Three years ago, I thought becoming a millionaire was some mystical achievement reserved for tech founders and lottery winners.
But after spending nine years working in finance and then another three years building multiple income streams to hit my first million, I realized that the strategies that actually work are nothing like what most people think.
So if I was starting from scratch today, here are five things that I would do to get there twice as fast.
Number one, I'd master the income first approach.
It's way too easy to think about wealth backwards.
And that's what most people do.
They focus on cutting expenses, living frugally, and trying to save their way to the top.
This feels like the safe route.
It feels like the less risky option.
But the reality is that it's almost impossible to save your way to a million dollars.
The maths just doesn't work.
If you save 500 a month, which is already more than what most people manage, it would take you 167 years to hit a million.
Even if you're super disciplined and you earn a bit more, if you save 2000 a month, you're still looking at over 40 years.
40 years to hit that $1 million mark.
I learned this the hard way.
I spent nine years in banking on a fairly good salary, living well below my means, and I still wasn't even close to saving my first million.
You can see the exact breakdown of my salary, taxes, expenses, everything in this video, if you're curious, but the reality was I was playing the wrong game entirely.
There's definitely a time and a place for budgeting and for watching your expenses.
This is a personal finance channel at the end of the day.
But if your goal is to hit a million soon, then you need to flip the script and focus massively on the income game.
Every hour that you'd normally spend hunting for deals, clipping coupons, trimming costs.
Redirect that energy into figuring out how to earn more money.
This one shift in thinking... honestly changed everything for me.
Ask yourself the bigger questions like what skills can I learn that are actually transferable into something that pays more?
Where should I invest this money to make it work harder than I do?
Which of my existing skills can I monetize right now or use to create a business?
It was these questions that stopped me thinking in the way that The traditional path forces us to think, and it helped me think out of the box, to understand more ways that I can explore to increase my income.
It's only when I completely changed my approach that I was able to really move the needle in this way.
And that's not to say you should go crazy with spending, but there's a huge difference between being smart with money and being penny wise but pound foolish with your time and energy.
Number two, I'd say no to almost everything.
Once you've got the income first mindset, the next step is creating multiple income streams.
But here's where most people mess up.
They try to create so many income streams all at once.
And I was guilty of this too.
When I decided to start a YouTube channel as a potential avenue to make money whilst giving back and doing something that I love, I was posting here and there.
And then I'd also be exploring other opportunities.
I'll take a few months break to try something else.
I'd come back to do it.
And I also had my full-time job.
And it was absolutely going nowhere.
It took me nine months to even hit 300 subscribers.
And then in August 2022, I decided I was going to commit completely solely to one thing.
And at that time, I chose YouTube and I gave myself exactly three months to go all in.
And I mean all in.
I was unhealthily obsessed with it.
Social events that didn't add value to me growing YouTube was a no.
Side projects that distracted me from growing my YouTube channel was a no.
New business idea that my friend said was a good opportunity, it was a no.
Anything that wasn't directly tied to me helping my channel in these three months, I said no to.
I still had my day job, but every spare minute was dedicated to learning or getting better at YouTube.
And it's only when I did this that the momentum started picking up.
And that's the difference between being interested in something and being committed to it.
When you are simply just interested, you do what needs to be done when it's convenient.
But when you're committed you do whatever it takes to really give that thing the best possible shot.
Because even if that thing doesn't work out, even if it doesn't land in the direction that you wanted it to, then you can make a decision at the end of three months or at the end of six months and decide if you want to continue spending time on this or if the time is now to try something else and pivot.
So pick one income stream, set a timeline whether it's three months, six months, nine months, whatever feels right.
Then say no to literally everything else that doesn't move that needle forward.
That's the best thing you can do to give something a real shot in the aim for it to turn into potentially a million dollar business.
By the way, once you've started building these skills and creating new income streams, there's one thing that becomes really important, and that is having the right financial setup to support your growth.
When I started my YouTube channel and other projects, I realized very quickly that juggling multiple income sources gets complicated fast.
Different payment platforms, different currencies.
If you work internationally, trying to keep track of all your expenses, it was a mess.
And that's why I started using Revloop Business from the very beginning.
And that is today's sponsor.
It's a super financial app that's designed specifically for business owners.
It's made my life so much easier.
You can send and receive payments in over 30 currencies, transfer money across more than 150 countries and exchange at the interbank rate, which is incredibly useful if you work with international clients or suppliers.
You can also hold local accounts in different currencies, which makes global business so much more seamless.
You can get full financial control with corporate cards, custom spending rules and automated accounting.
You can also issue up to 200 free virtual cards per team member for your team.
You can set limits and you can monitor transactions in real time.
On top of that, everything's managed in one app on desktop or mobile, so you can run your business from wherever you are.
And right now, Revolut Business are offering £200 as a welcome bonus for new users.
You can sign up at revolut.com forward slash rb4 slash nisha top up your account and that is it the offer is available for new customers only in the uk and it's valid until july the 20th so if you've been meaning to get your business finances sorted now is the perfect time and i'll drop the link in the description below Number three, I'd learn one high value skill per quarter.
The reality is your day job is probably never going to make you a millionaire.
Unless you're in finance, tech or another high paying industry, there's usually a ceiling on how much you can earn from your salary alone.
But here's the bigger issue.
The skills you learn at most corporate jobs also aren't valuable enough to help you build huge amounts of wealth outside of your job either.
It might help you climb the corporate ladder, but they won't help you create a lot of wealth fast.
So, instead of tunnel visioning on becoming better at your current job, I'd focus on learning skills that can solve expensive problems or create scalable value.
These are essentially leverage skills that they don't just make you a bit better, they completely change what's possible for you instead.
So if I was starting today, I'd pick four different leverage skills and I'd learn one every single quarter.
So Q1, it could be sales and persuasion.
Everything in business comes down to your ability to influence outcomes.
Quarter two I'd learn digital marketing, because understanding how attention works online is a massive advantage these days.
Quarter three i'll learn basic coding or data analysis.
A lot of what i do is actually heavily driven by what the data tells me, and i really believe the ability to interpret that data gives you a superpower in almost any field.
So every quarter, learn a new high value skill and pair that with what you already know to open up completely different opportunities.
Number four I'd protect my energy, like my life depends on it.
Building wealth is about an 80% mental game and 20% strategy.
But most people burn through their mental energy on things that don't matter.
Judging other people, negative news, comparing themselves to others on social media.
Instead, I'll become ruthless about protecting my headspace early on.
This isn't about being antisocial.
It's about recognizing that your mental state directly impacts your ability to take action.
When you feel defeated or distracted, you don't make good decisions.
You don't spot opportunities.
Instead, I'd surround myself with every podcast, every YouTube channel content that helps me learn about business, finance and building wealth.
That would be the thing that I constantly surround myself with.
And number five, I would get obsessed with the process, not the outcome.
Here's the thing about chasing a million dollars.
It's incredibly easy to get discouraged when you're sitting out 10k looking at how far you still have to go.
The gap between where you are and what you're aiming for feels absolutely impossible.
When you're constantly measuring yourself against this massive end goal, every day just feels like a failure because you're not there yet and the path or the journey to go is so much longer than how far you've already come.
So my advice is, instead of obsessing over the million, fall in love with the daily actions that create wealth.
For me, learning something new about investing became my evening entertainment.
Creating valuable content became my creative outlet.
Once I started doing this, every single day felt like a win.
Not because I was suddenly making millions but because I was getting better.
I was moving forward and I was building the skills and habits that millionaires have.
Think about it like this.
If you're doing the right things every single day, and you're doing it for a long time and you're committed to the process, the million becomes almost inevitable.
It's not a question of if, it becomes a question of when.
On the other hand, if you're constantly stressed about the outcome, you'll probably quit before you even get there.
So make it a goal of yours.
Be committed to the goal and do everything it can every day, with small steps and small actions, to ultimately get you to the place that you want to be.
The process is what you can control.
The outcome is just what happens when you get the process right.
So that is it five things that I would do differently if I wanted to become a millionaire in half the time.
Thanks so much for watching, and thank you again to Revolut for sponsoring today's video.
So you can find out more in the video description below.
