kiyosaki’s cashflow quadrant, he divided how you earn income into four quadrants. The E and the S quadrants take the left position while the B and the I are on the right side. According to Robert, it is possible to be on all quadrants, but the millionaires are not.
- E stands for employee – they work for others
- S stands for self-employed – they work for themselves
- B stands for a Business owner- employees work for them (500 or more employees)
- I stand for Investors – Money work for them like Warren Buffet.
Your goal is to move from the left quadrant to the right quadrants where you own big businesses or make money work for you.
It is possible to become financially successful by pursuing what you love. For instance, if you love writing, aspire to be the best seller. Wealth and passion work together.
9. Avoid Get-Rick-Quick Scheme
A millionaire holds patience as an essential virtue. It takes patience to become successful, not only in finance but in every aspect of life. While it is possible to become financially successful at an early age, most millionaires hit it at age 50. They live a moderate life, invest in their future and retire rich.
Bonus: How Can You Develop the Millionaire Success Habits?
Having learned these habits, the next question is,
How can I develop the Millionaire Success habits?
Here are six values you will need to develop:
Establish Your Life Vision
You need to be clear about what you want in life to set yourself for a life of success. Your vision has to go beyond becoming a millionaire to understanding why you want to become one. Any great entrepreneur you will ever find has a clear vision and an established mission.
Understanding why you are doing what you do will drive you to become the kind of successful person you want to be.
Make Your Passion a Profession
When your passion becomes your profession, work becomes pleasurable. Loving what you do enables money to flow to you and through you.
So what’s going to be? Wake up every morning by speaking positive words into your work, love what you do, and focus on the work that brings you joy.
Focus on Solution
Focusing on the solution means establishing the problem that you or your business address. This will help you focus on the solutions when others are faced with challenges.
A millionaire has a mindset that is fixed on the solution. He or she knows there’s a way out, and that every problem is an opportunity in disguise.
Develop Your Leadership Skills
Leadership skills are an asset that is indispensable if you want to develop a millionaire success habit. The more you hone your leadership skills, the more you will attract leaders who share your values.
Be Growth-Focused
Millionaire entrepreneurs prioritize self-improvement. Here’s how to achieve it:
- Get a coach. Coaching will impact your life, and you will achieve peak performance in life and business when you have a life coach.
- Be coachable. It is not enough to have a coach; you must be coachable. Sometimes, you need feedback and counsel to reposition your life and business. A coach has the wisdom and experience to counsel you from a higher perspective. The more you receive feedback and work on yourself, the more you become better at what you do and who you are.
Flip Your Thought Pattern From Acting To Being
It is not enough to have a millionaire success habit, you must also become a person of positive influence. This is how you can become significant. Bill Gates is not only rich; he is changing lives in Africa and different parts of the world.
If you want to become successful, you must first be and think like a successful person. This is how resources you need can flow into your life.
Here’s a final thought from me:
It is not enough to do something to have something; success is about being someone who possesses what is needed to take positive and inspired actions.
10 Weekend Habits That Highly Successful People Do
While most people know what other successful people do during the week, many of us are unsure of how successful people live during the weekends. Everyone has the same 24 hours a day, but how we use the time each day directly impacts how much you can get done. A great way to get ahead is to utilize your weekends in a much more effective manner than others do.
From my own experiences and from talking with numerous other successful individuals, I have learned quite a bit about what other people do during the weekends. I quickly found out that most successful people had very unique weekend habits and these habits set them apart from other people. These habits are the reasons why they are successful and they continue to excel in their respective fields.
Change your weekend habits and you might find yourself tapping into potential that you never knew you had. In this post, I will share with you 10 weekend habits that highly successful people follow:
1. They Don’t Sleep In
It has become a habit for highly successful people to wake up the same time they normally do regardless of what day in the week it is. For the average person, they are tempted to sleep in during the weekends to catch up on their lost sleep. Even though it might feel good temporarily, having to wake up at inconsistent times can disturb a persons circadian rhtyhm. When you sleep past your normal wake up time, it can disrupt your body clock and make you far less productive when Monday rolls around.
2. Mornings Are “Me” Time
Most of the successful people I know have family, friends and various responsibilities. They have said that finding some “me” time is often tough, but they make sure that they carve our sometime for themselves. They find a way to engage themselves in activities that they are passionate about. Having some “me” time each morning can pay massive dividends in happiness and cleanliness of the mind. The mind achieves peak performance two to four hours after waking up. Successful people make use of this and engage into something mentally challenging while their minds are at its peak.
3. They Create A Schedule
Weekends are a time to rest and slow down after a week of grinding and hustling. However, successful people can be restless and they want to do something that they can benefit from when Monday comes around. They plan tasks that they want to accomplish on a Saturday or a Sunday. These various tasks can help them feel that they are still productive during the weekend while they still get to enjoy their free time.
4. They Catch Up On Important Things
Contrary to what most people believe, successful people do not spend all their waking hours working. They also make time for their family members, friends and other relationships that are meaningful to them. Not only that, but they also utilize this free time to get some chores done and fit in some exercise. Successful people understand that work is important, but family, home, and health are also just as important. They make sure that they balance their work life and home life.
5. They Take A Break
Successful people also take time to take a break. They understand that their minds should not be working full-tilt 24/7 and they utilize the weekends to really disconnect from their work lives. They add entertainment to their weekend to relax and take their mind off of work.
6. They Pursue Their Passions
Pursuing their passions during the weekend is one way for successful people to escape the stresses of daily life and open their minds to new ways of thinking. Pursuing your passion can help stimulate the different modes of thought that can reap huge dividends over the coming week. For example, I play competitive basketball in an adult league during the weekends that helps me analyze and think of things much differently than I would in the business world.
7. They Disconnect
Disconnecting themselves during the weekend is one of the most important habits many successful people follow. Exposure to electronics even on weekends can cause you to somehow get involved with work. Continuous exposure to electronics can give a constant barrage of stressors that prevents a person from refocusing and recharging. Disconnect when you really don’t want to think or focus on work.
8. They Volunteer
Over the weekend, some successful people engage themselves in various types of charitable events. They take this opportunity to network and meet others while also being able to create change in the world. It also helps brand them as a philanthropic person. It helps to improve their branding, their image and gives them a sense of fulfillment they may not find elsewhere.
9. They Reflect
Weekly reflection is vital for successful people. It is a powerful tool for their self-improvement. They use the weekend to contemplate the larger forces that shape their industries and careers. This can then often times allow them to see things in a whole new light. They use their insights to alter their approach for the coming week and improve their efficiency of work.
10. They Plan For The Upcoming Week
Successful people know that they also need to be more productive and efficient for the upcoming week. So, they take time on Sunday to plan for the upcoming week. They set aside some time to check their schedule for the week ahead and create a plan in regards to how they can tackle the challenges looming ahead.
Conclusion
Successful people also take their weekends seriously to rest, relax and reflect. Most importantly, they prepare themselves for their weeklong grind in the upcoming week. In this post, I shared with you 10 weekend habits that highly successful people follow.
Sources: Lifehack , Jeetbanerjee