Your Stories Of Staying Positive And Focusing Amidst Negativity

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Hello all,

I was just curious about this topic since this is something I'm dealing with.  I've changed my mindset over the past few years after reading Rich Dad, Poor Dad and have since been learning all I can about investing and figuring out which path is ultimately the best for me moving forward.  

I'm recently back in close contact with a temporarily-disabled relative who needs my help a lot.  She has never been interested in investing or getting out of the rat race or any number of things and it shows in her personality.  For example she'll save a little money to do something that takes her all day to do.  She is trying hard to push me to go back down life paths that did not work for me before and I'm presently in a position where I can't do much about it at the moment but am making plans.

I understand that investing particularly when new, can take a lot of time to learn about.  It's not like going out and getting a job now because you need the money.  I understand that the numbers have to work, preparation should be made as well as a plan for anything that could possibly go wrong and even then could still mess up.  I'm finding the more I learn, the more I need to learn.

The poor person that I've been for a lot of years still shows in my present lifestyle.  So even though I've gotten out of what I consider to be my longtime victim mindset which is a huge step forward, I'm not yet who I'm trying to become if that makes sense and that takes time.

I just thought it might be interesting to hear from others about how you dealt with these issues in your own careers and what practices helped you in separating emotionally and keeping separate from naysayers and people who feel you should be a specific type of person.  Thank you!  

[Bjorn Ahlblad]

My wife and I had a rental in the 1980's in San Mateo Ca. It was OK but had a leaky foundation so we installed a sump pump and continued on. All the way through to the dot com boom it rented great. Then came the Bust and we lost the tenant. Property was empty several months and we tried to sell-no bites. Zero. I wanted to start a business and needed cash. We lowered the price all the way down to 260k still nothing. The fact that the house also needed 15k work did not help. 

We had some savings, I decided to take a job instead, we fixed the house and rented it some more to a steady tenant but there was never any cash flow. We hung on anyway and decided to take advantage of a seller's market. We sold the place in 2015 for 1.2 million! It was in a 1031x so we bought more rentals near Olympia Wa within the window. Perseverance and a positive attitude paid off. We have since bought more rentals in the area and retired there in 2017.