I wrote an article a long time ago entitled How Much Is Enough. It talks about a sit down meeting with a mentor of mine and how he helped me to work out that I could have anything I wanted with just $5m in the bank.
This was a lot less than I thought would be needed, but by the time I had listed down everything that I wanted out of life and put a price on the things to be bought and the investments to be made to achieve it, $5m was the number that came out.
Then yesterday, I saw a post from LifeMathMoney that said “Money starts to become useless fast after a certain point…” and I felt several experience-created nerves fire off, and wanted to write some more about my encounters with this.
Back in the mid-2000s I was running a consultancy that was sub-contracted by three government procurement agencies to provide training within a certain niche.
This is a very lucrative sector to be in, as commission percentages are involved for the agencies so the higher the amount they can sell the training for, the more money they get for finding the suitable subject matter expert.
The government department gets an increase in their budget, the agency gets more commission, the expert (me) gets paid very well and high quality training is produced. A win all round.
My bills per month at that time were $5,000 and that included rent, car and the usual expenses. However, my income was far in excess of this.
Initially, I had bought all the toys. The SUV, fast car, watch, electronics, vacations, first class travel, hotels, restaurants and the clothes. Life was absolutely amazing!
And then one day, I found myself standing in a shopping mall, and not seeing a single luxury item that I didn’t already have. The day I felt like I’d made it. I literally had it all.
That was, until I went back to the mall the following week. And there was still nothing to buy. No more adrenaline rush on the walk to the Omega store. No dopamine rush on the feel of the string on the fancy bag with the exclusive store logo.
Numb.
Immune to the drug.
Then, three months went by with five figures going into the bank and only $5,000 a month coming out. Something was triggered on their internal systems, my details were sent to departments, and then shared with outside entities, and the phone began to ring… and ring…and ring.
“Have you thought about making this money work harder for you.” “Congratulations, you’ve qualified for an exclusive black card.” “Is life insurance something you would be interested in?” “I’m from premium client services and I’d like to welcome you to our…” And on and on and on. It took me a year to find a bank that would leave me alone and let me get on with my own finances without bombarding me with services.
In the end, as many in business, this ended up with me opening numerous accounts across banks in order to protect assets as much as possible, but again, it became almost impossible to track finances and manage solo. An accountant was hired and that led to private banking and wealth management. A few years later and it all became too much. Putting your money into the hands of others to manage for you is a necessary evil as a high earner. And while it’s great to know you never have to worry about money, it’s also exhausting as it involves banks, tax offices, accountants, wealth managers, lawyers and agents. The far end of LifeMathMoney’s tweet says that it’s almost impossible to spend $20k a month. He’s right. Once you’ve got the houses, transport and contingency plans in place for illness and black swan events, there really is no need for any more money. Having more cash than you know what to do with is both a blessing and a curse. Ask yourself: 'How much is enough?', and once you’ve reached it, take a break, spread out life’s map and maybe think about changing the path you were on. You can always return to it later, if you need to. Until next time! Six