“They told us to save for retirement. We knew investing, while you’re young, was important.”
He lifted his coffee. The steam swirled in front of his nose. He took a sip and stared out the window.
“But they didn’t tell us about investing in our health. They didn’t tell us we need to make smart financial choices and smart health choices,” he said.
He slowly shook his head while gazing into the parking lot. “We should all be enjoying retirement, but we’re spending as much time with our doctors as our golfing buddies.”
He turned his attention back to me, returned his coffee to the paper coaster and leaned forward.
“Don’t make the same mistake. Learn from us.”
The waiter arrived holding a pot of coffee and balancing ceramic plates on her arm. She put down a plate of scrambled eggs, smothered in orange cheese and flanked by strips of crisp bacon. He pulled the plate to his side of the table. The waiter put the buttered toast next to his plate.
He asked for more cream. I asked for more coffee.
We met once a month for breakfast. The menu changed, but the order was always the same. He ordered cheesy eggs, bacon and toast. I sipped on black coffee.
These were monthly reviews of various ventures. We mostly discussed the progress of projects we were collaborating on. Every now and then, he would slip in sage advice.
Generally, he hid these lessons in funny stories. Stories where he was faced with a simple choice, but somehow still made the wrong decision. At 67 years old, he lived a life full of these fun parables. I’d heard hundreds of them. This one was different. When he delivered this advice without so much as a smile, I immediately felt the gravity of the lesson.
“Learn from us,” he repeated.
I nodded. “I am. I see it with my parents and their friends. Body parts seem to be failing people in their early 60s now.”
He frowned like I wasn’t listening.
“Your generation should be investing in their retirement. You all know that, but I don’t hear enough talk about investing in your health,” he said. “Financial discipline is worthless if you don’t have health discipline. You’ll need your health to enjoy your wealth.”
I couldn’t shake that thought on the drive back to my office. You need health to enjoy wealth. So simple. So obvious. So forgoten.
By most measures, my friends were all successful. The majority earned advanced degrees and were quickly ascending their professional ladders. They owned waterfront homes. They drove European cars. Their wives wore wedding rings with sparkling diamonds.
They worked hard for their money. But as their bank accounts swelled, so did their waistlines. Their careers moved forward as fast as their hairlines receded backward. They navigated digestion issues, fertility problems, fatigue and early stages of heart disease as they rushed from meeting to meeting.
What price are Millenials paying for success? These dudes are diligent about creating wealth. The luxury watch. The private schools. The country clubs. All the financial details are thought through. All but one. In their envisioned future, they’re perfectly healthy. Even as their health is quietly starting to decline.
They are all falling into the same trap as our parents. Health becomes fragile. It’s not an annuity that passively appreciates over time. Without proper care, health quickly becomes a depreciating asset. They are planning a detailed future while neglecting the most important detail: You need health to enjoy wealth.
So I’m working on a guide for men and women ready to invest in their future beyond money. I’m making a holistic framework for completely investing in your future. I’ve outlined principles that address all aspects of your health and progressively evolve for each stage of your life.
Who’s This Guide For?
Like investing in retirement, the earlier you start the better, but also like retirement, it’s never too late to start.
Ideally, this guide will help people during the transition from adolescence to adulthood. You are in your late 20s or early 30s. The resiliency of your youth is slowly expiring, but your patterns of bad habits still haven’t accumulated into chronic diseases.
Now is the time to start incremental changes. Regularly investing spare change into the stock market will compound significant returns over decades. Your health is similar. You’re about to learn how simple choices can create small changes that will yield a big impact on your health over time.
You need health to enjoy wealth. If you want to learn about managing your wealth, read Intelligent Investor by Bill Graham. If you want to learn about wellth management, just sign up for post notifications.
Originally published at Justin Root.
