It took me 15 years to hit 100k. Subsequently, it took me 4 years to hit 500k. I’d love to know what first popped into your head when you read that. For me, I would automatically think that this person’s earnings power must have increased significantly. That would be the obvious answer. But it couldn’t be further from the truth for me. I actually didn’t even earn an income for 2 out of those 4 years. So, aside from compound interest (🙌🏼), what made the difference? Awareness. Comprehension. Determination. But mostly TIME. For those first 15 years I worked hard. I worked all the overtime. Sometimes working illegal amounts of hours. I made stupid amounts of money and when I finally got a day off (sometimes after 3 months straight), I spent it ALL. Something changed when I took my first maternity leave in 2019. It was the first time in my adult life, that I had an opportunity to slow down. To get away from the grind. To be able to think about something (anything) other than progressing my career. I used that opportunity to teach myself something new. Arguably the most important life skill I’d ever learn. Money management. I invested in myself. I learned how to budget. I learned about the stock market. I started making educated and conscious decisions about money. So, the biggest difference between those two periods of my life was, TIME. Not earnings power. But having the time to learn important life skills that I never previously had the time for when all I did was grind. I know a lot of people will say they don’t have time to learn about investing and honestly, I GET IT, because I was that person! But my advice to those people now would be this: Make time. Step away from the grind and take the time to understand your finances. It’s arguably the most important life skill you will ever learn. Step away from work now (even if it means using a week of vacation), so that you can step away from work later. It’s the best gift you will ever give yourself. Most people think they need to grind harder, but maybe what they really need is to press pause for a second. Other factors that contributed to my portfolio growth: - Bull market - High risk tolerance - Growth stocks - Market timing - Employer match program - Stock Based Compensation program - Increased savings rate - Reinvested dividends - Luck 🍀
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23 Comments
Ashy @moneymuse · 1moEdited
Thanks for this post! Girl… this year has not been kind, and there were so many moments where I felt like I was falling behind. But growth isn’t always linear. Sometimes the only thing that matters is showing up with determination, consistency, and discipline. Even when it feels like you’re standing still, you’re still moving forward. Cheers to your future and success!
Fraser McGuire@frasermcguire · 1mo
Love this post! Accomplishing what you did during your first mat leave is wildly amazing. I think I hallucinated for 3 months straight after my first daughter was born 😂
Le Corb@lecorb · 1moEdited
Great post! Thank god for a post that isn’t Ai generated gross generalization of meaninglessness! @let_it_ride I’ve always appreciated your post and approach to investing. Thanks for sharing. I started investing in 1997…rode the bubble tech mania and thought we were rich when our portfolio went from $10k to $20k then $30k and $40k then zoom to over $120k in 2000. We couldn’t believe our eyes looking at our “online” portfolio. That crash hit hard taking us back to below our contributions. But I put my head down and grinded away for 22 years and tried to grow my income as much as possible. I completely ignored my portfolio. But my wife was wise and saved so aggressively, paid off our mortgage and our rentals and invested in broad market ETFs that started emerging. When I looked up from grinding in 2022 I could hardly believe it. But it is true. Grinding to your first $100k is the hardest. Then getting to $500k still feels long and arduous. But once you get to the first $1M then the compounding does accelerate and time only becomes your friend. These last 4 years I’ve deeply studied personal finance, budgeting, planning, retirement investing, income streaming, applying decades of business and executive management experience and professional consulting to some of the biggest companies in the US and Canada to ensure my retirement is as safe and sound as possible. I offer to share and teach this to all my friends and family. But have yet to have a single person take me up on the offer with any level of discipline. TIME is either your friend or not, depends on, if you put into place a system that perpetuates an upward trajectory or not. This post has more truth and nuggets of gold than most will ever appreciate until it’s too late.
Ade O@kingadey · 1mo
Congratulations on your success, MissG! Your consistency, patience, diligence, and hard work are paying dividends. You are a huge inspiration! Keep up the good work 💪🏾💯!
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