Video Transcript: Have A Good Foundation Slides

Many of you guys know what this building is. The Tower of Pisa, they call it the Leaning Tower of Pisa. And why is it leaning? Because of the foundation? Something's wrong with it. Right? Didn't set up correctly. 

Now in our life, what are the foundations? In our life, the foundations are the beliefs that we have. Right? Our beliefs are what? we believe are true. Now this every belief that we have, is it always correct? And is it always true? Can beliefs change over time? Have they changed over time? Even remember, 4 or 5, 600 years ago, people used to think the Earth was flat. And people were afraid to leave the shore because they thought they sailed out enough what was going to happen? They're going to fall. 

And one guy who decided to believe differently named Christopher Columbus, what did he think? He thought the earth was round? And then if he went around, he'd get to India? Well, he didn't quite make it to India. But he discovered what? The American continent, right? So do our beliefs affect what we are willing to do? Of course they do. Right? Our beliefs affect what we think is important. How we see life and what we act upon it. 

Our beliefs are the guiding principles, that tells us what we think is right, and what we think is wrong. What we stand for, what we do, and why we do it. In terms of beliefs, they also will affect our eternal destiny. For those of us who are Christians, we believe that God is a creator, that He created us for a purpose. We believe that Jesus is the Son of God who came to give his life for us. And that the only way to get to God is through Jesus Christ, right, and that we believe there's an eternity in that we're either going to spend it in heaven, or we're going to spend in hell. 

Now, we believe that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God. non Christians don't believe pretty much any of this or maybe very little of it. They believe that there's many ways to get to God, some of them believe that there is no God. Some of them believe that we're just a product of evolution. Some of them believe that, hey, morals are relative, right? Whatever is right for you may be wrong for somebody else, or vice versa, that there is no absolute. They believe in chance, they believe in luck. They believe there is no purpose to life. 

So why am I talking about this in a course about money? I'm talking about this because it affects everything. If a person thinks that it's okay to cheat, that the only thing that matters is making money. And that it's okay to cheat and back stab somebody else and to rob somebody else. As long as you hit your objective, the means justifies the ends, if there's no God. So how does it matter how you achieve money, right? 

If you do believe there is a God and you fear God, then you're not going to try to make money by taking advantage of other people and by basically deceiving them. Right? You're going to act a very different way, than if you believe that there is no consequences for your actions. 

We talked in the last class about basically aiming aiming through life, drifting through life without any goal or purpose. Do you believe that if your goal in life is to have fun, right, let's say that if you have a belief that we're just here to have fun, and that's your only goal in life? Do you think you're gonna act very differently than if you believe that you are responsible? For let's say, your family, or for others, who are less fortunate than you? Do you think these two people are going to live very different lives? Yes, this person, what's he going to think about every day and every weekend? Sell fish, right? 

He's gonna say, what makes me happy today. Right, that's the ultimate goal. And if not going to work. Makes me happy today. Then I'll skip work. don't have to be responsible, right? If what makes me happy today is to eat McDonald's or wheat, whatever. That's all he's gonna do. If what makes me happy today is buying things for me, then that's all he's gonna do. Right? If at the end of the day, he's just going to think about himself, right? And not others, he's going to lead a very different life. 

So, the reason that I point this out from the get go, is simply that if you have a goal, right, you can lead a very different life. If you are on the cruise ship, on your way to your destination, versus if you are simply floating through life, right, without any aim or purpose. In order to change, we have to change our beliefs. We have to start at least questioning our beliefs, whether those beliefs are serving us or not. Right?, and we have to wonder if those beliefs are going to help us achieve our goals or not. 

There's basically two kinds of mentalities in life. There's what's called a scarcity mentality. And they're what's called an abundance mentality. One set of beliefs can empower you, while the other set of beliefs can limit you. Let's go through this example. For example, let's see if you guys can read me the list on the left hand side. What's a scarcity mentality? 

Can somebody read this please?

I'm sorry, can you press that button one more time. Gain in another man's love. abundance mentality. There's plenty for, No, we can afford it. Money doesn't grow on trees. Rich people are greedy. The rich, the poor, the rich are crooks. He has money, he must be lucky, a tutor or a drug dealer. I have to be the competition. Every man for himself. 

Have you guys ever heard any of these phrases?

So a lot of people think that rich people are bad, the rich people are agreeing that rich people are always exploiting the poor. So if you believe all those things, in essence, what are you associating your mind with money? Money is bad. Right? Okay. Well, that's a belief is a true? No, not necessarily. Is, is fire bad? Depends how you use it. Right? If you use it to burn somebody as bad, if you use it to cook food, it's good. Some money is the same way. Money can be used for bad things. 

Money can be used for good things. 

All right. Now, how does it make you feel? If those were the kinds of thoughts that go through your mind all day long? Just read it even read that list? How did that make you feel? Don't want to be rich? If that's what that means? Right? Okay, let's read the ones on the left hand side. On the right hand side, I'm saying abundance mentality. There's plenty for everybody. How can I? How can I afford it? The rich are rich, because they are generous. Only the rich can help the poor. We become what we think about all the time. Victory starts in the mind. Whatever a mind, of a man can conceive and believe he can achieve. And I can do all things through Christ.

So when you read that list, those are other sets of beliefs, which are very different than the ones on the left hand side. How did you feel reading that list? positive, hopeful, right, more motivated. Exactly. You will lead a very different life if that's the script that's running through your head versus the other one that says all rich people are bad and greedy and bastards and all kinds of things. Right. 

Let's read another set of mentality, scarcity mentality. Would you like to read that list? 

He was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. 

Okay, no,you can read English. He does not cheat, does not get ahead. It takes money to make money. It's not what you know, it's who you know, the rich, the rich have to pay their fair share of taxes the government should take from the rich and help the poor. I am this way because I grew up in a dysfunctional family.

How many of you guys ever heard any of these phrases? Right? Lot of people think that way. And how does that make them feel more powerful? Or is it the other way? Makes you feel powerless and like a victim? Right? Lot of people running around with the victim mentality these days?

All right, can you read the list on the right hand side?

The abundance mentality God wants, wants me to be prosper even as my soul prospers. God's want me to be strong a term I have no fear. And I should have good success. I am a victor, not a victim. I am responsible for my own prosperity, not the government. And God has great things in store for me.

Capitalism is the most ideal economic system ever developed.

A lot of people they think they used to think capitalism was great. And now a lot of people think capitalism is bad, right? They say, well, Socialism is good. The government should take from the rich, give it to the poor, every government should tax everybody. 

So all these ideas are just that their ideas, their thoughts, their beliefs, right? There's been different governments across time that have implemented each of these ideas. 

Why is it that in America, America always fought communism? Is because they're bad evil people? Well, some, some people were right, Stalin and Mao and some of these people that killed millions of people trying to force them to accept communism. While we were fighting communism for a long time, what are we doing more recently?

Now we're promoting socialism, which is essentially the same thing, right? Yet, if we look at the proof, the proof is that capitalism has allowed society to prosper, and to raise the standard of living for most people.

Of course, not everybody is the same, because that's the basis of it. The basic idea is that if you everybody prospers, according to their own efforts and ability, right, but at the same time, if you try to implement socialism, which means everybody should have the same thing. Usually what that ends up meaning is what everybody ends up having equal poverty. That's what that ends up doing. 

So the point here is, what kind of mentality Do you have? Which of these thought processes that you associate with more? Do you have more of an abundance mentality? Or do you have more of a scarcity mentality? What's the impact of the thoughts do you have through your head and those invisible seeds? What are the fruits that your thoughts are yielding? Right? 

Let's talk about some beliefs that really matter in how we live our life and how that impacts our finances and our economics. We're gonna go through a few of these, and I'm just giving you the headlines here. We're gonna go through our purpose in life, God's will for our life, our calling in life, our values and our priorities. 

Let's start with the first one, our purpose in life, you might say, what is our purpose in life have anything to do with money? It has everything to do with money. 

First of all, what is the definition of the word purpose? The purpose is the why something exists. Right? What is the purpose of a spoon? To eat? What? Soup? What's the purpose of a knife? To cut? Some other kind of food? Right? Can you eat a soup with a knife? Can you cut steak with a spoon? No everything has its purpose, right? If you don't happen to know what the purpose of something is, who should you ask? The creator of that thing, right? In our case, if we don't know what our purpose is, and we believe there's a creator, we should ask God God, why did you put me on this earth? What is my purpose? Why am I here? Right. 

So there's a book called The Purpose Driven Life if you can read that, So I haven't read it, I recommend that you read it. But I'm gonna give you the quick summary of what it says. It basically says, Knowing your purpose, gives meaning to your life. And says knowing your purpose simplifies your life, why it defines what you do. And what you don't do, it becomes a standard that you use to evaluate which activities are essential and which ones aren't. Without a clear purpose, you have no foundation on which to base decisions, allocate your time and use your resources. 

Let me give you a very specific example. Let's say that your son was going to college or your nephew or some some kids that you know, they're going to college and they say, you know, you ask them, Hey, son, what are you going to study? But I'd like to be a brain brain surgeon someday. Okay, that's great. So which university be going to? I'm going to XYZ University. Okay, and what kind of classes are you taking right now? Well, right now I'm taking a class in history, I'm taking a class and dance, I'm taking a class in art, I'm taking the class and theology. And that's what I'm doing. 

What would you say to that person to that young person?

More focus in that area? What's gonna happen if he keeps taking these kinds of classes after four years? You're gonna waste time and money, which is what? Like, right? At the end of four years, how close is he gonna be to his goal of becoming a brain surgeon? Pretty much about this, this close, right. 

So as you see here, knowing your purpose, helps you make better decisions, helps you allocate your time, and your money and your resources. 

Now, let's bring it Tom to a more practical level, when you go to the grocery store, and you go there to buy milk and eggs, right?, because that's essential for your breakfast. And suddenly, you get to the checkout. And what do they usually have at both sides of the checkout lane? Candy, what else? Chips. What else? Some kind of magazines, right, that say how Elvis met, you know, Hillary Clinton and how they eat a dragon or something, some weird, crazy stories. And those magazines usually cost what 5 bucks? I mean, it might not seem like a lot. How much is a candy worth a couple dollars? How much does a soda worth $3. 

So before you know if you spent $10. Right? Now, if your goal is to get out of debt, how is spending $10 on a magazine, a bag of candy in the soda gonna help you get there? might not seem like 10 bucks isn't gonna do anything. But imagine if you carry that thought process every single day. You go to the mall and you say, hey, I need to buy some new shoes. And on the way to the shoe store, guess what you're gonna run into at the mall? A bunch of ads that are gonna say what? 50% off sale? 20% off, buy one get one free. You know, before you know it, if you don't have a clear purpose in mind of just buying those shoes and getting out of there. 

What are you going to end up spending by the time you leave the mall? A lot of money on what? Lot of stuff you don't mean? So how's that gonna help you reach? becoming debt free within a very short period of time? It's not, right. So knowing your purpose, focuses your life that concentrates what your effort and energy on what's important, and you'll become effective by becoming less selective. 

That's what this says, right? Without a clear purpose. You're gonna keep changing directions, you're gonna keep changing jobs, you're gonna keep changing relationships. You're gonna keep changing churches or other externals, hoping that each change will settle the confusion, or fill the emptiness that you fill in your heart. How many people go through a divorce, just because they're not happy?

What's the most expensive decision you could ever make? Economically speaking, the choice of who you get married to and the choice of whether you get divorced.If you've ever experienced it, and I hope you never do if you haven't, but believe me, that's the best way to become poor is to basically give up half of your paycheck to somebody you don't love anymore, who isn't going to be with you supporting you. 

So, as you can see, there's a reason why I'm bringing this up. It's not just for no good reason. Right? So the key to understanding your purpose is also to understand God's will. So what is God's will? Well, a lot of people go through life wondering what is God's will for my life? Why am I here? What should I be doing? Everybody hopes that someday the sky is gonna open, and they're gonna hear a loud voice. My will for you is this or that? 

Some people say, God, what should I study? Who should I marry? Where should I live? Well, the thing you need to understand is that when you understand the will of God, suddenly you're going to be wiser, and you're going to make better use of your time. That's what Ephesians says, When you understand God's will, you're going to also have better fruits. In other words, you're going to do better things with your life. 

Now, what is God's will, God's will is very simple. God's will, in a nutshell, is that you have a relationship with him is that you get to know him, and that you spend eternity with Him. And the way we do that, is simply by opening your heart and asking them to have a personal relationship with you. Right?, God's will, at the end of the day, is for you to spend eternal life with Him. What you do on this earth is really up to you. God gave you a thing called free, what? free will choice, right? You have the ability to decide for yourself, where you want to go to college, what you want to study who you want to relate to who you want to get married to? Those are your choices. Right? 

Now, before you make each of those choices, you should really think hard about those choices and what the possible outcomes might be. But a lot of people want to blame God at the end of the day when things don't go the right way. Right?. The truth is that what God cares about is having a relationship with you. And that's basically it all the other things, you have free will to pick them up. 

Now let's talk about what is God's will regarding money. A lot of people like I said, have this misguided notion that somehow God wants you to be for God, as against money or something like that. I think a lot of this comes from centuries and years of essentially wrong teaching that somehow people associate. You know that money is somehow a bad thing. A lot of people have this mistaken. 

There's a verse in the Bible that says that the root of all evil is what? The love of money, but some people think the root of all evil is money. Now, it doesn't say money, says the love of money, right? So let's think about this, first of all. in 1 John 2 it says that God wishes above all things that you may want, prosper and be in health even as your soul prospers. What's the definition of the word prosper? Prosper means? get ahead in life, right to advance, to grow to expand. That's what prosper means. 

Now, what else is it saying Joshua, and Joshua, it says, that if you follow the word of God, and you, you're gonna make your way prospers, and you're gonna have what? Good success. Somehow people think success is kind of a dirty word or bad word. Well, let me ask you this. If you guys have children, and you wish success upon your children and you wish failure, most people don't wish failure upon themselves or upon anybody. Right? And God doesn't wish failure upon you, either. He wishes upon you success. 

What about wealth, it says here, that God gave you power, power, for what? power to get wealth, right? Why would God give you a power without expecting you to use it? We saw me here, that God gave me all these gifts. He gave me a mind. So you can think, right? He gave you a heart so you can make desires, he gave you eyes, to see, he gave you a mouth to speak. Right? He gives you all these things, so that you can use them. Those are the powers that he gave you. So that basically you can use them creatively to make wealth.

And lastly, God's will is abundance. What's the definition of the word abundance? Abundance is having what? More than enough more than necessary. What would you rather have just barely enough or more wasn't enough? I think most of us would rather have more than enough. Now, if we had more than enough. What would? Let's say you had? I don't know, 100 chickens? What would you do with them? Maybe eat one? Or to do what the other 99? Let's say you already roasted them? Well, you probably go share them and find somebody else who wants one, right? Sell it to them or give it to them or something. 

But the point is, you know that that's part of abundance. It says in another verse in Deuteronomy that God wants you to go through life without scarcity and not lacking in anything. Right? That's what is the true blessing of God. 

Now, God's will is not a mystery, as we said, God's will is for you to spend eternity with Him to get to know Jesus. God's will is for you to prosper, that's well as for you to be successful, God's will is for you to have abundance in all things, in God's words for you to share that abundance and prosperity with others. 

Now, we're not here to talk about the so called prosperity gospel. What does that mean? The frustrating gospel is where they just tell your name and and claim it, and that's going to happen. No, there's no such thing as naming and claiming, you have to work for it, you have to put in the thought process in the effort to generate that money. 

So you have to make sure at the end of the day, that you understand that, that money and those things should not be the center of your life. They're just tools, right? They're a tool for you to use, and they're tools for you to bless others with. 

Now, let's recognize, first of all, who's the owner of everything. God is the owner of all things. We are just here to be stewards. Stewardship means that someday, we're going to give an account right? Now, what's the most important quality and stewards? Just to be faithful? What is faithful mean? Faithful means taking good care of something that's entrusted to you. Right? 

So when you're a faithful steward, God's going to give you more have you guys ever heard of the story of the talents? What are the stories of talents, there was a guy who had a lot of money, and he went away, he entrusted it to His servants. One guy, he gave him five talents. Another guy, he gave him two talents, and another guy he entrusted in with one talent. You guys know how much talent one talent is, in terms of actual gold? A talent is not like acting and dancing. 

A talent back then was a quantity of money. Right? You guys have a rough idea how much gold one talent was? About $2 million. So one guy who got five talents, essentially, you got $10 million. The other guy got $4 million. The other guy got $1 million. The guy who had the five talents, what did he do with those five talents? Who said that he went and invested them. And he multiply them. And he gave back to the Lord when he came back so much. Another five talents. 

The other day who had two talents, he went and invested on when he did one, same thing. 100%, right. And the guy who had one talent, what did he do with that money? He buried it. And he says that when he came back, he didn't even earn any interest on that money. So what is his Lord say to him? Because he was unprofitable. They took away that money from him, and they gave it to the guy who has the 10 right. So God wants us to be profitable. Right? He wants us to be faithful. Yes. The person only God make it. There was a middle person. I think it's because, you know, I think about it this way. When I was in my 20s, I used to make hundreds of dollars. And I started giving away, let's say $10 to this, or that ministry.

A few years later, I started making $10 1000s of dollars, and I started giving away 1000s of dollars a few years later started making $100,000 And I kept giving away $10,000 A few years later started making millions of dollars. I think if right now, I was to receive a billion dollars. I don't think I'm quite at that level yet to manage a billion dollars right now managing millions of dollars and I feel comfortable at that level. 

I think to me, the reason is because that guy, his Lord knew that he wasn't capable of handling more than that million dollars. And he was right because even with that million dollars, he didn't even do anything. He didn't even have the common sense to put it in the bank. Turn it over. Little bit of interest. 

So I don't think he could have given him $2 million simply because it's a challenge because he wasn't up to it. He wasn't ready. You know, and the other two guys, he they got as much as he thought they were capable of handling. And they proved that by multiplying each 100%. You know, it's like most people, that sometimes people have big dreams or want to start a multi million dollar company, we'll start with the $100,000 company start with $10,000 products. I mean, you have to kind of start where you are, and build up to that capacity. 

A lot of people don't have that capacity to handle things. So to me, that's what I think. Yes. The word. Can you grab the mic? I'm sorry. The words to me, guy. He's a number gives, you know more than you can handle. Right. And I think when it comes to stewardship, he's careful not to get you like you say, you wonder why that wasn't possible that he knew more, but you don't want you to also crash and burn by getting too much. And so we know exactly what just to give you enough that you can handle it at your level of skill at that particular place in time. 

And as a increases, you increase, you get more and what the opposite, right? If you can even use make good use of what you have to take that away from me and give it to somebody who does a better job. You know, in the in the Wall Street where I've spent my career, I see this all the time. I see money managers who have a certain amount of money to start out with 100 million in five years, something they have a billion dollars, because they make good returns. 

And guess what happens more people say, hey, well, you're making good returns, I want you to invest my money, too. And I've seen cases where they given the 100 million dollars and a couple of years later they shut down. Why? Because they started losing the money. And guess what happens when you start losing money. Other people take away what they have before you lose even more. Right? 

So it's just kind of the way I guess it works. You know, when I look at businesses that grow and grow and grow, like, I don't know, if Starbucks or McDonald's or some of these businesses, why did they grow? They grow because they started off on a small base. They made it profitable, and they just continue to reinvest and continue to grow to other businesses that start off with big promises. 

And then they crash and burn like a lot of the dot coms. If you guys remember a lot of those dot coms, they give them a bunch of money, and then they were close within one or two years. Why? Because they were unprofitable. They couldn't make it happen. 

So anyway, I hope that answers the question. So it says here, whoever is faithful, in little is going to be faithful and much whoever is unjust with bliss with little is going to be unjust also with march, right? And lastly, it says that when you learn to be when you learn to be generous, you're going to reap march. And when you're not generous, you're going reap a little. 

Now let's switch to the subject of money. What is money? Why did you guys come this day to learn about money or discuss money? Why is it that money is something mainly say money makes the world go around? Right? What is it that money?What is it about money that makes so many people think about it, want some more, you know, fight over it, steal about it, you know, etc? What is at the end of the day money, we'll redo some lessons of what some of these thoughts that I've read. And over the years. 

Some people say money is a medium by which earthly success is measured. Money makes the possible enjoyment the best of the Earth can afford. Money is plentiful. For those who understand the simple laws that govern its acquisition. And money is governed today by the same laws which controlled it. And prosperous man were going through the streets of Babylon 6000 years ago. 

At the end of the day, money. In the initial days, if we go back several 1000 years ago, there was no money. People used to exchange in a system called what barter, have you guys heard of barter? What does barter mean? Barter means? Exchange, right? I'm going to exchange. 

Let's say you had the guy who used to fish with the guy who used to make bread. Right? So a guy who said, Hey, I have two fishes. I'll take five loaves of bread and phone you would exchange right. And some other guy maybe was a shoe maker, he would say, Well, I've got a pair of shoes. I'll exchange it for 10 loaves of bread. Well, what happens if the guy who's trying to exchange doesn't want what the other guy has? 

Now you got a problem. So eventually, over time, people came upon this one thing that everybody decided that they could easily trade with. And that thing was called what? Gold, right? Gold or Silver became the two metals that over time were consistently used. Now, gold especially became Money, money basically became just a means to exchange because one guy could exchange his fish or his bread for a piece of gold. And that guy could take the gold in exchange for shoes or for a house from for something else. 

Now, what are the qualities that make gold money that are unique that are not found in anything else on this planet Earth? Gold, if you if you had a gold coin, and they chop it in half, or each of those house worthless, now, they're worthless. They're still gold, the value of gold, the weight in gold? Right? If I put gold, and let's say I leave it abandoned for a few years does gold rush? If I put it under the ocean inside water does gold wear away? So gold always maintains its value always maintains his character. Gold doesn't rush, right? Nothing ever happens to gold? 

Now, how many times can I divide gold? Infinity, right, I could get that coin or that block of gold and chop it off? 10 times 100 times. At the end of the day, what matters most about gold is the weight of gold. Now, if I go to some other country, let's say I go to India or I go to China or go to Africa. Will they accept $1? Bill? Maybe maybe not. But if I offer them a gold coin will they offer it will be accepted? Even if I don't speak their language. Why? Because every single person on this planet knows that gold is worth something, right? Every single planet was willing to exchange gold. 

Now, gold serves three purposes, or money. Money serves as a medium of exchange. Money serves as a store of value. And money serves as a measure of value. Networks a store of value. store value is for example, if I have a bunch of fish. And that's let's say, my wealth, I go and fish and I pull together 1000 fish. If I put them in a vault, how long are those fish going to be worth something to me? Maybe a couple of days at best, right? Unless I put some ice or something in there. 

But if I don't, if I don't take good care of them, what's going to happen to my wealth? It's gonna get lost, right? But if I can exchange those fish for gold, or for money, how long is that money going to last? A long, long time. Right? So it's a store of value. It's also a measure of value because I have to put a measure on what I do. For example, if I go to work for let's say, I offer you guys a job and I say, I got a job. 

Would any of you guys like to take it? Well, what would be the first question you'd ask me? How much do you pay? Right? Okay. Well, if I said I pay $1 an hour, how many would take it? Mostly for price aid? I don't think so. What if I offered $10 an hour? Maybe one or two might take it? If I offered 1000? an hour? A few more takers? What if I said a million an hour? I think almost everybody raise their hand and say yeah, where do I sign up? Right? Why? Because I'm measuring your time based on the amount of money. Right? 

So why is it at the end of the day that people care about money? People care about money? Because when we go to work, what is it that we're exchanging? We're exchanging our time, our knowledge, for what? For money, right? So when we have money in our wallet what we've done is we've traded a portion of our time in our life for that money. So when somebody when we exchange that money for something else, what is it that we want to give in return? Something that's worth our money, right? 

Now, what happens if somebody cheats us? Let's say that I sold you a ring and I said, Hey, you know, I've got this ring. It's made of gold and it's got a diamond. And you go to take it to the store and they tell you that's our goal that's just gold plated and that diamond was A cubic zirconia. And let's say you paid me $5,000 For that ring, how are you gonna feel when you find out? That I didn't give you the real deal? Cheated, right? You're gonna say, What the heck, like I paid $5,000 For something that I thought was worth $5,000. 

Now, the reason that we get upset about money, the reason that we care about money is because money, in essence is a portion of your life, that you've traded for that money. Right? We know that we're not gonna get any more time. We know that in this world, our life is essentially like those are glasses. Each of those little grains of sand represents what an hour of the time we have left on this planet, right? And we want to make sure that we make the most of that money in that time. 

Like Peter, Daniel says, Here, it says, money is only time well spent. If you have enough time, you can always make more money, but you cannot buy one more time. All right. So Is money the same as well? Now what is well? Here, wealth is a power. With wealth, many things are possible. You can ornament your house, you can sell distant seas, you can do lots of stuff. Right? Money is only valuable in the country where you live.

If you take dollars to Russia, will they accept them? Now, what do they take over their rubles, right? If some Russian guy comes here, and he gives you rubles when you take him for payment, now he knows I need dollars, right and vice versa. Well, it says here, well, like a tree grows from a tiny seed. It says the first copy you save is where your tree of wealth is going to grow. And the sooner you plant that seed, the sooner that the tree is going to grow. 

Now there's another saying that says when's the best time to plant the tree 20 years ago, right? Now, if you didn't plant the tree 20 years ago, when's the second best time to plant a tree today? Right? Okay, so what is wealth? Wealth is measured in time, not dollars. Wealth is measured in the name, number of days that you can survive without having to work and still maintain your standard of living. That's what Robert Kiyosaki says. And Ren says wealth is a product of a man's capacity to think, Peter Daniel says wealth is a thought. Wealth is basically what we acquire through our time. 

Now let's think about the word riches. What is riches mean? Again, it's a slightly different term, riches at the end of the day, what the Bible tells us is that we should not fall into temptation to go after riches, to our own destruction. So basically, we shouldn't allow money, or riches to become our only focus in life, because we might fall into the wrong temptation. 

Now, let's switch subjects and talk about values and priorities. What is the definition of a value? Value is something that we what we think is important, right? What's the priority? Something that needs to be done. Something that has different levels of importance, right? For example, for some people coming here was a priority. For some other people being somewhere else was a priority, right?

Values. Here's some definitions of some examples of some values. For example, freedom is a value we all value freedom, we all value security. Now sometimes, values are in conflict with each other. Happiness is a value. Peace of mind is a value. Right? Being with your family is a value for some people. Having fun is a value. Now, which of these values is the most important in your life? depends on the person. What's the most important value for you? Most important value for you? Security. Okay. What would you say is the most important value for you? Greater spirituality, how about for you? What's the most important value for you from this list? What time, what time of day they're all important, right? 

This is where we have to then talk about priorities. Because for some people, they would love to do some things, but they're saying, You know what, I gotta take care of these first. Right? Some people are willing to sacrifice their freedom for security. Some people are saying, heck, no, I want my freedom above all things. Even if I have to take some risks. Some people would say, Well, I gotta be with my family. Some people are saying, well, no, I gotta go work, even if I have to spend time away from my family, because I got to provide so it all depends, right? There's no right answer. It just depends on each person. 

Now, the way we define our priorities, is we have to look at all these values. And we have to ask ourselves, which of these is the most important, right? And then why? So for example, in order to make a value ladder, you have to kind of say, okay, for me, the most important is security. Once I achieve security, I'd like to have more freedom. Why do you want more freedom so I can have more time? Why do you want more time, because I want to feel happier, I want to have a life, I want to live longer, I want to be an example, I want to help others, I want to make a difference. 

Most, most of us would probably want to do all these things. But it's pretty hard to be making a difference in helping others if you don't even have the basic thing for yourself, right. So these are levels of values and priorities. But sometimes we have to kind of take care of number one before we can take care of number two, and so forth. Right? For an older person. Maybe for them, you know, these are their values. And for them, they want to have security. But at the end of the day, they want to not be a burden on anybody. You know, they want to feel like they kind of are not having to ask for pity from anybody else. 

So just to wrap this up, you know, the goal here is to teach us that it's important to lay out these foundations before we start talking about money, which we're going to start talking already in the next in the next lesson. We need to think about what are the core beliefs that drive us through life? What is the purpose of our life, so that we're not wasting time? What is God's will for you? Have you already figured that out? What are the most important values? And have you ever created a value ladder with priorities about where money lives for you? Any questions on any of these topics that we've discussed so far? We're gonna now start shifting years after this to start actually showing you how money works, but we have to sort of lay this foundation so that you basically have some things that we're going to come back to at a later point in time