Tony Robbins

I was recommended this book to me several years ago by a friend. He was the most positive person I had ever met and I asked him how he was that way. He was going through a divorce and things in his life were quite difficult but he was always happy. He told me that this book transformed his attitude about life.
It has taken me a while to actually sit down and read this book but this was definitely the right time. For many years, I was a wife and mother and all my goals and dreams involved my show more husband and kid. Five years ago, that all ended and my youngest graduated from high school a couple of years later. I am finally ready to focus on me and my goals again. I don't think I realized that until I read this book. I have been thinking about goals and dreams now and am making plans. I have broken a lifelong habit of picking my skin. Tomorrow is two weeks since I picked and I actually have not had a hard time in days. I am no longer a picker. I have tried to quit all my life. Quitting smoking was easy compared to this. Suddenly, after reading this book, it has been easy to quit.
I highly recommend this book to anyone that is wanting to make positive changes in their life. I will continue to work on the assignments in the book and continue to grow and follow my new dreams and goals. show less

Tony Robbins isn’t the first person you’d think would be the one to write a book on money, but on Tim Ferriss’ recommendation I picked up a copy. As a finance major with an MBA to my name, I was skeptical that I could learn much about money from a “feelings” guru like Tony. I was wrong – this book probably gave me more useful lessons in finance than my entire formal education.

Tony began building this book by interviewing a litany of investment titans – Warren Buffett, Charles show more Schwab, Carl Icahn, Ray Dalio – pretty much the entire investing all-star team. Most of us would never get the chance to gain access to any of these masters’ knowledge, but Tony used his conversations with all of them to synthesize a money manifesto.


Section 1: Welcome to the Jungle: The Journey Begins with This First Step

The first chapter is an introduction to classic Robbins psychology. Tony begins by lamenting that money is somewhat of a taboo subject, asserting that money is an essential part of our holistic well-being, and explaining how he went about building the book by interviewing the best of the best. His first conclusion is that it’s very difficult to earn enough money through your job to have financial freedom, so you need to save and invest. Develop the mindset of an investor, rather than being only a consumer. The only way to overcome ingrained human psychology and actually save is to create a plan and automate your investing, so set up the automatic withdrawals and forget about them.

Section 2: Become the Insider: Know the Rules Before You Get in the Game

Because money is such a misunderstood topic, especially by those who think they know what they’re doing, Tony goes into the nine financial myths that have to be busted in order to start building a correct understanding of how money works.

Myth #1: The market can be beat. Only a few gifted people can beat the market’s returns consistently, and neither you nor your financial advisor are one of them. Less than 4% of actively managed mutual funds beat the market, which is far, far worse than a coin toss. You’re much better off buying a passively managed index fund, which simply matches the overall market.

Myth #2: People are telling the truth about fees. The average cost of owning a mutual fund is 3.17% a year when you include all the hidden fees – expense ratio, transaction costs, cash drag, unseen taxes, etc. That may not sound like much, but for each 1% increase in fees, 20% of the final value of the typical retirement portfolio is eaten away. The end result is that even though the percent looks small, it can result in (literally) most of your savings ending up in someone else’s pocket. Again, investing in index funds with fees around 1% will make an enormous difference in your financial storehouse.

Myth #3: People are telling the truth about returns. A core truth about investing is that it is much more important to avoid losses than to get gains. Why? If you have $100 in your portfolio and you lose 50% the first year, you then have $50. If you then gain 50% in the second year, you end up with only $75. Your average (time-weighted) return was 0% (up 50%, then down 50%), but your real (dollar-weighted) return was negative 25%. Which type of returns do you think mutual funds like to report?

Myth #4: Your broker is on your side. Most brokers are perfectly good and honest people. However, most of them also probably don’t understand the three myths we’ve just covered. On top of that, the broker model is a serious conflict of fiduciary duties. Your broker has a responsibility to increase your money as well as a responsibility to increase his company’s money, and the two duties are mutually exclusive. A much better decision is to go with a registered investment advisor (RIA), who gets an annual fee from you rather than commissions from the mutual funds, to manage your investments. Go to the National Association of Personal Financial Advisors or Stronghold Financial website to find an RIA.

Myth #5: Your 401(k) will set you up for retirement. In my mind before I read this book, I had a mental image of the 401(k) as some kind of timeless bastion of classic investment best practice. Not so – the 401(k) is a (failed) social experiment that has only been around for 30 years. The unique bull market conditions of the 80’s and 90’s blinded society to a point where we believed that the 401(k) system was effectively setting people up for retirement, but with the recent financial crisis, it became more apparent that the system is a failure. The factors listed in Myths 1 – 3 severely limit the growth of your retirement portfolio, and taxes on withdrawals will slash your nest egg further. On top of that, the 401(k) doesn’t do anything to protect against the unfortunate retirement timing that left many people with a fraction of their savings after the financial crisis.

Hopefully you’ve already avoided the traditional 401(k) or IRA in favor of a Roth, in order to solve the tax problem. You can use an IRA instead of a 401(k) to avoid the factors in Myths 1 – 3, but IRAs have much lower contribution limits, and don’t let you take advantage of matching contributions from your employer. Tony recommends that you go to the online fee checker here, which will show how much you’re really paying in fees in your company’s 401(k), and then approach your employer with the results. Because of a new law passed in 2012, employers are legally required to compare their 401(k) plans to make sure the fees are reasonable. Hopefully this combination of information will be enough to convince your employer to consider offering low-cost index funds in your plan.

Myth #6: Target date funds are a good way to allocate your investments. Since ordinary investors have no idea how to diversify their investments, many choose a “target date” fund where their mix of investments changes based on their age. The point is to get higher returns when you’re young and can afford more risk, and then to preserve your capital when you’re getting closer to retirement (typically less in stocks and more in bonds). While it’s a helpful idea in theory, the “experts” who put these plans together operate under two gravely mistaken assumptions: that bonds are safer than stocks, and that bonds and stocks move in opposite directions. We’ll cover more on that later.

Myth #7: Annuities are bad. Conventional wisdom will tell you that annuities as an investment class are overpriced and a bad investment. While this is true in general (largely due to exorbitant fees that are even worse than mutual funds), it would be unwise to paint this entire investment class with the same brush. At least one type of annuity (the tax-free fixed indexed annuity) is an invaluable investment tool. We’ll revisit that soon, as well. (Side note: If you already own a bad investment like a variable rate annuity, ask your advisor about using a feature called a 1035 exchange to switch it for a good annuity without having to pay taxes.)

Myth #8: You have to take big risks to get big returns. One of the most important rules of investing is to risk a little for the potential to make a lot. Some easy ways for the individual to do this are structured notes, market-linked CDs, and fixed indexed annuities, which all share the common feature of protecting your invested principle but also giving you access to upside potential if the market moves the right way.

Myth #9: Success is determined by something beyond our control. We take a detour here for some more classic Tony Robbins psychology, applied to money: a change in mindset is necessary to succeed. With these myths busted, you don’t have any excuse not to turn around your financial life for the better.

____________________________________________

Read the rest at http://www.deconstructingexcellence.com/money-master-the-game/ show less

Tony Robbins is a great inspiration, and operates his body/mind/soul with an infectious zeal. He makes no secret that the purpose of his life is to collect, absorb, test, and retail wisdom. The material he presents is valuable and marketable -- he markets it.

In terms of critique, the proof is in the alumni who have taken his "courses". Many have made successes of their lives by finally "hearing" this wisdom because of Tony's ability to communicate it. The only sad part is that he is so show more caught up in the illusion of "individual entrepreneurship" that he misses the Collective power of organized specialization. The Project is filled with negative aspersions about "Government", missing both the point and the hope of good governance in a participatory representative Republic. Politically, Tony veers into a personality cult. To his credit, he really does model the wisdom he preaches. He fails to understand or teach the social economic discovery of Adam Smith and the benefit of a democratic Republic as a form of governance owned by its citizens. He ends up preaching hatred of "our" Government, which is self-hatred.

Ultimately, "free enterprise" is only unleashed if capitalist/monopolist impulses are regulated by just laws enforced fairly with judicial recourse for violations and breaches. Humans have understood this since Aristotle studied Politics. Greed and corruption have always interrupted our implementations. Ultimately all "self-improvement" movements fail and fall in the face of those interruptions. Tony never challenges the Greed kill.

Tony teaches Unlimited Power by grasping the potential of the human brain. He locked on to Neuro-linguistic Programming, psychological triggers, and couples techniques with business acumen and marketing. Steps include building a ready-State for the mind/body/soul, with physiological body-training and emotionally resonant compassion. "Turn your mess into message" by labelling your own Identity, telling and rewriting your Story, and unfolding your Self. Unlocking your emotional drivers and "secrets" to create breakthroughs. All directed to taking action. "Happiness is a habit," and "Success leaves clues".

He teaches the power of Relationships -- "the greatest evolutionary advantage is Love" -- although he restricts his lessons to the short plays, to intimacy and private partnerships, not the Great Game of polity and Governance. One beautiful contribution is his explicit example of the power of apology, paying restitution, forgiveness, and finding honor in making amends. He uses the healing concept of Hoʻoponopono.

The teaching is filled with reinforcement "triggers" --Tony is primarily a teacher, but pretends to be a leader for the hidden and very limited heuristic purpose of modeling the lessons. As a leader he brings a genuine delight and love for people. The project is filled with charism, non-judgmental acceptance of others, and well-thought out marketing designs. The project brings genuine "opportunity" by enabling us to find the answers that are inside every one of us all the time. We need Tony to help us "see" and hear. show less

I am not into self-help and motivational gurus so even though I heard Tony Robbins name I didn't read his books or watched him speak. Somebody recommended me this book and I was very surprised. It's a combination of motivational rhetoric and logical concrete steps to try to get your finances in order by the retirement time. It's simplified and often too absolute but I think it will be invaluable for many people. I give discount for annoying repetitions and sales technique, which probably show more come with motivational territory. But it looks like this method of writing works. Tony Robbins is a good writer and is able to explain some complicated financial matters in a very simple language. His advice is sometimes contradicting but I am ready to overlook this for the overall value of his advice. show less