More Than You Value Yourself

[Chorus]
No one is going to value you more than you value yourself
No one is going to value you more than you value yourself
We're here to talk about wealth creation
That has to be your number one
Priority
No one is going to value you more than you value yourself

So you just have to set a very high personal hourly rate and you have to stick to it
Since when I was young I decided that I was worth a lot more than the market thought I was worth
But I started treating myself that way
So always factor your time into every decision
How much time does it take?
So it's gonna take me an hour to get across town to get this thing?
Well, I value myself at $100 an hour, that's basically throwing $100 out of my pocket
Am I gonna do that? You buy something from Amazon, they screwed it up, you have to return it
Is it worth your time to return it? Is it worth the mental hassle? Keep in mind that you have less work hours, you have less mentally high output hours, do you wanna use them to run errands and solve little problems or do you wanna save them for the big stuff?
(Big, big, big stuff)
All the great scientists were terrible at managing their household life
None of them had a clean, organized room or, you know, made all their social events on time or sent their thank you cards
You can spend your life however you want
But if you wanna get rich, it has to be your number one overwhelming desire
Which means that it has to come before anything else
Which means you can't be penny pinching
You can penny pinch your way to a basic sustenance
You can keep your expenses low, maybe you retire early and not spend too much and that's perfectly valid
But we're here to talk about wealth creation

[Chorus]
No one is going to value you more than you value yourself
No one is going to value you more than you value yourself
We're here to talk about wealth creation
That has to be your number one
Priority
No one is going to value you more than you value yourself

So fast forward to your wealthy self
And pick some intermediate hourly rate
For me, believe it or not back when you could have hired me, my hourly rate, I used to say to myself over and over it's $5,000 an hour
Today and when I look back, really it was about a thousand dollars an hour
And, of course, I still ended up doing stupid things like arguing with the electrician or returning the broken speaker, but I shouldn't have
And I did it a lot less than any of my friends would
And I would make a theatrical show out of throwing something in the trash pile or giving it to Salvation Army rather than trying to return it or handing something to people, rather than trying to fix it
I would argue with my girlfriend and even today it's my wife
I don't do that
That's not a problem that I solve
I still argue that with my mother when she hands me like little to-dos
I just don't do that
I would rather hire you an assistant
And this was true even when I didn't have money
And this was true even when I didn't have money

[Chorus]
No one is going to value you more than you value yourself
No one is going to value you more than you value yourself
We're here to talk about wealth creation
That has to be your number one
Priority
No one is going to value you more than you value yourself

Another way of thinking about something is that if you can outsource something or not do something for less than your hourly rate
Outsource it or don't do it
Outsource it or don't do it
So if you can hire someone to do it for less than your hourly rate, hire them
That even includes things like cooking
You may wanna eat your healthy home-cooked meals but if you can outsource it, do that instead
And I know some people will say, "Well, what about the joy of life and what about getting it right, just your way?"
Sure, you can do that, but you're not gonna be wealthy because now you've made something else a priority
Paul Graham basically said it pretty well
You should be working on your product
You should be exercising and eating healthy
That's all you have time for while you're on this mission
So set a very high hourly aspirational rate for yourself and stick to it
And it should seem and feel absurdly high
If it doesn't, it's not high enough

[Outro]
And whatever you picked, my advice to you would be raise it
And whatever you picked, my advice to you would be raise it