Live Below Your Means

Easily stated, rarely mastered, the financial principle of living below your means is not a hard concept or even a hidden one.

Living below your means is not about deprivation or living like a college student eating only ramen. It's making intentional choices to spend only what you have and saving for your future. This is how you maintain and grow true freedom.

Your success should not be defined or dictated by specific expectations or appearances touted on social media or by the Jones next door. Don’t let society pressure you into a lifestyle that exceeds your income.

From my own experience and that of the business owners and practitioners I work with, as we earn more, it's tempting to upgrade our lifestyle – a bigger house, a nicer car, more luxurious vacations. This “lifestyle creep” is insidious. It keeps us on a treadmill, always chasing the next raise, bonus, or client just to maintain our inflated standard of living.

You’ve Been Told a Lie

Many believe the lies and propaganda from Wall Street and financial advisors that you can’t learn how to manage your own money. I’m telling you, Yes, you can. Furthermore, if you don’t, you are allowing someone else to dictate how you live your life. 

Too many people fall into the trap of relying on 401(k)s and traditional retirement accounts that lock up your money until you're nearly 60 and don't offer the flexibility and control that comes from owning income-generating assets like real estate.

I have helped hundreds of other high-income professionals learn how to make their money work for them. It’s what I learned to do myself from a very early age. Real estate was my chosen asset, providing both cash flow and appreciation, building wealth over time. 

Because I started young (while in dental school), I was able to escape the chair and leave my dental practice about 20 years ago in my 40s during my daughter’s health crisis. I had the capacity to do this because I built a Plan B not in the 401(k) lockbox, but in reliable assets that I learned how to manage myself. 

If you want to be on the frontier of creating your own life and having freedom earlier in life, not “someday,” you must start taking control of your own money and creating your own plan for financial independence.

Stepping Off the Treadmill 

It sounds like a fairy tale, but I’ve seen it happen with the doctors and business owners I work with. Conversations run deep, relationships are strengthened, and couples begin to work together, sometimes for the first time, toward the life they both want. The transformations that this produces are monumental in mindset, relationships, health, legacy, purpose, and wealth.

So, instead of using all your income to provide for a lifestyle impressed upon you, consider how every dollar saved is a dollar you can invest in assets that generate passive income. The more you progress towards financial independence, making your money work for you, the more you can create space and margin to build the life you desire way before age 62 – the current average retirement age (69 for dentists).

In fact, some of my members in Freedom Founders have achieved financial freedom in their 40s and late 30s. They love their life because they spend their time how they want to, with their families and kids, while still being involved in their businesses and practices without pressure to work more than they want. 

The key is to start as soon as you can. The sooner you adopt a “live below your means” mindset, the more time your money has to compound and grow in reliable income-generating assets. This isn't about waiting until retirement to enjoy your wealth; it's about designing a life where you have the freedom to make choices not dictated by financial constraints.

Reduce the expectations you have allowed other people to put on you. Don’t live life by other people's agendas. Step off the treadmill by living below your means and live a much freer life.