WORK FOR YOURSELF
If you read my bio on this very website, you know my backstory. If you don’t, here’s the basic gist: In the late 80s, I saw Hulk Hogan bodyslam Andre “The Giant.” I’m sure it was a highlight reel on a sports news show, since we didn’t have cable. I was probably around three years old, but I knew in that very moment, I was going to be a professional wrestler.
Unlike most kids who obsess about being firefighters only to grow out of their childhood dreams, I stayed hyper-focused on the world of pro wrestling. When I was seventeen, my friends thought about colleges. I thought about pro wrestling training schools. Luckily, I had a mom who supported my dreams and realized that I was only young once. School would always be there.
When I shipped up to Massachusetts, I was terrified. I’d never been away from home before. And the kids in the school looked rough. Like, country farm tough. Despite this, we got to work. Hitting the ropes. Learning how to cut promos and take bumps. And then, it was time to get thrown over the top rope. No one in the class could do it. And then, it was my turn. I landed on the floor outside of the ring like a 10/10 gymnast. Perfect.
The coach called me back in and tossed me over the top rope a second time. Perfect. Flawless. He couldn’t get over it, and so he called me back in the ring for a third time and ordered everyone to pay attention. Ego Level: 1000. I wasn’t paying attention on the third go round. I landed on the top rope incorrectly and bounced, propelling myself through the air.
I froze, mid-air, like the Coyote from those Roadrunner cartoons. I looked down. I’d overshot the protective mat. Shit. And then, I fell. Eight feet. To the cement. An MRI revealed a broken back. And so that was the end of that.
Unsure of my next move, I knew one thing: I didn’t want to go to college just because. Major in something just because. Get a career just because. I wanted to pour my heart and soul into something. Studying something and getting a degree in something just because society was telling me I had to wasn’t reason enough to go.
So, I floundered. I played video games. I went to the gym. I wanted to do membership sales at my gym because it was something I knew I would be good at. But they weren’t hiring. After a few months of wallowing, my mom told me it was time to do something. So, I applied for every job I could find. But no one was hiring. It was September—all of the minimum wage jobs were already filled by college students.
There was just one place I left off of my list: A neighborhood Tex-Mex place my mom and I had gone to once and swore we’d never go back. The food was just awful. But … it was the only place I hadn’t applied. So, when I walked in and asked if they were hiring, I was frankly a little bummed when they said they were. But, I got hired and spent the next three or four years working there. And I loved it. The chaos of the restaurant industry was exciting. But after several shifts in management, my passion was no longer there.
I went to another restaurant, hated it and left after a year. I went back to my gym and asked the manager if I could do sales. But they still weren’t hiring. They had their two salesmen. They didn’t need a third. But he did need someone at the front desk. So, I took the job and thought sooner or later, I would get promoted to sales. Instead, the GM I knew and loved got promoted and a series of horrendous managers tried (and failed) to fill his shoes. They got increasingly more and more corporate (aka miserable). There were quotas and twice daily meetings for the membership salesmen. They were hounded and micromanaged endlessly. So, when the call from the GM came to see if I was interested in being promoted to sales, I said no.
Working for other people sounded horrendous. Plus, there was something else calling my attention: The stock market. When I was a kid, my mom assembled a portfolio of dividend paying stocks for me to inherit upon my 18th birthday. But I didn’t know much else.
When I expressed interest in learning more about the stock market, conventional wisdom said: GO TO COLLEGE AND PAY TO LEARN ABOUT IT IF IT INTERESTS YOU!!! My thought was: Why would I do that when I can teach myself? I got a few books and poured over them, learning as much as I could.
I started trading in 2008/’09. My first year, I was incredibly nervous. I listened to moron strangers at my gym. I lost a butt ton of money. I was flying blind. But I kept reading and kept trying and eventually, I started to figure some things out. Back then, there weren’t tutorial videos on Instagram or YouTube. There weren’t Facebook groups where I could go and ask for advice (and frankly, even today those groups are straight trash). I learned by trial and error. Lots of error. But I learned.
And eventually, I was able to leave the gym and venture out on my own as a self employed stock trader.
There were a few things that made this easier for me:
I lived at home and my mom didn’t charge me a dime. Even luckier for me, she moved to NYC in 2005 for work. Even if she hadn’t moved to NYC, I would have remained at home. Yeah, it would have been annoying. Yes, it would have been less than ideal for a 20-something year old to be living at home. But, I saved up almost $90,000 from all of those years in the restaurant industry. I always lived below my means and even though I didn’t know much about minimalism back then, I suppose I was an unintentional minimalist. My friends never came home after college, either, so I didn’t have that vibrant of a social life.
I wasn’t pressured into the college industrial complex. I didn’t have student loan debts. I didn’t have to worry about rent. I didn’t have to worry about much. If you don’t think this can apply to you, you’re potentially wrong. The solution: Don’t go to college when you turn 18 simple because you are being pressured into it. I know it’s a hard sale, especially to parents who want what they think is best for us. But often times, their ideas are antiquated.
So, here I am. It’s 2020 and I’ve been trading for almost a decade. I could come out here and charge you an arm and a leg for an online course, but the honest truth is: Doing these videos on YouTube and answering your questions on Instagram has made me a better trader. And that’s where I want to earn my money from. Trading. Not selling.
