Bounce
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<div class="bbWrapper"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'"><span style="font-size: 12px"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">Bounce’s story</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">I hardly know where to begin with this. Stories are great, but nobody is going to become as wealthy as Warren Buffett by reading his story. Nobody is going to become as successful as Bill Gates, or Donald Trump by reading their stories. So, rather than just tell you <u>my story</u> as the series of events that happened to me (which will help nobody), I think it would be better to explain my journey from one set of ideas to another and how my life changed as a result.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">I don’t know how many of you are familiar with the John Burley/Robert Kiyosaki <u>Seven Levels of Investors</u>, but that is a great tool for demonstrating how the constantly changing ideas you accept as true form the reality that you know. My entire life up through about age 25, I was a Level 0 on the <u>Seven Levels of Investors</u> scale. I spent every dime I could get my hands on and I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that my biggest financial problem was that I didn’t have any money. It was just as obvious to me as it was <u>WRONG</u>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">I had dreams of winning a big lottery or somehow coming to acquire a mountain of money. I thought that would solve everything for me and I could skate through life. I’m not sure how aware you are of what happens to most lottery winners, but winning the lottery generally ruins the lives of the winners. They don’t have the financial intelligence to respect what it is or to keep it. In the end, they wind up digging themselves a hole they may never get out of.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">I worked three jobs in college. I was trying to fulfill the requirements to become an airline pilot. It took me five and a half years to finally graduate. The whole time I had nothing. I was so broke that I used to keep the circuit breakers in my efficiency apartment OFF. The only time I’d turn the hot water heater on was 30 minutes before I’d take a shower in the morning. I’d wake up at 5:30, flip the hot water heater circuit breaker on and go back to sleep for a half hour. At 6:00 I’d wake up, turn the breaker off and take a shower. Whatever hot water was there was it. Nothing would anger me more than forgetting to turn the breaker OFF. To me, that was an enormously expensive WASTE of money. I got my electric bill down to under $10 a month most of the time. I could afford that, BARELY.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">I have a lot of hardship stories through this part of my life that I could spend time typing out, but I hate to waste too much time on the pain – most people know those parts all too well, but I’ll tell a couple of them.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">I had my expenses and income calculated down to the penny most of the time. However, one week I ran out of money on a Wednesday and I wouldn’t get paid until Friday. I had a dollar and a few cents to my name to get me across the abyss. I remembered seeing a “Two heads of lettuce for a buck” sale at the local supermarket. So, I figured that I’d eat a half a head Wednesday night, a full head of lettuce on Thursday and the rest of it Friday morning for breakfast. I’d survive until I got paid on Friday. It wouldn’t be fun, but I’d make it and everything would be fine. Well, I went for it. I bought the lettuce and took it home and cut it all up. However, when I took my first bite I realized I’d made one HUGE mistake. I had inadvertently bought two heads of cabbage. Here I was, a 20 year old kid, learning the difference between lettuce and cabbage. OMG! However, I had NO MONEY. I didn’t even have a penny. There was nothing else to eat. I had to muck it on down.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">The next thing I learned in short order is the amount of gas cabbage can give you. I sat there in my <u>SMALL</u> efficiency apartment, which was now FILLED WITH FARTS, sick to my stomach, and completely penniless. I had nothing. It seems humorous to me now, but now that I think back on it, that was my lowest point. One other thing about this that needs to be mentioned is that there was NO running back home for me. I was 1500 miles away from the security of my old bedroom. I was on my own and completely alone. The end of this story is great. On Friday morning, I got paid and rushed to the bank and cashed my check. I raced to the school cafeteria because it was the cheapest food in town. I stood in line and stacked up my tray – I was starving. A real smart-a$$ kid I knew stood behind me in line and was talking to one of his buddies. He said, “<i>This Bounce guy is rich. You watch, he’ll pay for this with AT LEAST A $5 bill – you watch</i>.” We college kids were generally down to paying for food with coinage. After hearing him chide me like that, I reached in my wallet, which was now FULL of money, I opened it up to let him catch a glance of just how much money was in there, and pulled out a $20 bill to pay for my food. LOL The look on his face was worth all the pain I’d been through. He had a car to drive and I was traveling either on foot or on my bicycle. That little scene lifted my spirits a lot.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">Another thing that was burdensome to me was not being able to afford to drive. I couldn’t even get a date most of the time. If some girl was going to go out with me, she’d have to drive AND PAY. That wasn’t going to happen. Those of you who saw me at the first REIU know I’m not exactly Chippendale’s material. LOL</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">I used to go to school, work in the math and computer science as a tutor between classes, I worked behind the counter at a convenience store each evening from 3:00 – 11:00 and, being a pilot, I flew loads of skydivers on the weekends. I can remember sitting behind the counter at the convenience store selling gas and beer and bread while trying to get my homework done. There were many times that I felt like my life was over. It felt like was wasting my life away for nothing. It seemed endless.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">Anyway, I kept plugging away and plugging away and plugging away. Then, just before I was FINALLY going to graduate, the PATCO air traffic controllers went on strike, were fired, and aviation in this country virtually shut down.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">After EVERYTHING I had been through, all the pain, all the grief, all the hardship… to have the entire airline industry shut down just as I was rounding the final bend was a blow that I cannot describe. It was a life event that I couldn’t do a damn thing about. It was an insurmountable mountain. I sat in my room and cried, and cried and cried. It seemed that everything I had just been through was all for nothing. My life was over. Moreover, I managed to acquire about a $50,000 debt. I had no idea how I’d ever pay off that debt. I just couldn’t believe it. I was about to have a degree, but I had a very dark $50,000 debt cloud hanging over my head and I had no job prospects – nor did it look like there would ever be any. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'"> However, shortly thereafter, I heard a radio ad that said the military was hiring pilots. So, having no other choice, I joined the USAF and some lights started to come on for me.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">Realize, this whole time I had been a Level 0 on the Seven Levels scale. I was about to receive a life-changing idea.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">I remember getting a bank statement back in 1984 (as a Second Lieutenant in the USAF) and I saw something that just blew me away. I received a statement that showed a “CREDIT” to my account for some small amount (maybe $2 or something like that). It hit me like a truck. I can still remember thinking, “<i>MY GOD! I DIDN’T HAVE TO WORK FOR THAT MONEY!”</i> It may seem humorous that I could be so affected by such a small amount of money, but it wasn’t the amount that hit me, it was the fact that money showed up in my account that I didn’t have to expend effort for. There was a free lunch!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">In that moment, I KNEW that somehow it was possible to realize my dreams, but more importantly, my real dream became clear. Up to that point, I didn’t even have any real goals other than to have “more money.” At that instant, my real goal materialized in my mind: <u>Effort free cash flow</u>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">My life changed in that instant. I had no idea how I would create it, but as I stood there holding that bank statement in my hand, I KNEW it was possible and I had proof right there. If I could start the flow with a $2 deposit into my account, I knew that somehow, some way, it was possible to create ANY amount of effort free cash flow. I became a believer and once you truly BELIEVE in something, your life changes.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">I want to pause here and go back to something I said in the opening paragraphs… Your life changes as your beliefs change, not before. In that instant, my beliefs changed and my life would change as a result. In that instant, I transitioned from a Level 0 to a Level 4 investor. Every single day, I started to get wealthier. I had no idea what a Level 4 was, but I became one, instantaneously. I was so fired up. I can’t tell you how elevated my emotions were as I saw my debt load being paid down and my net worth stacking up. Each month, more effortless cash-flow was showing up in my account. My attitude went from one of constantly being in the doldrums to having a skip in my step and a whistle in my lips. I was on my way. Going from a Level 0 to a Level 4 in my mind, made ALL the difference in my life. Realize, this is 1984 and I had no clue what these Levels were, but I had made the jump from one to the other in my mind and it had completely changed my life.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">I will leave it here for now. Little did I know at the time, but I had much bigger horror stories to come and much bigger challenges to deal with. I’ll type more as I get time, but the biggest thing I can do to help someone else at this point is to point out that your ideas form your reality. Your life grows as your mind grows and NOT before. Please believe me. You must know what you think and then start weeding out ideas of limitation. Those that exist for you are in your mind, not in reality. Later, I'll explain the journey from Level 4 to Level 5.:icon_super:</span><br />
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