Lifestyle Builders: Build Your Business, Quit Your Job and Live Your Ideal Lifestyle

How This Book is Organized

This book is divided into six major sections, with each section focused in on one piece of the frame work. These are the most important elements in building your ideal lifestyle.

Section 1: Plan With Purpose. The first step to shift towards the life that you want to live is to define what that life looks like and build yourself a roadmap that directs you from where you are to where you want to be. In this section you’ll learn how to identify what your ideal lifestyle looks like and build that initial roadmap for how to get there.

Section 2: Find Your Freedom. With clarity around your ideal life and a roadmap in place, it’s now time to determine what you need to make that happen. You will go through and define your Freedom Number: The amount of money and income that you need to leave your job. This includes gathering and understanding all of your financial information, from how much you make, to how much you spend, to how much debt you have, and how much money your business provides you. The goal of this section is to help you get your personal finances in order, as well as help you model your business to achieve your goals.

Section 3: Concept to Cash. Once you know what it looks like you achieve financial freedom, your next course of action is to create a business that will enable you to achieve it. Most people go about this process by creating the product or service first, then attempting to sell it, but often struggling. This section of the book will show you a better way, focusing on testing and validating your idea to make sure people will pay you for it before you even build it. After finishing this section, you’ll have a step-by-step process that will take you from creating your idea all the way through making money from it.

Section 4: Setup & Scale Your Systems. With your business model increasingly becoming more validated, starting with your initial set of sales and continuing with each subsequent sale, you will now shift into designing and organizing your business so that it can continue to grow and drive closer and closer to your goals. In this section you’ll learn how to run a business and how to structure and organize it for effective and efficient growth that doesn’t take over your life.

Section 5: Quit Your Cubicle. With a lot of hard work, some pivots along the way, and a little bit of luck, your business will grow to a point where you achieve your Freedom Number and can leave your job. This is an awesome time in your life, but it come with some new shifts and challenges. The goal of this chapter is to help you to make the transition from an employee to a full-time entrepreneur as seamless and possible and help you navigate through some of the obstacles that will arise as you make the transition.

Section 6: Stop Self Sabotage. How do you make sure you don’t get in your own way? Often we are our own worst enemy and inner critic. If you trust the process, you can join the small group of people who not only have big dreams but go after them and make it a reality. The goal of this section is to help you identify the various roadblocks and barriers that will arise and navigate past them so you can put this plan into action.

How to Get the Most Out of This Book

The only thing you sometimes have control over is perspective. You don’t have control over your situation. But you have a choice about how you view it.

Chris Pine, Actor

As Ariana and I were initially discussing the writing of this book, a fundamental question came up: Should we write this book together, or should just one of us write it?

On one hand, we work together in each of our businesses, and obviously in life. People have appreciated this fact and said that they get so much more value because they get both of our perspectives. I am the natural entrepreneur, with a very visionary and business-oriented mind that is open to explore a new path, while Ariana is the non-entrepreneur, used to getting a paycheck every two weeks, not worried about how we would pay for health insurance, and not being accountable for the success or failure of the business. We called her the official reality checker as she often brought up important concerns early on in our journey (and still does now).

On the other hand, we’ve always found it initially more challenging when we try to team up on a project. First off, we need to be aligned on what the overall vision is for the project. This means rather than me just jumping in and going to town, I need to take some time to slow down, share my vision, listen to Ariana’s vision, and ultimately create a joint vision that works for both of us. Then we need define our individual roles on the project and set parameters on how we will collaborate. So generally, it’s easier to fly solo on projects, but when working together on projects they almost always come out better.

So, after many discussions and just about every one of our friends telling us that we needed to write the book together, we decided to write the book together (cue peer pressure). Right after we made that decision, we then quickly ran into the next issue: How would we actually write a book together? Our writing styles and voice are so different/unique, and we each have very different perspectives on the same story/experience. Whose perspective should we use for each of the stories, and how would you, the reader, know whose perspective you were hearing?

After going back and forth on exactly what the format of the book would be, we decided to arrange it into 6 different sections. For each section, we will start it off with a story, which will set the stage for the section and give you a peek into our journey as we went through this process of building our ideal lives. Then we follow it with specific lessons and actions that you can implement to build your ideal life. The only remaining question was how to write it so that we each brought our unique perspective, without confusing you as to who was talking. In the end, we decided that we would each write the intro story in every section from our own perspective, but then co-write the rest of the section. What we hope what you gain through this format is seeing the different perspectives of how we both viewed the same situation that we experienced, followed by actionable steps to help you move forward and put the pieces in place to build your ideal life.

So when you read the first chapter of each section, you will see "Tom’s Take and Ariana’s Take." This will indicate whose point of view you are hearing. As you get into subsequent chapters, we have written them together in a single voice.

If I have seen further than others, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.

Sir Isaac Newton, Mathematician & Physicist

Prior to graduating from college, I despised reading. Since then, I have read thousands of books. I often tell people that nothing that I do is original; why reinvent the wheel? Instead, what I do is take the amazing concepts and ideas that I have read, learned, and experienced, and distill/organize them into simple frameworks that makes them easier to implement. Think of me as a walking version of cliff-notes who can breakdown and explain how you can use these concepts in your life & business (and save you the time and energy of reading and understanding all the original books!)

People often thank me for taking all of this knowledge and concepts and packaging then in such a way that not only does it look simple, but that people also gain the confidence that they can actually do it. You will notice that throughout this book there are various stories and analogies to help you better understand the concepts.

We meet people all of the time who are probably smarter than us. In fact, some people that we have worked with have flat out told us this.

Look, I probably know more about this than you do. But the reason I’ve sought out you guys is to help me take all of this knowledge I have and turn it into results.

You see, having the knowledge is an important first step, but that is just it. It is the first step. The implementation of that knowledge is what ultimately allows us to succeed and achieve our goals.

So, as you read through this, please realize that all of this is built on the work of those who come before us. So why write this book? Because you shouldn’t have to read thousands of books in order to build a business and live a great life. We have taken the key principles, lessons, and steps, and put them into a logical framework for you to follow. As often as we can, we cite the specific source of a concept. In some cases, this can be a challenge, as many of these concepts we have picked up over the course of our journey, and we may not remember where we first encountered them. Additionally, when you read thousands of books, you will find that the same concepts and themes are repeated over and over, so it can often be difficult to know where the concept originated from.

In addition, you will encounter various activities throughout the book. These are the same activities that we use with our clients as we take them through this process. As a thank you for purchasing this book, we’ve compiled the worksheets and templates that we use with our clients into a special Lifestyle Builders Starter Pack. You will see us reference this pack from time to time throughout the book as we go through the various activities. It contains guides, worksheets, and videos to help you implement and get more out of this book. To download this free starter, head over to www.lifestylebuildersbook.com

Section 1:

Plan With Purpose

Section Summary

Most people have 2 lives: the one they are living and the one that they want to live. The first step to shift towards the life that you want to live is to define what that life looks like and build yourself a roadmap that directs you from where you are to where you want to be.

The goal of this section is to help you get super clear on what your ideal lifestyle looks like and to help you build that initial roadmap for how to get there.

Chapter 1.1 - What Are We Doing Here?

Chapter 1.2 - Describe What You Want to Have

Plan Your Life

Purpose

Vision

Ideal (Every)Day Experience

Chapter 1.3 - Define What You Need to Do

Creating Your Roadmap/Timeline

Making Changes Today

Chapter 1.4 - Create Your Process: Reflect and Adjust

Set Your Check-in Points

Chapter 1.5 - Prioritize & Implement

Perform a Brain Dump

Categorize Your Thoughts

Prioritize Your Tasks

Plan Your Week

Chapter 1.6 - Track Your Progress

What Metrics Do You Track

Qualitative vs. Quantitative Metrics

Chapter 1.7 - Distill Who You Need to Be

Victim vs. Victor Paradigm

Be – Do – Have

SWOT Analysis

Personality Tests

Identify Shifts to Make

Chapter 1.1

What Are We Doing Here?

Tom’s Take

I ’m not sure what to even say. We are getting married in 9 months. What were you thinking?

Those are not exactly the words that you want to hear out of your fiancé’s mouth, especially when you are doing everything that you can to build the ideal life that you desire for the two of you.

You see, Ariana and I had met 5 years before on our first day of college. We began dating about a week later. As we graduated from Oswego State University, I looked ahead at the path we were on. It was that traditional path that we described in the introduction of this book.

Graduate from high school. Check.

Graduate from college. Check.

Get a job. In Progress.

Work for 45-plus years. Ugh.

You see, my degree was in computer science. And at that point, my next 45 years looked like sitting in a cubicle, typing on a computer, working long hours, and savoring my weekends (unless I had to work overtime) before having to repeat the process the next week.

Did you know that 45 years is composed of 2,340 weeks? That’s a lot of time, and I didn’t want to waste it sitting in a cubicle, not enjoying life to its fullest.

You see, I was 21. Forty-five years was more than DOUBLE the amount of time that I had even been alive.

Things didn’t look as bleak for her, or so the story in my head went. She had a zoology degree. Her next 45 years could be spent playing with animals and traveling to exotic locations to do so. But while she was doing this, there I would be, stuck in my cubicle. I would miss all of these adventures while she had the time of her life.

Also, not to mention all of the times I would miss in our future kids’ lives when they had sporting events or dance recitals or spelling bee competitions. You know the story all-too-well from movies: The father promises to be there but gets stuck at the office working on a project. He keeps looking at his watch and finally finishes, rushing out of the office to get to the event. But when he shows up, everyone is gone. He missed it. And his child is devastated.

This was NOT the future that I desired for us and our family.

So I did something crazy, as Ariana would say. As we graduated from college, I set a goal: We would be retired by 35. I had no idea how we would get there, but I figured 14 years would give us enough time to figure it out.

I started figuring out how to make that happen. To do so, I looked around at successful people to see if I could follow in their tracks. What were they doing right that others who sit in cubicles for 45-plus years weren’t?

I wanted to see what they did to make money and build wealth. The first thing that stood out was investing in the stock market. So, I started there. I bought a bunch of books about the stock market, such as The Successful Investor: What 80 Million People Need to Know to Invest Profitably and Avoid Big Losses and The Intelligent Investor: The Definitive Book on Value Investing. I began watching YouTube videos by financial strategists who studied the market for years. I even opened some investing accounts. Then I learned 2 important lessons about the stock market: 1) you generally need money to make money, and 2) there was a lot to learn and I didn’t have the patience to learn it all.

After stock marketing investing, I next looked to starting a business. I had had several side hustles throughout high school and college, and many successful people owned their own business, such as Robert Kiyosaki and Donald Trump. I investigated opening a franchise business but found out that you often needed to have a specific net worth, as well as several hundred thousand dollars available. So that wasn’t going to work. I then checked out some Multi-Level Marketing (MLM) companies. If you are not familiar, these are the companies that you sell products for, such as health supplements, jewelry, and other similar products. After checking out a few companies, I just didn’t get a great vibe from any of them.

So, I went back to the drawing board, and then I found it - real estate investing! It seemed like every wealthy person had real estate investments. Better yet, as I began doing research, I came across this concept of buying a duplex as your first investment property. You live in one half and rent out the other half. If you do it right, you could then live for free, or for very low cost. Given that we were already spending $750 a month to rent a 2-bedroom apartment, this seemed like an awesome opportunity for us. So, I approached Ariana with the idea, all excited, only to get shot down. She wanted us to buy a house for ourselves like we had originally discussed. She wanted nothing to do with being landlords.

I was running out of ideas. Nothing seemed to be working, and Ariana seemed to say no to every opportunity. Demoralized and depressed, I drove home from work one evening questioning whether retirement by 35 could really be done. Then I heard an advertisement come across the radio that changed my life:

Sick of your job and not living the life that you want? Do you want to learn how to build real wealth and start living your life? Join us for this limited 2-hour free training on how to become a real estate investor!

This was it. I just needed to learn different ways to invest in real estate so that we wouldn’t be landlords.

I went home and signed up. I also got an extra ticket. Clearly Ariana was not going to go with me, so I called up my cousin Kip and convinced him to go. The night of the event came. There were lots of people there, and although they didn’t actually show you much about how to invest in real estate, they did do an awesome job of getting you excited for the life that you could create through real estate investing. They offered an additional 3-day training where they would dive deeper into various strategies for only $500. And you could bring a friend, while also getting some audio programs and workbooks to get you started. So Kip and I decided to split the $500 cost and go to the 3-day training.

On the car ride home, I listened to disc one of the audio lessons. That night I tore through the workbooks and was so excited for the training. When it came, there were probably 75 to 100 other people who decided to attend. The training was held on a Friday, Saturday, and Sunday from 7AM - 5PM, so they were long days, but I showed up excited.

The next 3 days were a brain dump of information. They discussed concepts from the audio trainings. They provided an overview of real estate investing and financing your deals. They went into various investment strategies and showed example deals.

On the last day, the next sales pitch started. They passed out sheets of paper with their advanced training session. We then each wrote in the regular prices and the discounted prices if you signed up today. And as I know now but didn’t know then, the entire 3 days had been strategically organized to get people to invest in the next set of training at the end.

As I wrote down the prices, I was shocked. The lowest cost training was $5,000 for a single course, and they went all the way up to $45,000, which was more than I made in a year at that point. I knew right away that we were not going to invest in any of these courses.

But then I thought about it (The sales tactics and psychological conditioning from the past 3 days was working). I saw other people sign up. They were praised for taking action and investing in their future. And as I thought about my future, I knew I didn’t have enough information to invest in real estate, especially because Ariana wasn’t on board. So how was I going to achieve that goal of retiring by 35? If we did invest, it would only be $7,500, since I could split the $15,000 with Kip. But I didn’t have $7,500, so that wasn’t possible. Oh, but I did have a few credit cards with some space. If I did invest, I would be able to make this money back pretty quick, right? Just like the presenter talked about; a single deal could be worth $5,000, $10,000, or more. It would only take 1 or 2 deals, which I could definitely do if I got additional training courses and guidance, right?

I was torn, but in the end, my cousin and I decided to sign up for a package that included 4 additional trainings. I ended up having to split the cost over 2 credit cards. When they processed the transactions and gave us our new materials, I was excited, but also a little sick to my stomach. Ariana and I had just bought a house and were planning to get married in a few months, and I had just added another $7,500 to our debt (which also included $66,000 in college loans, if you recall from earlier), for a training course on real estate investing, which she didn’t want us to do anyways. On the bright side, I guess if I didn’t make this work, then we wouldn’t have to worry about adding on more debt from the wedding, as Ariana would probably call it off…

Ariana’s Take

I’m not sure what to even say. We are getting married in 9 months. What were you thinking?

Those were the words I said to Tom, after he told me about his latest business venture—a $7,500 investment into 4 real estate trainings. He spent $7,500 we didn’t have, on 2 credit cards, without discussing it with me, his fiancé and partner in life. We had just bought a house together 6 months before, spent money on improvements, and we were gearing up to pay for our own wedding with 250 guests in just 9 months.

I had a brief (it felt much longer in my head of course) moment where I wondered if I even knew him anymore. Had he changed so much in the time since we graduated from college that I didn’t see this coming? What had possessed him to do something so risky and expensive when we were just starting out our lives together?

We sat in silence in that dark and quiet living room. The only noise that echoed in our house came from the dog shifting close by in her bed and me sniffling into a pile of tissues. The light illuminated the kitchen, creating weird shadows on the wall next to me.

I guess I just don’t understand WHY. How did we get here?

And that was the crux of it. The end of our first story and the beginning of this new one. The Why.

You see, our lives together thus far had been so simple, so easy. Four years of college, deepening our connection and friendship, knowing we’d spend the rest of our lives together. Talking all things life: jobs, marriage, house, kids. The Path as it were.

Except somewhere in those couple months in between college and our first jobs, Tom read a book that changed his whole view on life. A friend had given him a copy of Automatic Millionaire by David Bach. After reading it, Tom was apparently spending his time thinking about how he could do this and seeing this dream of financial freedom for us and our future family.

One Problem: He kinda sorta forgot to share these thoughts and dreams with ME. While I looked forward to the traditional life path, Tom took that flying leap towards his dreams and left me to fall flat on my face.

I felt betrayed and confused. We were best friends. We had spent the last 5 years doing everything together—late night snack trips to the dining hall, holidays with our extended families, binge watching Sopranos for days, even grocery shopping and laundry. We told each other everything, shared all of our fears, and even revealed, in detail, our most embarrassing moments. So how did I not see this coming? Was I that far detached from the man I was supposed to marry? Did I have some serious rose-colored glasses on, clouding what was really going on here?

How DARE he do this to me as our life was just starting to move forward? I had worked hard, graduated from college with honors, successfully played soccer for 4 years, done the internships and stuck by him through all the tough times during college. I had done everything right! I deserved a good life, and a partner who was going to help me find one. Not someone who would go behind my back