I was reading about this scenario where a person had opened up a martial arts business with of course the revenue coming from people who pay a fee to train at the studio. The person started from ground up with an emphasis that he opened up the business as he was passionate about teaching others and not for financial gain.

As the years went on, the business was doing very well and the owner was bringing in a lot of revenue where he was able to create a financially rewarding lifestyle. As a result, he apparently began to buy luxury items such as a BMW. Still though, he advertised that he is not in it for the financial gain.

It was interesting to see the responses as there were people condemning him for having items like that while the other side argues that he earned it and that it should be no big deal. Kind of interesting I must say as in some ways this is kind of like when people say they are struggling in life and need help yet you see them spending like $20 on a lunch everyday. Basically, it is like a contradicting action.

In general what people buy with their money is their own prerogative and I wouldn’t necessarily categorize people just because they own certain things. On the other hand, like in this situation if you specifically use the “I’m not in it for the money” gimmick as a way to lure people to do business with you, then I would say to a certain extent you would unfortunately have to be consistent with that in terms of your actions.

Kind of reminds me of that AIG situation in the US where the company is getting financial help yet you see them with bills from luxurious events. If you are going to change persona in this sense, then I would think the best thing to do is be upfront about your new business direction.

This was the final chapter in the book and of course it was titled “Think big and kick ass in business in life”. For the most part it was mostly a re-affirmation of what has been said with different stories.

One thing that I thought was odd was that there were a lot of pages near the beginning of this chapter where Trump talks about how many women he has been with as well as diving into topics such as what attracts women and so fourth. It felt completely off topic especially with lines such as “So guys, be cocky, confident, smart, and humorous and you will be able to get all the women you want”. Felt more like reading a book of “How to be a player 101”.

Although, I believe the intent in writing those parts was to demonstrate how in life attitude plays a large role on how others perceive you. He then talks about how if you are thinking big in life that you should say also own expensive and high end clothing to project to the world that you value quality.

I can easily see people interpreting that in a surface level way though which usually causes people to kill themselves financially. Speaking for myself, everyone who I have personally met who does that usually aren’t too well off financially with the ones who can speak for themselves are usually the ones who are better off financially.

The rest of it talks about having the right will, courage and determination to see things through to the end. At the same time, he emphasizes the importance of how if you want to succeed then you need to surround yourself and make friends with like-minded people as oppose to say people who are always negative and complaining to others about problems. He even says that you should discontinue contact with negative people as they will only drain you.

He then wraps it up by re-emphasizing that in the world there will always be obstacles forced upon you in your journey to success such as greedy professionals who will want to take all of your money or people who are willing to lie, cheat and steal from you. You just have to be prepared to find ways to keep going.

That does it for this book. I’ll be writing my final thoughts on it overall.