Time is not money because we’re humans, first and foremost. Our lives are not designed to create value and revenue our every waking moment. We don’t convert time to money and think it’s perfectly OK to do the exact same thing day in and day out with no complaints.
There was a brief moment in my life when I thought time was money. I thought if I wasn’t producing results and value, then I was wasting my time. That was when I was in 17 – 21 years old. That was when I had all the time in the world and no money.
I can confirm after having money that time is not money. There’s much more valuable things in life than money. Money isn’t everything. It makes sense that I thought time was money in my younger years. I had all the time in the world and no money.
Therefore, I happily traded my time for money because it’s all I had to give.
Now that I have a little bit of money to my belt, I realized that’s just not true. Time is worth more than any amount of money that you can generate. You can always make more money. You can NEVER get back more time. Once a second is gone, it’s gone forever.
Time is not money because time is much more valuable than any amount of money. These days, I will gladly spend money if it can save me time. I don’t mind paying for toll road fees as long as it saves me valuable time. Time is everything to me now.
The less headaches in my life, the better.
Why Time is Not Money
The first and biggest reason why time is not money is because time is a non-renewable resource. There’s an endless opportunity to make more money. There’s limited opportunities to create more time. Time is the most valuable commodity that we have.
Time is what we spend to create happiness. It’s what we spend to move up in our careers. Time is the most valuable resource that we have. There’s a reason why companies spend millions of dollars to capture your attention.
It is very valuable and companies want it. Time is not money. The poor think that trading dollars for time is worth it. The rich understand that trading dollars for time is an expensive exchange. They always figure out ways to make money without giving up their time.
There’s a reason why the truly richest and wealthiest people figure out a way to make money while they sleep. They either have employees work for them or they buy cash flowing assets that pay them money every month. Whatever the case is, they figure out a way to let someone else do the work.
Time is not money. School taught us the wrong money lessons because it’s taught by teachers who aren’t wealthy. Many people don’t understand that about money and they are happy with a $5,000 raise they got after working there for 2 – 3 years.
You need to think bigger and think about the actual value you’re providing to your company. Your pay should reflect that.
Passive Income Disrupts the Money/Time Relationship
The person who thinks that time is money doesn’t understand the role passive income plays in their lives. Passive income is money you earn regardless of what you do. Whether you sleep, work, or don’t work, that’s money that’s coming in. Without lifting a finger.
Passive income disrupts the entire time is money relationship and completely changes your way of thinking about how to get rich. Time is not money as long as passive income exists. I invest my money so that my money pays me more money.
Whether I work or don’t work, dividend income always makes its way into my pocket. I get about $5,000/year in dividend income, alone. Not even including stock appreciation. That pays for a solid 3 months worth of expenses, which isn’t insignificant.
Regardless if I work or not. If I do any amount of work throughout the year, that’s just additional money paying for my lifestyle. Time is not money because there’s always a way to earn money without giving up your time. There’s no need to give up something so valuable as time for money.
When there’s an opportunity to earn more money without sacrificing time. There are many opportunities to earn passive income because there are more unique asset classes that are popping up every single day. Your money should be paying you, instead of the other way around.
Your money is the best employee you’ll ever have.
Passive Income Opportunities Are Everywhere
With the invention of the internet, there are resources out there teaching us the ways of sound personal finance. The passive income opportunities are everywhere these days and there’s many more opportunities now than ever before.
You can walk dogs on Rover, create a blog, a YouTube channel, and many more. That’s just the tip of the iceberg. People are generating passive income in so much volume that they’re actually reaching financial independence in their early 30s. Much earlier than the traditional retirement age of 60s.
Time is not money because passive income opportunities are everywhere to make us be wealthier and richer than ever before. We don’t have to work for money. We can let money work for ourselves for years on end without us working another day.
There’s no one set path anymore. We have the opportunity to create and carve our own paths, if we want to. The traditional model of working for an employer until retirement is slowly being shifted away. Many people are becoming financial influencers on their own and the like.
Time is not money once you get hit with the passive income that’s out there. $1,000 in dividends just hit differently than any amount of paycheck that I earn. It’s money that I didn’t have to work for. It’s money that comes into my pocket, no matter what I do.
Your life changes once you understand this about money. One source of income isn’t enough.
Time is Better Than Money
You can always make more money. But you can’t always get more time. There’s a reason why the wealthiest Americans always buy assets. There’s not a single wealthy and rich person who doesn’t own assets. Assets are what sets people free.
It’s what gets us financial freedom and the ability to move up in life. There’s real estate, online websites, stocks, bonds, and many more asset classes to choose from. The person who holds these assets over the long haul will come out ahead by the end of it all.
Time is not money because it’s better than money. Once we leverage and use money to our advantage is when we figure out the world. That’s what sets us free. With your 9-5, you have to keep putting in work daily to earn more money. That’s active income.
With passive income, you just have to do it once and it pays you money for the rest of your life. That’s a powerful concept that the rich understand very well. There’s only one of you but there’s many thousands, if not millions of dollars you can have to put to work.
Money is the best employee you’ll ever have. It doesn’t complain, ask for a vacation, or does anything that is outside of your control. That way, it’s not a good idea to use it to your advantage and to its fullest potential to make you more money than ever before.
Create Opportunities to Get More Time
These days, if I can pay $100 to save a day of my time, I gladly pay it. It’s not worth it to me to spend my most valuable commodity that makes me a lot of money. Not only that, I already have enough money for my age group, anyway. There are many opportunities to get more time.
These days make it infinitely more possible to get more time because the economy is shifting to a freelancing economy. People gladly deliver your food to the door. They also gladly come to your house to clean for 5 hours a week. There’s no need to hire a full time nanny.
Time is not money because money can be used to create infinitely more time. You can’t create more time to get more money. When you’re starting out, time is less valuable. You’re young and full of energy. However, as time passes and you move up in life, time is much more valuable.
You’re not willing to go through with the hassle of interviewing for a new job if the new job is going to be a $5,000 raise and the new job requires a case study as a part of the process. You have more important thing to do with your time.
Especially if you have to complete the case study over the weekend, your most valuable time. Especially if you have to take PTO time to complete the interview. It just doesn’t make any sense at all whatsoever. Time is not money because time is worth more than money.
The rich understand this.
The Time is Money Mindset is Wrong
When you’re first starting out, time IS money. However, as you progress forwards and upwards, time is not money. There’s more important things in life than money, anyway. And that is in addition to time! These days, my passive income equal to around $25,000 per year.
That’s not an insignificant amount of money, given that I spend around $25,000 per year. However, I know that passive income isn’t always guaranteed year after year, which is why I continue to work my day job. I love it when my money continues to pay me for doing no additional work.
I’m not done, either. There’s much more income streams that I want to generate and I’m working as hard as I can to make them happen. I’m putting in work week after week in hopes that my dreams become a reality one day. I know I can make it work.
One day, my passive income will equal $50,000 per year, and that’s when I know that I can stop. That’s when I know I have the power to stop because my expenses are all taken care of, regardless of whether or not I work. Time is not money. My money should be giving me more time.
Instead of using my time to earn more money. The years are a grind but I know that the journey will have all been worth it once I actually get there. I truly believe that hard work pays off and this will not be the exception. The time is money mindset can be a good start.
After a while, the mindset should shift to time is not money.
Everyone Can Buy More Time
The idea that time is not money and that you can buy more time is not only for the wealthy. Anybody can make this goal a reality because everyone has the ability and willpower to do so. It doesn’t require intelligence. it does require the temperament and ability to follow the blueprint, day in and day out.
Even if you need to take a break for a couple of months before coming back to the idea again. Everyone can buy more time because time is sold on the open market every single day. There never will be a shortage of people who wants to trade their hours for dollars.
Then that’s where you come in. If you’re pulling in $200,000 a year, is a $1 daily toll road fee going to make your life different in any way possible? I would think not. In fact, spending that $1 to save 15 minutes of time is a valuable investment.
Time is not money. Your ability to control your time is worth more than any amount of money. There’s a reason why many people look for financial independence. Financial independence is freedom. Financial independence is what gets you ahead in life.
Trading your time for dollars has limitations to how much time that you can sell. Therefore, it’s not a bad idea to always go for the path that has an unlimited potential. Unlimited potential means everything. There is no need to be playing a game where you’re always going to be capped.
Your potential is more meaningful than that. It’s time to unleash it.
