The rich are getting richer! New numbers show the top 1 percent took their biggest share since 1928 last year, and the share held by the top 10 percent of earners last year reached a record 48.2 percent. While the wealthiest people lost more than 36 percent in the Great Recession, their ability to make it all back and then some are what really stands out – and should be a lesson to all that acquiring substantial amounts of wealth is possible.
While it’s easy to say the reason the top 1 percent have made it all back is due to rising corporate profits and stock prices, which certainly plays a role, there’s a lot more to it. Here are just a few reasons:
3 Reasons the Rich get Richer
1. The rich are obsessed with success
The average person believes obsession is a bad word. The truth is wealthy people have a healthy obsession with getting what they want, which includes money.
Materialism is only part of their motivation; the strongest for most is the freedom to do what they want when they want. They see business and life as a game, and it’s a game they love to win. This is the reason millionaires still go to work every day chasing success. Winners love to win, and the elation they experience after victory never gets old.
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The rich are masters at getting what they want, and their number one objective is building a substantial net worth so they can shift their focus to higher-level pursuits, such as personal fulfillment, freedom, and philanthropy.
On a scale of 1-7, 7 being strongest, how strong is your desire to succeed?
2. The rich focus on money-making activities
The masses spend a substantial amount of time entertaining themselves in a variety of activities. They live in a state of consciousness where effort is minimal and pleasure is king.
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Rich people focus the majority of their attention on money-making activities they enjoy. They parlay a love for real estate into property speculation; a passion for beautiful paintings into investment art; or a flair for numbers into buying and selling stocks. So while they’re working, they are making money, and while they’re enjoying their hobbies, they’re still making money.
While the masses are memorizing box scores and batting averages, the rich are directing the same amount of mental energy into revenue-producing ideas. To the average person, it looks like the rich are working all the time, but one of the smartest strategies of the wealthy is doing what they love and finding a way to get paid for it.
The wealthy are famous for saying the best thing about being rich is you never have to do anything you don’t want to do, and this includes how they earn money.
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3. The rich swing for the fences
Since comfort and security are the top priorities of the masses, they subconsciously (and sometimes consciously) live in first gear and avoid risk at all costs. The old joke about the masses is when they die, they are greeted by Saint Peter at the pearly gates and congratulated for arriving safely at death.
The great ones go for it all. They consciously plan their lives by night and execute them by day. These people are critical thinkers who know they only have so many days left to live and the clock is always ticking. Since the end is imminent, they know they have nothing to lose. They fearlessly live their lives taking chances while succeeding and failing more in a year than most people do in a lifetime. Their failures are big and their successes even bigger.
They live largely and wake up every morning with a sense of excitement and anticipation. They know they will be richer tomorrow than they are today, and their wealth allows them to take even bigger chances while minimizing their risk. Every success breeds a new level of self-confidence, which motivates them to take even bigger risks, knowing if they fail, they have the skill and knowledge to recover.
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So while the masses struggle to survive and dream of being comfortable, the wealthy are basking in abundance and dreaming of even higher levels.
What about you? Isn’t it time you joined the top 10 percent of earners, or even the top 1 percent? If you’re rich, keep thinking the way you’re thinking. If not, maybe it’s time you changed the way you think about money.
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Steve Siebold has interviewed 1,200 of the world’s wealthiest people over the past 30 years and discovered 100 differences in how the wealthy look and think about money compared to the middle class. He is the author of the book How Rich People Think.
Featured image by JD Hancock