You can’t fit a wheelchair in a Lamborghini.

Most of us use our youth to amass wealth, which we use to care for our health in old age. We usually care better for our cars, toys and pets than our bodies. Your body is your only one; it is a temple and should be treated as one. You cannot fit a wheelchair in a Lamborghini. The Lamborghini is a metaphor for wealth, and if one does not prioritize one’s health in the process of amassing wealth, one will come to the truth eventually: Money will not make you happy. As Canadian-American actor and comedian Jim Carrey famously said, “I think everybody should get rich and famous and do everything they ever dreamed of so they can see that it’s not the answer.” 

You will get the Lamborghini eventually, but at what cost? Becoming wealthy is a great feeling, but society has conditioned most of us to live in the future instead of the present. We would rather buy a share of Tesla than invest in our nephew’s startup; we optimize for certainty instead of taking calculated risks and betting on ourselves. We save religiously for a retirement that might not come; we slave our life in a cubicle, only to be laid off multiple times. We live a life of quiet desperation, in fear and trepidation of the unknown and what other people would say while in the process, neglecting to take care of the only body that we have.

Our time here is minimal, but we delude ourselves with the infiniteness of our journey here on earth. What shall it profit a man to inherit the whole world and lose his soul and health? Develop a wellness, nutrition and fitness plan to enhance your well-being and staying power. Take care of your body, mind and soul by engaging in activities such as participating in multiple sporting activities, meditating, reading to stimulate your mind and other self-care activities. With a sound body and mind, you can always re-create wealth as most of wealth creation starts with the mindset.

MJ DeMarco, author of The Millionaire Fastlane: Crack the Code to Wealth and Live Rich for a Lifetime!, had a chance encounter with a stranger driving a Lamborghini Countach, triggering a consciousness of possibility. That awareness led him to the Fastlane wealth creation methodology: “Creating wealth need not take 50 years of financial mediocrity devoured by decades of work, decades of saving, decades of mindless frugality, and decades of 8% stock market returns.” Owning a Lamborghini is synonymous with being super wealthy. DeMarco describes the feeling as he used to own a few of them:

Society has conditioned us to believe that wealth is an absolute construct perfected by material possessions. Wealth is not authored by material possessions, money, or “stuff” but by the wealth trinity: Family (relationships), Fitness (health) and Freedom (choice).

The Slowlane

The driving force behind wealth under Get Rich Slow is time-time employed at the job and time invested in the markets. Your glorious tomorrow might arrive after 40 years, when you’re living your last presidential administration and on your second hip replacement. Your glorious tomorrow might arrive when you’re 73 years old and soaked in urine and strapped to a stinking bed because you’ve lost your mind to Alzheimer’s.

Wealth is best lived young and enjoyed while you have health, vibrancy, energy, and yes, maybe even some hair. Wealth is best lived in the prime of your life, not in its twilight after 40 years of 50-hour workweeks have pulverized your dreams into surrender. Deep in our soul we know this, yet we continue to faithfully pledge obedience to a financial roadmap that promises wealth after four or five decades. A strategy that requires your life and your dreams to be paid as penance is a sucker’s bet. The Slowlane arrogantly assumes that you will live forever and, of course, be gainfully employed forever. Unfortunately, wheelchairs don’t fit in the trunks of Lamborghinis.

In his very insightful book, The Psychology of Money: Timeless lessons on wealth, greed, and happiness, author and partner at Collaborative Fund, Morgan Housel describes the end of history illusion and the risk inherent with delaying living your life in the quest to amassing wealth. He writes:

“I know young people who purposefully live austere lives with little income, and they’re perfectly happy with it. Then there are those who work their tails off to pay for a life of luxury, and they’re perfectly happy with that. Both have risks—the former risks being unprepared to raise a family or fund retirement, the latter risks regret that you spent your youthful and healthy years in a cubicle.”

There are two things to keep in mind when making what you think are long-term decisions.

1. We should avoid the extreme ends of financial planning. Assuming you’ll be happy with a very low income, or choosing to work endless hours in pursuit of a high one, increases the odds that you’ll one day find yourself at a point of regret. The fuel of the End of History Illusion is that people adapt to most circumstances, so the benefits of an extreme plan—the simplicity of having hardly anything, or the thrill of having almost everything—wear off. But the downsides of those extremes—not being able to afford retirement, or looking back at a life spent devoted to chasing dollars—become enduring regrets. Regrets are especially painful when you abandon a previous plan and feel like you have to run in the other direction twice as fast to make up for lost time.
2. We should also come to accept the reality of changing our minds. Some of the most miserable workers I’ve met are people who stay loyal to a career only because it’s the field they picked when deciding on a college major at age 18. When you accept the End of History Illusion, you realize that the odds of picking a job when you’re not old enough to drink that you will still enjoy when you’re old enough to qualify for Social Security are low.

Meditation

• Daily Calm with Tamara Levitt – Patience
• Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
• “Patience is a form of wisdom. It demonstrates that we understand and accept the fact that sometimes things must unfold in their own time.”― Jon Kabat-Zinn, Full Catastrophe Living

• Daily Jay with Jay Shetty – Don’t Celebrate Early

University of Oregon runner Tanguy Pepiot was ahead in the Menss steeplechase at the Pepsi Team Invitational and began cheering the crowd on as he approached the finish line, assuming he was going to win.

• Don’t jump for joy until the job is done. Nothing in life is guaranteed, no matter how promising something looks; it hasn’t happened until it happens. When we overfocus on the future, it can cause us to lose our focus on the present. We borrow from our eventual enjoyment if we party prematurely, projecting ourselves forward. Then, when the moment those arise, it is not as exciting. Instead, it feels like a foregone conclusion. But if we wait and stay present with what is, we increase the intensity of our appreciation.

• The Daily Trip with Jeff Warren – The Aging-Gracefully Gradient
• Researchers call it the paradox of old age; for a great many people, as their bodies decline through old age, instead of getting more miserable, they actually get happier. They have more acceptance of life’s ups and downs, more appreciation and gratitude for the present moment and less focus on anger and stress.
• Meditation is a training in accessing the wisdom of old age in all stages of life. Meditation builds perspective and resilience and helps us connect to what matters. We practice a simple kind of happiness in the here and now.

Podcast

• Jack Kornfield and Yung Pueblo Explain How To Balance Self-Interest with Taking Care of Other People | Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris

All the best in your quest to get better. Don’t Settle: Live with Passion.