Hello my friends, and welcome to another episode of Passive Real Estate Investing. I am your host Marco Santarelli. We have an interesting interview today. So, you know, as an investor, I think a lot of people are very much left brain, they’re analytical, they’re looking at facts, data, and numbers and whatnot. But we don’t necessarily stop to think about, I’ll call it mindset, but that’s an oversimplification. But really just how do you create the life you really want? And what is involved with that? How do we think about money? What’s our relationship with money? What are the habits that come out of that? Do we have a story? I think we all have a story related to money, but what is that story? Did you write your own story or did someone write your story for you? And what are you doing to sabotage yourself if that story is not the right story for you?
And does it lead to procrastination or making the wrong decisions, decisions that are too emotional and not logical, rational? There’s just a lot around it. And that is really where I wanted to bring on my guest today, who is an author and speaker on the topic about designing the life that you want and making sure that you have the right story in your mind and you create the right pathway for you to achieve the goals that you want to achieve. Her name is Leisa Peterson and I had a great conversation with her. We spoke offline and she’s actually presenting at the Real Estate Wealth Builders Conference that I am doing an opening keynote to. It’s known as REWBCON for short. And I think there’s the, a link on our website and in the show notes the event is REWBCON 2023 or REWBCON2023.com.
I’m not sure, but just check the show notes and you’ll find that link there. But she’s actually one of the speakers and presenters as well. And so she has a book out, it’s called The Mindful Millionaire, very interesting book. And I thought, well, you know what? I should bring her on the show and interview her and talk about these things that I think are a little bit, don’t wanna say Woo, they’re certainly not woo, but a little bit more of the intangibles that go from intention, feelings, opportunity, the stories that we tell ourselves and the stories we create about money that we live by permission, the permission we give ourselves the evidence around that. And, and ultimately, how do you reinvent your life? How do you create the life that you really want to live? And so that was our conversation. I tried to keep it short, but it went for about 45 minutes, maybe 50, but there’s a lot of good content there.
And her book is chock full of more information about the stuff that we talk about today. So without further ado, let me bring on my guest, Leisa here, and I hope you enjoyed today’s show. And thank you for listening.
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Well, it is my pleasure to welcome Leisa Peterson to the show. Leisa is an author, speaker, podcaster and educator and a coach. She has an MBA in finance, which is amazing cuz that was the thing I wanted to take when I went to university. And she has held the certified Financial Planner designation as the founder of Wealth clinic.com. Leisa helps clients and students create abundant and thriving lives. Additionally, she’s a regular guest on podcasts and radio shows and has been featured in publications like the Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, Forbes, The Week, and Huffington Post. And with that, Leisa, welcome to the show.
Thank you, Marco. I’m so happy to be here.
Well, it’s great having you on. I’ve enjoyed my conversations with you offline. I like your book, which is relatively new. I believe the title, correct me if I’m Wrong, is The Mindful Millionaire, correct?
Yes. Yes, that’s it.
All right, I’ll let you finish finish filling in the rest of it here in a moment. But I wanted to get you on the show because you take kind of a different approach to wealth and money, more from a psychological perspective, and it’s very much story based, which I appreciate it, it makes it very memorable. So why don’t we begin by you sharing with my audience a little bit more about yourself. I mean, my bio about you was, was brief and to the point, but I think it it’ll be more colorful if you tell us a little bit about yourself and then we can kind of jump into, you know, your philosophy, these beliefs.
Yeah. So like you said, started with that MBA in finance many years ago, 30 plus years ago. And what I realized early in life is that money was something that we didn’t have, but I wanted more of. And I would say that really dictated the decisions that I made and life the career. I went into banking, I figured pretty early in life that people, bankers had moneys and I wanted money and I’m just gonna follow the bankers around and, and see if I could get some, but what ended up happening after working in money, the money business for many years working for a large bank eventually becoming a mortgage banker and also becoming a financial planner simultaneous to my husband and I investing in real estate. He’s a general contractor. I’m really good with the numbers. We make a great team in being able to finance projects that we were building from the ground up for the most part and some renovations.
But putting all that together, what happened was I got into meditation about 20, almost 25 years ago as a result of a tragedy that happened in my family. And I came to meditation for healing. And because of meditation and being so close to money and people’s relationship with money started coming up over and over again. And I would notice these interesting behaviors where some people were totally fine with money, it was like comes, it goes, there’s no stress. I just worked my way through it. And then there were a lot of other people that were more like me, where whether I had it or I didn’t, I stressed about about money a lot and I wanted to understand that. I wanted to understand what was happening for people. Why do some people glide through life with, with money? And other people either don’t have it or they have it, but they’re worried about it all the time or they’re thinking about it all the time. And so my research and my work went down that rabbit hole, and ultimately I wrote the book, mindful Millionaire, to help people understand what’s actually happening under the surface.
It’s an interesting title. I know a monk who has an organization called Mindful University, and this is what he talks about all the time. He doesn’t talk about money or things specifically, but he talks about mindfulness and how everything around you ties into your thinking. And I don’t know how to summarize mindfulness, but mindfulness. And so it’s very interesting that your book is similar. It, it ties into everything you think about how you think it affects and manifests in your life. Is that pretty true?
Yeah, I, I like to say that the relationship or the experiences we have with money are often a reflection of how we see ourselves or even the relationship that we have with ourselves. And so if everything’s awesome, there’s a tendency, like if that’s how things are going with money, we tend to have that feeling in life. Like, my life is pretty good and, and here’s money just kind of showing up for me in this way. But then there’s a lot of folks who have had adverse circumstances growing up. They’ve had trauma, they’ve had tragedies, they’ve had difficulties. They’ve had parents who maybe were really bad with money like mine, and because of that they did not feel safe growing up. And so, like for me, I was go running after the money because I wanted more safety in my life. But what I found was I, I became a self-made millionaire by my mid thirties, and then I just switched to worrying about losing it. Like that scarcity way of thinking didn’t go away. And I just was so caught up inside of it until I started meditating. I couldn’t step back and say, wait a minute, this isn’t healthy. This isn’t actually serving you. And oh, by the way, you have a whole bunch of clients that are exactly the same way <laugh>, like they have some of these same problems. Right?
So what prompted you to write the book? Was it because of your fear or was it some deep-seated emotion, or was it like an aha moment or discovery that you had?
You know, the book itself, I think that at first it was like, I have something to say and I’d love to say it. And I didn’t really understand how hard it was gonna be to write it or to communicate my ideas. And I kid you not, if I hadn’t had a few things happen. Like I went to a conference in San Francisco in 2014 when I had just started my business and I found myself in line at the bathroom with Ariana Huffington. And I started talking to her and by the time she heard my story and she heard what I was doing and teaching about money and mindfulness, she was like, you should blog for the Huffington Post. And I was was like, I can barely write, you know, like I’m a banker. And, and but, but that invitation was so huge. I was like, I’m gonna do this.
And then I ended up about blogging. And along the way, within a few months of blogging, ultimately the agent that helped me to create this book, you know, sponsored me, reached out and said, what you’re talking about is so unique, I would love to help you bring a book into reality. What do you think? And I told her, I’m not that great of a writer. And she said, it’s okay, you can learn. And I was like, okay, I love you. What, what do I do next? And, and she worked with me for years and she’s one of the best agents in the world. Like it just doesn’t happen, you know, normally that way.
Yeah, yeah. Very, very interesting. So I was going through your book and early on in the book you talk about a tale of two paths. And obviously it’s related to money, but would you mind sharing that, you know, that quick story about the tale of two different paths that we take or some people take maybe?
Exactly. Yes. So the premise is, is that we don’t know until we start to look at the, at the effects in our lives, what’s showing up for us. Another way I’d like to think of this is are we playing to win or are we afraid of the losses? Like, are we really in this game to run away from our fears and just kind of take care of ourselves, like create bubble wrap for life? Or are we here to truly thrive? And I think that, I thought I was here to thrive, but when I got into it, I was very clearly so afraid of things falling apart, that that was the way that I approached everything. And I guess, you know, as a real estate investor, it’s interesting because I, I will watch this sometimes where I’m like, oh my gosh, all I’m thinking about is all that I would lose here and I’m not thinking about the potential gain and I can’t make good decisions when I’m coming from that place, right?
Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. But the challenges is when we’re inside of it, we don’t know what we’re doing and we have to kind of become the witness. And that’s where this whole healing path steps in where we say, I’m not making good decisions, or I’m really struggling with my decisions, I need a better way. And that whole idea of coming out of the story, which you referred to before, and, and the book talks a lot about story. It’s like, oh, I grew up with no money and I want more money and I’ll do whatever it takes to get more money. Like that’s a money story and kind of look like my money story until I step back. And I was like, dang, at what cost? At what cost to my life? If I pursue money and it’s more important than anything, I’m gonna wake up one day and pretty unhappy with the life that I’ve created. And so this book is chronicling and helping people kind of assess where are they on that journey? Are they in a healing mode? Are they in a healing path and, and wanting to help themselves live more thriving, beneficial service oriented lives? Or is it all about you and just you staying safe and secure?
I don’t know if this is a a complex question or simple question, but how does someone know if they’re on the right path? You know, I think mm-hmm. <Affirmative>, if I can kind of clarify that a little bit. I think a lot of people early on want to make money. They think that is the end goal and they set themselves a goal. I want to be a millionaire, or I want to have a certain amount of income every month. And they’re so hyper-focused on the money part of it that they don’t stop to realize that. And this is my opinion of course, that money is not the end. It’s a means to an end. And a lot of times people just don’t realize they’re not on a path or on the right path. And if they become successful or semi-successful, then they start to realize the path they’re on and, and that there’s a bigger purpose, a bigger vision. There’s a, a give back or a purpose or a mission in their life, whatever it may be. I think a lot of people, especially in the early part of their journey, they don’t realize whether they’re on the right path or not. Is there a way in your mind to know if you’re on the right path?
I think that there’s obvious signs when you’re off, you’re not on the right path, and that is your relationships are in disorder, your money’s in disorder, your health is in disorder. Like I think those, that’s like the three legged stool. If any of those aren’t in a really good place, I think they’re good signals that you can pay more attention to. But there’s also, you know, I work with a lot of women and the relationship that we have with ourselves, I don’t know that many women have as positive voices in the back of their minds about like, what’s happening. We can be really hard on ourselves. And what’s sad about that is you don’t even realize that you, it’s this voice inside of you that’s being so hard on you. Mm-Hmm. And, and so until you’re around people who aren’t acting that way or aren’t treating you in that way where they’re being hard on you, it’s hard to break the cycle.
It’s hard to get out of that pattern. And so I think that’s why I started to find in my conversations, cuz I’ll, I’ll tell you what happened. I knew from meditating and from working with people with their money that there was something going on. But I didn’t, I’m not a psychologist, I don’t approach this from psychology. And what I started to do is ask my financial advising clients if they would have lunch with me and answer questions, I wanted to understand their relationship with money. And I would ask them about their backstory with money. Like, what are your earliest memories of money? Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, what happened with money when you were growing up? How was it treated in your home? And once I started asking these questions, this whole, well, spring of stories would come forth and many times people would cry and be very emotional about like, you’re asking me something that I have never thought about.
And as a result of that, people would start to gain knowledge of themselves that they had just never thought of or never kind of turned the spigot on. And as a result of those questions, people started making big changes in their lives. And this was out without me even knowing what I was doing. Right. I’m just like, Hey, tell me about these, these experiences. People would like leave marriages that weren’t healthy because they figured out that the only reason they were in that marriage was because of the money and that was not serving them. Or they’d quit a job because the only reason they were in that job was for the money and that was destroying them. And all kinds of things happened. And that was when I was like, oh my gosh, there’s something happening here that nobody’s talking about and, and I wanna talk about it because it seems like money can become a prison if we’re not careful.
So it sounds like everybody has a story, a money story of some sort, good or bad. They may not even realize that they have a money story, but it stems from probably their childhood and maybe their lack of money or some traumatic experiences that they have. So is it true that everybody has a money story And and if so, how do you change it or rewrite it or maybe create a new story?
Yeah, I think everyone has a story or you have multiple stories. I think that acknowledging and understanding it is gonna be the first step in anything. If, if you don’t go back and kind of understand where you came from and why you’re doing what you’re doing, it’s gonna be pretty tough to change it. You know, you need a target of like, okay, here’s where it is. And then simply saying what might look different? What, what might I wanna change? And what’s interesting too is like I mentioned in the case of somebody staying in a relationship because you know, it’s cheaper <laugh> to like be married or in a relationship than two people living separately, you know, and, and what’s gonna happen if we get a divorce. But what’s interesting is we’ll see how that one pattern of staying in something that’s not working for you actually shows up in all these other areas of your life. It’s not just with money <laugh>. And so the minute that starts to come into your consciousness that holy moly, I’m doing the same thing here and here and here, you’re like, okay, I need to call the bluff on this story. Like I need to say to myself that this isn’t serving me anymore and maybe we need help. Maybe we buy a book, you know, like the mindful millionaire, you know, we decide that we’re going to make a change and we begin moving in that direction one way or another.
So does that ultimately lead people into some sort of self-sabotage? I mean, is it possible that they create bad habits that lead to financial self-sabotage or even procrastination, which is very common. I see procrastination everywhere I turn.
Yeah. Procrastination, self sabotage. Yeah. Because what we’re doing and, and there’s a lot of research, so I talk a lot, I mean the book is overcome scarcity, experience, true prosperity, create the life you really want. Scarcity was the big kind of like once I learned about scarcity, that it’s not just a thought, it’s actually a research topic. Yeah. And we know about it from the perspective, like, oh, when things are in scarce supply, we buy more of it like toilet paper during the pandemic. Right? Right. That’ss a classic scarcity story. But what these researchers found is that when you believe that there’s not enough of something, you have a loss of like 13 points in IQ in that moment. And you make stupid decisions. Like you can’t help but do that because you’re tunneling. They’ve actually come up with a term you tunnel, you only see like a couple possibilities, but you don’t see the whole landscape of all the different things that you could do to make the situation better. And I think coaches a lot of times, because they’re not inside the story that you’re in, which is skilled, filled with scarcity, someone else can be like, well, have you thought about this? Or have you thought about that? Because those are totally viable options, but because you are in a story of scarcity, you can’t see those possibilities.
Right. So do money habits come from your stories and your beliefs or do money habits good or bad come from something else? I’ve never really been able to put my finger on that.
Yeah. <laugh>, I think that if you go back, I, I like to go really far back in people’s lives when we’re talking about money stories. Because it’s like when were those early ideas of the way the world works formed right? And what was happening? What were you in a recession when you were five years old, six years old? Because that might change how you think about money or a depression, right? Because that happened and we still have grandparents who, you know, live through that what was happening early in life that would impact or affect why you believe something today as being a certain way. And so it’s our parents, it’s the stuff on tv. You know, it’s funny cuz even things like, you know, when I was growing up Gilligan’s Island mm-hmm <affirmative>, it, it’s fascinating how these characters where the people who were poor were nice and kind and benevolent, but the people who were rich were evil. It’s like that stuff right? Has been drilled into our heads and so there’s no surprise there that we have to check some of those beliefs because we saw it portrayed by these characters that we thought were amazing, you know, early in life. Yeah. So it comes from all the different places.
Yeah. I think we’re dating ourselves cuz I was actually thinking about this literally yesterday about Gilligans Island, but you know, the characters you’re talking about are Mr. And Mrs. Thurston, Howell III
I actually remember this. That’s funny. But you’re right. You know the, like, you know, Gillian and the captain, I forgot his name. You know, they, they didn’t have money, but they were, you know, the kindest people. Yeah. It’s crazy. But yeah, I, you know, I I think money habits come from a lot of things as we grow up and in our environment. I’d like to say that money habits come from school, but it’s actually the lack of financial education in the school that creates or leads to poor money habits or a lack of good money habits. Parents are certainly a major influence, a major impact. You know, if, if you’re a child growing up or a teen, you’re at the dinner table, hopefully, you know, with your parents and what you talk about and what you learn certainly will have an impact on your beliefs.
Like, you know, do you have to scrimp and be frugal and cut coupons? Well, you know, that’s, you know how you’re gonna think until you change your thinking habits. So yeah, I think it’s a product of environment and also of experience, which is what you’re talking about related to stories. You know, we all have our own money stories and you know, that can impact our, our habits I think positively or even negatively. But that’s kinda the part one of your book is you talk about that stuff. So just kind of transitioning here a little bit more of the financial side of things. You know, modern day financial advice is not necessarily good and it seems to miss the mark for a lot of people because they’re trapped in what I call these traditional investment opportunities or vehicles, which most people don’t, you know, have access to things that an accredited investor would have. But where did, or where does modern day financial advice miss the mark in your opinion?
Yeah, having been a financial advisor, I mean, I feel like it, it misses the mark in so many places. <Laugh>, one of which would be education because here you’ve got a population of people who haven’t in outside of studying finance and working in finance, they just haven’t been exposed to anything in schools. So then the consumer goes to the advisor and the advisor’s got more education, but still really not at the level that you need to be able to guide somebody as a true mentor. They’re more of a, you know, fee for service kind of thing, right? You get the, you get the education you need, but nothing else. So you’re not questioning assumptions, you’re not trained to question assumptions in that industry. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. So the lack of education is the issue I think because I believe, and this is why I had to kind of leave the profession.
If you’re trying to sell something to someone that they don’t understand, I think that’s stealing period. Like stealing in the way that you take their money. They don’t totally understand what they’re getting involved in and there’s no process to bring, bring them up to speed over time. It’s very rare when people are like, I won’t work with you until you learn these things. And interesting enough, I found someone, I found a very successful advisor that I mentored with and he was dealing with high net worth folks, but anyone who worked with him had to go through a, a 90 minute presentation of every single aspect of what was happening with the stock market, with the bond market. Like it was the most fascinating presentation I’ve ever seen. And he was like, if you don’t sit through that and learn what we’re about to do with your money, I don’t wanna work with you. Really. And that’s an exception.
And so you like that, you thought that was…yeah
It was shocking. People who had 10, 20, 30 million net worth coming to an advisor, you would find out that they did not understand the most basic aspects of investing, and yet they were handing that money over to someone to invest.
That’s amazing. Think about how much that person has differentiated himself from all of his competition just being that educational in nature and scope. Right. And his clients probably love it and appreciate it and and probably refer everybody they know to him, right?
Yeah, most definitely. Yeah. Yeah. And people don’t like it, right? Because they’re like, I don’t wanna sit through that. I know it is what people would say, I already know it. And he is like, you know, then you’re not our client. So he held a very high standard. And that’s not easy when you’re starting out as an advisor because other people will just gladly take your money and you don’t have to go to the training and education.
I think that really answers my question about where modern day financial advice misses the mark. It is really about transparency and education. At least that’s my opinion about it. That’s why you and I, you know, do podcasts episodes every week. It’s why we put out content like almost every day on our website, on our blog. I mean, we have articles coming out almost every day. There’s just a lot of good information out there that I want people to learn and know. And I, and I think people need it, want it, and they respect that, appreciate it. And they, you know, they come back to you as, you know, the the subject matter expert at some point because they, they’re getting the education they need and want from you.
Totally. It, it’s fascinating because if you ask me it, one of the chapters in the book is called Evidence and it’s about building your financial house. And I looked at these stages that we go through in life of what do we need to be thinking about at these different stages from the perspective of having been through the CFP training and working with people and their money for now three decades. Like I wanted people to see, it’s not complicated, but there’s a lot of steps to it. And, and I wanted to educate people about this, and I’ll share my daughter’s 25 and she’s got a business that’s just exploding and it’s so exciting. And I’m just blown away by is how much time it takes to transfer the things that I know and the things that my husband know about money to her and to her fiance. And she’s like, mom, where would anyone learn about this? And I’m like, good question. You know, this is like, I feel like this is the thing I wanna do for the rest of my life is make sure that people get access to this information as early in life as possible. Preferably. Cause it’s gonna change your life for the better.
Hundred percent. A hundred percent. So on that note, are there tools out there, or what tools do you think of or talk about regarding changing how you think or feel about money? I mean, you mentioned meditation, which was kind of interesting at the beginning, and I didn’t really want to question you about it because I thought, well, you know, I used to meditate for a while and I actually enjoyed it, but now I just don’t have the time to meditate. But I never meditated because of money. Right? It was just really just to self-center myself. But do you have recommendations or, or comments or thoughts about tools to change how you think and feel about money?
Well, yes, definitely meditation. I know it’s unconventional, but I would say that the more you become a witness to your life rather than being inside of your life, the more powerful you become in the world.
Ah, that’s a golden nugget right there. Yeah, I like that. Being aware. So can you say that again? It sounds like you’re looking from the outside in.
Yeah. Well, most people, they’re inside of their life, but they’re not witnessing their life. And when we’re inside of our life, it’s just like, if you’re a business owner, you’re a real estate investor, when you’re inside of a business, you have one perspective. But when you step out of the business and you become like, you’re kind of becoming your own guide, your own mentor, you’re like, okay, what’s working here? What’s not working here? How could this be better? How could I change these things in my life? You’re stepping out as the witness to say, maybe I’m not doing the best things for myself and for my family and for the world at large. And meditation, I don’t know how else you do that, but meditation, both in learning how to control your mind like a well-trained horse so it’s not scattered and running from one thing to the next to the next.
You gotta be able to, you know, squash that kind of tendency, short attention span. And the phones and all the things that we have are making it worse. It’s proven that our brains are actually not being able to hold our attention on one thing for very long. Right? So once you develop that in meditation, then you sit and you st you actually have quietness, you have the ability to start to examine. So there’s stages that you’ve gotta go through. And then I, I’d add to that, that’s where education comes in too, of making sure that you are understanding the areas that you’re strong in and you’re very wise and you’ve got experience and where do you need to get better knowledge and wisdom and experience, whether that be, you know, a mastermind that we talked about the other day, or a book or a class. Like what can you do to enrich yourself? Because from where I stand, I’ve been working in this business for 30 years. We’ve been building houses, we’ve been investing in all these different things, and there is not a day that goes by that I don’t find new opportunities for growth and expansion that would improve my life or money <laugh> or my relationship with my husband. You know, like there’s so much opportunity for growth, but, but we miss it if we’re not mm-hmm. <Affirmative> more of a witness.
Yeah. I’m of the belief that there’s a millionaire, quote unquote inside all of us. And I don’t know if you feel the same, but I think we all have the capacity and the capability to become millionaires. I dunno if this is a fair question to ask you, but how does someone discover that millionaire within themselves? I think some people are, are lost in even knowing, you know, I’d like to say that ignorance is expensive, not that ignorance is bliss. And, and I I I think a lot of people just don’t know how to reach inside themselves to find that millionaire. Is is there a way, in your opinion, to discover that millionaire within
What comes to me is what happened for me? And, and I see this showing up in different ways, but when I was in college, I met a woman who would become my best friend, and her father had started a company and that company was starting to really take off. And by the time we finished college, she could take me, call me up and say, Hey, let’s go to Barcelona to the Olympics next week. First class, Hey, let’s go to New York City and let’s go shopping this weekend. Like I got to see that these folks who had a lot of money were normal people just like me. And that if they could become multimillionaires, there was no reason why I couldn’t do it too. And it was a very pivotal thing that it’s the company that you keep in that I saw, why not me?
Al I’m willing to try. It doesn’t seem too hard because they’ve been able to do it. But what’s interesting is part of the reason I think I started my company is that I’m so comfortable with my relationship with money that just people hanging out with me or people like you, and I’m sure people listening to your podcast were talking about money and what might be very uncomfortable topic for other people. We’re talking about it as if it’s normal and fine, and it’s great to, to learn more. And by people hanging out with us, they have that same effect that I had with my friend and her father early in life. It’s like, it’s actually not that hard. I can give myself permission to dream big and what’s the worst that can happen? Okay, maybe I don’t get there, but at least I’m gonna expose myself to these people and these ideas and these things.
Yeah, that makes sense. And it’s always a, it, I think it’s a, a fluid and evolutionary process, you know, no matter what you do, but especially on, you know, the path to financial independence and then ultimately financial freedom. And at least that’s how I look at it. Which reminds me, you talk about this prosperity ladder, I don’t know much about it. Can you talk about what the Prosperity Ladder is and how it works? I, I’m not familiar enough with it to really talk about it.
Yeah, yeah. So what I realized in all of the work that I do with money and then in meditation is that we have a hierarchy that we’re sort of working our way up. And this goes back to like Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, interesting enough, I teach about chakras, which might sound completely ridiculous, but the funny thing is, is Maslow was inspired by the chakra system, which is basically an ancient form of psychology. So it’s not just like woo woo, like this is been around for thousands of years beyond modern day psychology. But what I realized is that the chakra system is chronicling our own maturation process as a human being. You know, starting from birth and going to about twenty eight, twenty nine years of age when we should be like, fully matured as a human being. And so the prosperity ladder is tied into the beliefs that we’re gonna need to have to carry us through to that form of actualization that Maslow was Hi was talking about, like what are the beliefs that we, that will be life giving rather than life draining, which we have, like we talked about before, a lot of people had these scarcity beliefs that drain us.
So I, I kind of made this contrast. Here’s a scarcity ladder and then here’s a prosperity ladder. And I, if for example, the prosperity level, the bottom of the ladder is I am safe and supported by life, which is a root chakra or a very kind of low level. Like I just need to know that I’m gonna be safe. If I don’t feel that way, my life’s gonna be kind of wonky. I’m gonna be living in fear of my own safety. It goes up. The next one is I’m worthy of having money. It’s kinda weird how there’s a lot of people that actually don’t feel worthy of having money. They feel like it’s greedy and selfish and that’s true. And they’re afraid to, to say, I like money <laugh>.
Yeah. They feel it. I, some people feel it’s dirty that, you know, money’s the root of all evil. I mean, they have these bizarre myths, you know, that money’s evil or dirty or whatever it may be. But no, I mean, you can live a life with money and live a life without money. Which one do you prefer? You could probably live a healthier, better life and give back and help other people through charity and giving with money than without. I mean, it’s kind of silly to think that have not having money is a good thing.
Yeah. Right. And especially if you are like, well, there’s more where that came from. Like, why do we have to think that it’s just a pie, like mo money and life is just a pie and we’re taking out the slices, and once all the slices are gone, then it’s all gone. Like it’s not, yeah. It doesn’t work that way,
<Laugh>. No. Which goes back to the thing at the very beginning, you were talking about the scarcity mentality. Scarcity, the me scarcity mentality thinks that the pie is a fixed a amount. You know, it’s got a fixed whatever volume or circumference in that. If you, your slice is bigger, that means other people’s slices are smaller. But the reality is, is the pie could be any size you want to be, so why not grow the size of the pie? So everybody’s slice of that pie becomes larger too. That’s an abundance mentality, you know? Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, the scarcity mentality thinks that the pie is fixed in size and shape, but it’s, it’s not…
Yeah. It, it really does mess with us when we’re caught. And, and what I, I think of it as a lie. We’re caught in a lie that that causes us to not shoot for the sars. Not say, well what if, what if I could do this? What if this is possible? And I’m guessing, I mean, I don’t know all of your backstory, Marco, but I mean, I’m shocked at how much, even in my lifetime, I could go from lower middle class. My dad dealt drugs to subsidize the family income. I came from a very, my parents barely had a high school education and my dad went to jail right before I was born. I mean, like the idea that, that that could be how I started out in life and now I’m here where I have enough money to last me for the rest of my life. I don’t have to work in a traditional way ever again. I’m in my mid fifties. Like it can happen. It just blows me away at the potential, even now in the United States the way that it is and all the things that are going on that the potential for each of us to get past our youth. Cuz that’s kind of what I had to do. I had to like get past some of those things that weren’t serving me in order to ultimately do what is happening. Like this wasn’t a natural trajectory, is what I’m saying.
Very interesting. So if I may go back to the prosperity ladder for a moment, what, I’m gonna jump ahead, but what’s at the top wrong? Is there a top wrong? What is, what is that look like? Because I’m, I’m very curious what, where you’re going with this prosperity ladder?
I think it’s important, the two top rungs. They’re seven rungs, the two top. I am enough and I am prosperous or I am abundant, but I am enough. I have to say that one because if you don’t feel like you’re enough, you’re not going to reach this place of like, I’m prosperous, I’m abundant. And it’s a big realization for many of us to say, I am enough in this moment.
But that’s not where you want to stop. You don’t wanna say, you always wanna believe that you have enough, but you don’t wanna fall short in your goals, in your goal setting. You want to aspire to more. True.
Yes. But it’s funny because what I found in my journey is that when I reach these places, it’s the opposite of what I thought. And I think I’m on a different side of the building, so I can only speak from someone who has the money, but then was able to say, pull back and say, what if I actually surrendered more? What if I didn’t work quite so hard? What if I said to myself, this what I’ve created is enough in this moment. Like, what happens to my life from that place? And what’s so comical is that it’s actually more is coming in when I’m not striving and seeking and attached to some kind of outcome as I’ve let go. More is coming in. And so I think that the, this is the great question in life is what is the right balance of working hard and putting our time in and being strategic?
And what is that balance with this idea that I am supported by this life, that, that I will be okay, that I will be taken care of, that I don’t have to like fight for the rest of my life to hold on to what I’ve got. Like, it, it’s a very different attitude that in the past few years has kind of taken over for me. And I don’t know where it goes, but I will say me striving for that next goal is definitely not it. And as long as I don’t feel like I’m enough or I’m complete where I’m at, then I can’t seem to turn off the striving. Hmm.
So I interpret some of what you’re saying as be grateful for where you are, have an attitude of abundance and I, I guess avoid the scarcity mentality, but also stay focused, have some goals and strive to achieve more. In other words, reach your full potential if you can. Is, is that a good summation? Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>?
Yes. I just say that I think that in the course of all of this, I’ve come to realize that me, myself, and I, and what I can create is actually quite limited and it’s potential that there’s so many other factors going on. And when I am, I need this goal. This is the way it looks, this is how I’m gonna go get it. And I’m striving for that path. I actually miss out on a whole bunch of resources and opportunities and things that I probably couldn’t have in my wildest imagination kind of envisioned. But when I let go and I have more space in my life and I say yeah, I, I say yes, tell me, show me what could happen next. What is possible. I’m blown away because if I’m so focused on this one thing, all that other stuff seems to not really come into my, into my field of awareness.
And it’s kind of like magic in a way. And, and that might seem really silly and weird to some people, but I couldn’t say it if I wasn’t actually living it in this moment. And I think this also is because I’m going through a big pivot and I think I saw that I had reached the top and, and you get to these ceilings in your life. And I think that the opportunity at some point is only the next level is only gonna come from a complete surrender. It’s not gonna come from working harder to get more.
Yeah. Yeah. Very interesting. Okay. So as we kind of start to pull this all together, I wanna maybe just start to wrap things up with something you refer to as the I Prosper method. I Prosper is an acronym, and I wrote this down. So the letters represent intention, pattern, reclaim your feelings, opportunity story, permission, evidence, and reinvent your life. So those letters put together as I prosper, we don’t have time to go through all of this, but I’m gonna let you pick one or maybe two, I’ll leave it up to you, that you think is pertinent to talk about here today based on what we’ve just talked about. And something that maybe can leave our audience with a takeaway or an action item. Something that they can maybe put into practice right away that will, you know, help them in creating the, the type of life that they really want. Mm-Hmm.
<Affirmative>. Yeah. So the R and the P are jumping out to me. So the R is called Reclaiming Your Feelings. And I picked that one because I think it’s one that we don’t really think a lot about. And what I’ve found is that money, because there’s numbers like dollars and cents associated with it, we’re gonna be more left brain with it. But when we open up the right brain and we start to touch into our feelings and our emotions and what’s happening in our bodies, those are some of the greatest tools that we have available to us. If we wanna make a big change in our lives, they’re, we have to be in touch with those feelings. You know, it might be our gut, it might be headaches, it might be something happening in our heart, but these different parts of our bodies are great tools for us to get in touch with and notice if we’re actually listening to what’s happening in our body when we make decisions, right?
Because I think most people are, if you’re investing, you’re regularly making decisions, maybe you could up your game in your decision making by being more in touch with your feelings. So that’s one of the stages. And these stages are meant to take you through a process ultimately of reinventing or upleveling, right? If you, if you feel like you’re in a ceiling right now, you can approach this processes, Hey, what might that look like? How could I write a new story to, to create what I want? The other one was key for permission. And again, I work with a lot of women and we, we grow up, we’re so excited to like be given permission where we don’t have to let anyone tell us what to do in life. We’re like, I’m gonna be an adult and I can give myself permission whenever I want. Right?
And I, and then I’m like, but we actually forget that we’re the one in, in the driver’s seat that we can be the one to give ourselves permission and the decisions and choices we make. So if you’re not a real estate investor today and you want to be one tomorrow, what I found in all my research is it starts with permission. Like give yourself permission to become a real estate investor. Like start there and maybe that will push you just over the edge. Maybe you’ve analyzed things, you know, backwards and forwards. You can see how to do it, you know everything, but you just can’t get the mindset to make that switch. And seems really simple as I describe it. But it’s funny cuz sometimes we spend our whole lives not giving ourselves permission to do the thing that we really wanna do.
Yeah. I personally struggle with that and I, I probably speak for a lot of people listening to this, especially guys and the analytical people because yes, I’m male. Yes. I’m very analytical, so I’m very much left brain. So for me to tap into my right brain when it comes to investing and numbers and business is very difficult cuz I just don’t mix emotion and feeling with anything related to business. To me it’s just numbers and logic, right? So I’m sure a lot of people struggle with that. I do. Very hard.
Yeah, I totally get it. It’s funny because I think one of the reasons my husband and I are so good in business together is he is playing that role and I’m playing this more feeling based role and we have a lot of very lively discussions is what I would say. Cause cuz even in the book I talk about the blend of the masculine and feminine. Like it’s not right or wrong, good or bad, but I think that when we live whole lives, we’re in touch with both parts of ourselves, like the whole picture of those emotions and, and it’s fun. Like it’s going into chart uncharted territory. Yeah. But I think it makes us more creative as humans of the things that we get involved in.
Yeah. So I’ll, I’ll end with this one big question and that is this, how does a person listening to this, of course, you know, especially if they’re working with you or reading your book, but in general, how does a person create the life they really want? If you were to boil all this down, I know it’s hard to just summarize it, but, but if I were just to throw the question out at you, how does a person create the life they really want? How would you answer that?
What comes to me is that one of the most important things that we have it as human beings that is underrated and not necessarily paid enough attention to is what is the narrative that’s playing out in the background of your life? Like, what is that narrative? Is that narrative about proving things to people? Is that narrative about feeling, you know, confident that you overcame all your obstacles? Like what’s the narrative? And the more that narrative is aligned with your values, the things that are absolutely the most important things in your life, the happier you’re gonna be. And many times we haven’t taken time to a, even know our values and b, understand like those voices that cause us to make the decisions we do and to bring them into, you know, parody with each other. Like they need to support each other. And so I’d say that’s the best place to look.
Yeah, very interesting. Cool. Leisa, really appreciate you taking the time to talk about this. I think this is very much new material for a lot of people. I understand it. I struggle with parts of it just because I am so left brain, but it’s nice to open the door and look at other views and perspectives and, and like you said, look from the outside in to learn more about yourself. So that’s very good. Thank you. So do this, tell our listeners how they can follow you, learn more about what you do, where they can get your book and get more information. Just share whatever you like.
That’s great. Well, first I just wanna say, Marco, thanks for going out of your comfort zone and like exploring something that you are like, okay, show me what you’re talking about. Like, I, I appreciate that because not everybody would do that. So kudos to you and thank you to your listeners for having this conversation with us. <Laugh>, maybe something new came, but if you wanna learn more, you can go to wealthclinic.com. If you wanna get the first chapter of the book you could go to wealthclinic.com/vision and there’s a way to get some.
Perfect, well, we’ll put all that in the show notes along with your website address and the book and all that good stuff so people can just click on it, whether it’s on their podcast player or on our website. But once again, Leisa, thank you for coming on the show. Thank you. And I’m just gonna wrap things up here just to remind everybody that if you want more information, visit Leisa’s website. And of course if you have questions about real estate and real estate investing, just visit our team through our website. Our investment counselors are here to help you. No obligation. We have a strategy session for you. If you have a question about real estate, send it in to me at Ask Marco. Just go to our, the Passive Real Estate Investing website, click on the Ask Marco link and I can answer your questions on the occasional episode that I do remember to subscribe. It only takes you three seconds to do that. Spread the word and share the show with your friends and family. And like-minded individuals, appreciate the ratings and reviews on iTunes. So keep ’em coming. I read every single one of them. Thank you for listening and we will see you on our next episode.
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