SUCCESS STORY: PhxMJ - My Story

PART I



I graduated from a major University with 2 business degrees. College was a trip -- It made me sick because all the teachers and professionals "groomed" you for corporate America. The common saying, "when you work for corporate America, they will want this, that, etc."

I was tired of hearing it. I knew I never wanted to work for anyone. Upon graduating, all my peers where bragging about the great "safe secure jobs" they were hired for. "I work for Motorola", "I work for Northwestern Insurance", blah blah blah. Everyone interviewed like crazy. I didn't. I left college jobless with the goal of starting a business. This was in 1992. I was 22.

The next 5 years were a mess. I lived at home in Chicago with mommy for most of it. I struggled from venture to venture with no real success. I tried all sorts of things, and while trying all of these things, I worked "odd jobs" to pay bills and to pay student loans.

Amway, Vitamin MLMs, various other MLMs, Car Audio Sales. Direct Marketing, Jewelry, etc. All business attempts and all miserable failures.

The jobs I held to pay bills while pursuing my business dream: Pizza-delivery boy, Flower-delivery boy, Dispatcher, Day Laborer in the ghetto of Chicago, Bus-Boy at Chinese Restaurant. Limo driver. Subway restaurant salesman. Sears stock clerk. Charity errand boy. All while I was a multi-degreed, educated person who graduated in the top 10% of his class.

At 26 years old I was at the end of my rope.

Desperation. Frustration. Getting up in the morning was a chore. My motivation waned.

To make matters worse, my girlfriend of 5 years gave up on me. She said I "had no resolve". She worked for Enterprise Rent-A-Car and had a "safe secure job"-- we'd argue because she worked 55 hour weeks for peanuts ... $28,000/yr maybe. She'd fight back and say "you don't have a job, you make no money, and none of your businesses are working".

I told her that an Entrepreneur's income generation is different than someone that worked at a job. Income generation for a person working was LINEAR .. Entrepreneur income generation is EXPONENTIAL. Basically, very very slow to begin, then as time progresses, explosive.

Ever see a straight ascending line juxtaposed with an exponential line? The exponential line eventually catches up and ultimately, blows by the linear line.



Story is continued here: MY STORY

great story. like you, I had a college degree, started piss poor but lived with the folks while friends landed 35k year jobs in manhattan and lived in hoboken...

you mention many good points, and one that hit close to home is: >>Don't listen to those who have less. "you should do this, you should do that"<<

everyone has an opinion, but only a few are worth listening to...

thanks for sharing

I've already read this, so I know it's a great read. Thanks for posting it here. I do have a question though...do you feel that your college education benefited you?

Amazing story, the part about working at Enterprise makes me chuckle, because I currently work at Hertz and every single other person that works there is so content making the measly 20-30k a year they pay.

FYI: I wrote the above years ago so its somewhat dated. I tried to update it in places but didn't do a very good job.

Yes, but at a very expensive cost. I could have learned my college education on my own just by reading books. My degree(s) are finance and marketing. I ended up in technology / computers.

College was an experience that I wouldn't trade. It also teaches you discipline, self-motivation, and people skills. Those things aren't taught in classes. The problem with college is it gets you into debt - its almost a trap that forces you to get a job and start your trek on the endless spinning hampster wheel.

I was lucky and escaped.

Great story MJ. this is the second time I have read it, and it's still captures me.

Wow great story. Really inspiring.

Long read but well worth the time! Its really inspiring like Shawn said.

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Ahhh another young Lambo guy living large ... welcome Shawn.

Likewise. Read it on LamboPower but just as good second time round.

We need to get that dude on here... can't remember his login on LP but he wrote a huge multi-post story of his life. Moved to Australia/New Zealand with his girlfriend, round Europe etc etc... Peter2... know who I mean?

his story was very long!

That was CantWait2 ... he's over on both LP and TL. He did have a great story -- and very well written.

I can't tell you how much I enjoy reading that story

Truly inspirational stuff.

Thanks

i read it a couple times and heard the shortened version rigth from your very own mouth and I still love reading it. The picture and explination of the linear curve is great. Thats exactly what happened to me. I have not reached a $200k a month level but I was at that bottom in the first year and within the next 2 to 3 years everything exploded. Going on year ten and the goal is now 100k a month. I don't remember exactly when my net worth was over 1 million ( a couple years ago I think) but I remember adding everything up one day for something and it dawned on me, shit I'm worth over 1 million, DAM. Unfortunatly my business is not a business I could really sell as it is now, so thats what my goal is becoming. To turn into one that can be sold !!!!!! Its like starting all over again except your already making good money in the process.

I have a printed out copy of your story from LP that I reference . I have to give you major props on your writing. You are an excellent writer my friend, hopefully this is another skill you can put to use on the fast lane to millions!

Just wondering, but what's TL?

For you L/P members here, for cantwait2's story, go to the website, and in the Search feature, type "corporate world" and then you should get four threads, one of which will be labeled, "Keep the Lambo Dream Alive" by cantwait2. That's thre thread with his multi-post story in it.

www.Talklambo.com

I signed up to be an L/P member for the sole purpose of reading that story. Damn was it good. I wish we could get him over here to add to our collection of successful entrepreneurs (and Lambo owners ). I highly recommend reading that thread, though. It's up there with MJ's story as one of the most inspirational ones I've ever come across.

I'm PMing the gentleman today to see if he will repost the story.