A Book Review “Optimal Wealth’ By Chris Wilson

This blog is a book review of “Optimal Wealth” by Chris Wilson. I am reviewing this book as it deals with an important and sometimes overlooked topic which is money. It is overlooked because we do not spend time educating ourselves and how it affects our lives.  Money is an integral part of career development. The reason for this is that no matter what we do, or what path we follow we do it in exchange for a financial reward, money. It is because of this we can let money control us or we can control money.

The former can and will lead to perhaps an ungratified life. This is because we are slaves to our careers, we are doing something just for the money to buy things that in the long run may not make us happy. The latter provides us with freedom. We need money to live. Beyond the basics, if we develop a clear picture of the lifestyle we desire and match it with a career that we like we will be much better off in the long run. I give many examples of this in a previous blog I wrote https://www.thecareerguy.ca/blog/money-and-careers.

In this blog, I will review some topics Chris talks about in his book “Optimal Wealth” and how they relate to some of my guests on my podcast. This blog covers topics such as Debt, Budgeting, Investing, and putting final thoughts and words into a conclusion.

Debt Sucks

My interview with Chris Wilson, the author of this book, explains in his interview with me https://www.thecareerguy.ca/episodes/time-out-regrouping-and-moving-forward how he acquired a lot of debt at a young age, and then how he got himself out of debt. Debt is stressful and it has also been accepted as a way of life, especially in our progress to a cashless society (we use electronic payment so we do not see the cash) our concept of cash has been distorted somewhat because of this. On a side note, this could be why health issues seem to be on the rise. Carrying credit can limit us, in what career path we can pursue we are tied to a job just to pay our bills.

My interview with Paul McNeil https://www.thecareerguy.ca/episodes/a-passion-for-dinosaurs-working-as-a-paleontologist explains it well. Working as an engineer in the oil sands in Northern Alberta Paul made it a habit to save his money and stay out of debt. It was this practice that provided him the freedom to pursue his dream of becoming a paleontologist later in life. He saved enough during his tenure in the oil sands that when he went back to school to study dinosaurs, he lived off his savings finishing his doctoral degree with no debt.  In essence, it was his ability to save money that provided him the opportunity later in life to pursue his dream career (as a side note it was not that late in his life).

Budgeting

Understanding what our money is being used for. Learning how much money is coming in and how much is going out for expenses is fundamental. This is imperative for life and a business owner. People who aspire to be entrepreneurs or business owners need to be proficient with this attribute. My interview with Paul Rogalski https://www.thecareerguy.ca/episodes/a-chef-that-is-continually-re-inventing-himself owner and operator of the Rouge restaurant explains this well. He breaks down what it costs to operate his restaurant. Take this same idealism and apply it to our personal lives. It does sound a bit ruthless but if we do treat our personal lives more like a business when dealing with money it can increase our chances of doing better. The idea is to apply logic and take the emotions out of the equation.

Investing

Putting our money into assets that will pay us later is another great suggestion from the book. However, a lot of us do not follow through with this notion. There are many avenues a person can pursue with this from real estate, stocks, and bonds, to name a few.  My interview with Teresa Mitchell https://www.thecareerguy.ca/episodes/a-renaissance-women-from-chef-to-financial-planner-to-a-coaching-services-and-a-podcaster a financial planner explains all the options with risk tolerance to the listener. It can be overwhelming to figure out where to put a person’s money. It does take some time and effort to figure this out and it is time well spent. However, there is nothing wrong with hiring someone like a financial planner.

It is worth pointing out and it is explained well in the interview that anybody working in this role is licensed by a governing body that ensures that they perform with integrity to serve their clients' needs the best. Also, a financial advisor is well-versed and experienced in the markets. More importantly, a financial planner will get their clients to think about the bigger picture, what kind of lifestyle a person wants, and what stage of their life they are at which will also determine risk tolerance. All of this helps a person create a good financial plan with regularly reviewed goals.  

Again, it is understanding where we are in life and what are our desires. Not everyone needs a financial advisor doing it alone is fine it just requires discipline by putting time aside to evaluate, measure, and adjust, if need be, our goals.

Conclusion

It is my interview with Ron Salahub https://www.thecareerguy.ca/episodes/mechanic-mechanics-and-more-mechanics explains it the best. As a mechanic especially when he worked in the oil fields, he made very good money. However, as put it when he quit chasing the money and instead chased the education his perspective on life and his career changed. He went after work which interested him and this is where he was able to shine. He realized that happiness came from him not from buying more stuff.

Going off what Teresa Mitchel talks about in her interview it is developing an understanding of life and lifestyle and what we want our lives to look like. However, this does take time and most of us do start to figure this out in our 30s and 40s, which is evident from all the interviews I have done.

So, understanding how we can budget ourselves, put our money to work for us, and above all understanding the lifestyle we want will help us develop a good relationship with money and can set us on the right path. The book “Optimal Wealth” is a simple easy read that discusses the topics I have talked about in this blog and other fundamentals of money. It is an important topic and very much a part of career development and our life decisions. Thanks for reading this blog and I hope it helped.