Rich Dad Poor Dadworking for pay and benefits that reward them in the short term, but
are often disastrous in the long run.
Instead, I recommend to young people to seek work for what they
will learn, more than what they will earn. Look down the road at
what skills they want to acquire before choosing a specific profession
and before getting trapped in the Rat Race.
Once people are trapped in the lifelong process of bill-paying,
they become like those little hamsters running around in those metal
wheels. Their little furry legs are spinning furiously, the wheel is
turning furiously, but come tomorrow morning, they’ll still be in
the same cage. Great job.
In the movie Jerry Maguire starring Tom Cruise, there are many
great one-liners. Probably the most memorable is: “Show me the
money.” But there is one line I thought most truthful. It comes from
the scene where Tom Cruise is leaving the firm. He has just been fired,
and he is asking the entire company, “Who wants to come with me?”
And the whole place is silent and frozen. Only one woman speaks up
and says, “I’d like to, but I’m due for a promotion in three months.”
That statement is probably the most truthful statement in the whole
movie. It is the type of statement that people use to keep themselves busy,
working away to pay bills. I know my educated dad looked forward to his
pay raise every year, and every year he was disappointed. So he would go
back to school to earn more qualifications so he could get another raise.
Then, once again, there would be another disappointment.
The question I often ask people is, “Where is this daily activity
taking you?” Just like the little hamster, I wonder if people look at
where their hard work is taking them. What does the future hold?
In his book The Retirement Myth, Craig S. Karpel writes: “I visited
the headquarters of a major national pension consulting firm and met
with a managing director who specializes in designing lush retirement
plans for top management. When I asked her what people who don’t
have corner offices will be able to expect in the way of pension income,
she said with a confident smile, ‘The Silver Bullet’.