Friday, September 7, 2007

The Millionaire's Mindset

Millionaires think and see the world very differently! Where most people see problems, those with the millionaire's mindset see money-making opportunities.


Let me give an Illustration

Imagine if you had to take an important early morning flight to Australia but due to unforeseen circumstances, the flight got cancelled and you are stranded at the airport with a hundred other passengers. There is no other flight out that day. What would you think about? How would you feel?What would you do?Would you (a)just wait for news of the next flight out? (b) Lodge a complaint with the authorities? (c) Hang around with the other disgruntled passengers and complain? Well, it depends on your mindset. Most people would think of the situation as a 'problem' they can't do anything about. They would feel frustrated and angry and take one of the three above actions. What would someone with a millionaire's mindset do?


How a billionaire Richard Branson responded to the same situation

Well, this exact same situation happened to billionaire Richard Branson in 1980. While vacationing on Beef Island (part of Virgin islands), Richard Branson and his wife were stranded when the local Puerto Rican flight got cancelled. There were no other flights out that day. Instead of seeing it as a 'problem', Branson's millionaire mindset got him to see it as a challenging opportunity. As a result, he took a very different set of actions.

Branson got on the phone to a few aircraft charter companies and managed to charter a private plane for $2,000. Knowing that there were many stranded passengers who needed to catch a flight out badly, he borrowed a blackboard and wrote 'Virgin Airways $39 Single Flight to Puerto Rico'. Within an hour of walking through the airport terminal, with the blackboard in his hand, he had sold every single seat!

After successfully flying everyone back and making a cool profit, he mulled over what one happy passenger had casually said, 'Virgin Airways isn't too bad-smarten up the service a little and you could be in business.' Up till that moment, Branson, the builder of Virgin Records and a Hot Air Baloon adventurer, hadn't given any thought to getting into the airline industry! But Branson, ever the bold adventurer, lost little time in launching Virgin Airways, taking on the giant British Airways and the rest is aviation history. Today, Virgin Airways is a global budget airline and one of the most profitable in the world.

The amazing thing about Branson was that he did not use any of his money to solve his 'problem'. He used his millionaire mindset and thinking to turn a problem into an opportunity, which not only solved his problem, but made him even more money.

So, if you are not creating tremendous wealth right now, it is because you are not taking the right actions. In other words, if you want to massively change the results in your life, you have to take different actions. To take different actions, you have to think differently. And of course to think differently, you must have a different mindset.. the millionaire's mindset.

The millionaire's mindset is made up of your habits, beliefs, values and attitudes.