Louis Savilli asks in the comments -
Interesting and timely topic for me personally. Here’s my question to those who already make $10,000, $100,000, or $1,000,000 per month:
What is money? What can you tell me about it and how you feel about it? How have your opinions and feelings on money changed over the years? Going further – have you always felt comfortable exchanging your services for money? For relatively large amounts of money?
Some of these questions are more about self-worth and your own opinion on the value you can provide. I’d love to hear some answers!
I like running a site that's unapologetically pro-wealth, pro-ambition, pro-building, pro-doing, pro-excellence... we wind up meeting getting into lots of good discussions and I've met lots of great people.
I've had $10k+ months, never broke the $100k+/month mark. For me, the money never felt real in the moment, it was all kind of abstract, like having 607 gold pieces in a video game. That's probably a problem to some extent, and probably part of what kept me from doing more. Not translating money directly into important things I could do with it.
I've always been spartan - I've never been into luxury. The only things I spent on really were having excellent tools, paying for knowledge/experiences that further my development, and treating people well who treat me well. That's... pretty much it. Beyond that, I just bought stocks or put it in a money market, reinvested in whatever I was running, and/or looked for opportunities to get into a deal with a mix of cash and labor (I've found bringing cash and labor/skills to the table simultaneously seems to have much higher ROI than either individually... the challenge is knowing people doing things where your skills and cash create value).
I had some screwed up views of money before - I thought it was bad. I'm still working to eradicate those. On an intellectual level, sure, I think money is a useful measure of the value you provided to society, as decided by whoever is paying you. But the emotional stuff gets deep in you. This is common among people not raised wealthy - you hear terrible things like "Money is the root of all evil," which is just clearly nonsense.
Back in Roman times, Publius Syrus said, "Everything is worth what its purchaser will pay for it" - thinking about that and realizing it was true shifted my view of money. There's no "right" price - things are worth what people decide they're worth, based on voluntary exchanges. Thus, offering voluntary exchanges gives opportunity for others to maximize their goals - and is a virtuous thing.
I know that intellectually, of course, but I still don't hustle as much I should and would like to. Funny enough though, I have an easier time asking for $10,000, $20,000, $100,000 for a large B2B contract than I do consumer facing stuff. I don't know why. Odd, huh?
I explored some of these themes in this controversial piece - "Some Differences Between Being Low Born and High Born"
That might be worth a read, but before you go off to it, I'd love to hear your experience and thoughts. What's money to you? Anonymous answers are okay. Also, don't strictly limit yourself if you haven't done $10k in a month, I'd love to hear everyone's experiences here. Very important topic.