Krisstina Wise: How Losing Everything Twice Led Her to Financial Freedom

Krisstina Wise What happened to me when my body came out? What happened in my business? Did my business go up? Or did it go down? Mike Koenigs Yep, totally went down. Of course. Krisstina Wise Yeah, money is to live a really good life. Mike Koenigs Yep. Krisstina Wise And money is so that you have money when you need it in this situation. So it's my private stuff over here on the side that I was studying. So I will spend this money that actually ended up saving me not my business, not my success. So simple. Everybody's worked with me. I haven't had anybody yet. That hasn't worked with me that said, Krisstina, you're telling me I've been putting this off my entire life terrified, thinking I couldn't do it in at all is this simple? I'm like, Yeah, money is the best employee. Money is the best business. It just gives you money. Mike Koenigs Mike Koenigs here. Welcome to another episode of capability amplifier. This is Krisstina Wise. I want to tell you a undefined story. First of all, I met her about 15 years ago, and immediately have a great connection with her because she's really, really smart. And we have something in common, which is she grew up in a little tiny town like me. In fact, she grew up poor in a trailer park, both of her parents were poor minded, poor thinking. But she managed to go to work, make a lot of money, lost it all, not once, but twice. And now she's worth over eight figures. And she lives on passive income. Everything she does is a matter of choice. And she's also a mother of two. Now, she also lost that money because she married some wrong guys. Okay, so she has some fantastic love stories. But here's why it's so important to you and why I have her on today is because she has a great story about most of us as founders who our answer when we don't have money is we go out and hustle and make more we're great at making money. Usually, we have high income, low net worth. And most founders I know are ashamed about that as I've been, which is, we've worked so hard, we've made so much and we show so little for it. And there's no way you could get off the hamster wheel and actually live on passive income. So big reason I had Krisstina in today is to talk about what her formula is, what she has been doing, and how she has been helping other founders just like you and me, get to the other side and get off the hamster wheel. As I like to say, you know, at some point you want to get out of that circus and quit being a monkey. So Krisstina, I love you. It's nice to have you here today. Krisstina Wise Glad to finally be here. Mike Koenigs My god. It is so awesome. So why don't we begin? Before we get into like some of your strategies, your tactics and how you built this remarkable business? Where do you come from? Give us a little more of the story. Krisstina Wise Yeah, well, there's a little strip where it came from. And you pointed that out already. You know, that's that was the beginnings and certainly from a poverty mindset. And from those upbringings and it really when I think back, like where I am today, compared to where I started from, like many of us, it's like, I don't even know how that's possible. Like I never could have imagined living the life I have today based on those beginnings. But really, the story I like to tell is, I was in the real estate industry. And I had made it to the top I was nationally known I was an icon I was in every cover of every magazine, I was speaking at the biggest stages. And I had this one stage that I wanted to be on. And this was the stage of all stages. This is where all the technology people like founders, household names that you know of people, when we think of real estate, we type our address into those URLs to find out our value of our houses, so on and so forth. So I speaking on the stage keynote speaking, there's about 750 people of the real estate leaders in the audience. I was the opening keynote. And I had been waiting and waiting, and practicing and practicing. And this was the stage that if I could make it on this stage, I knew I'd made it and I made it to the stage. And I made the stage as the opening keynote. So I am speaking, I'd practice this whole, I'd rehearse this, I hit every mark, like a Broadway play type thing. And so I'm onstage giving this talk it was going perfectly and all of a sudden I heard this, like click in my brain. It was very fast. And it took me off for a second. But luckily I was able to get back on track and one of this performance, standing ovation again, these are the leaders in the industry. I get offstage. There's a break. People are like clamoring after me. Krisstina, can I get your phone number? Can I get your name did it so the funny thing about the story is that I'm walking out of the room and I'm telling myself like I'm like, Krisstina, girlfriend, you Fe made it. You did it. This is your dream come true. Everything that you've done was for this moment. You can name your price from here on out. Yeah. And I just was like, relishing in that that feeling of success and accomplishment. And not six hours later, I was in bed and couldn't get out of bed, my entire body was breaking down. And I had to deal with the fact that I might never be in that place again, right. And what had happened at that moment, it was like this, the snap of a finger. But what that sound was, is I'd had a mini stroke on stage. And the dominoes just went down from there. And then it ended up being a year of just one breakdown after another after another and my body was just basically giving me the finger. Yeah. And what I kind of thought about reflecting on that is like, I was the entrepreneurial poster child, I did everything everybody told me to do. And I made it and I hit that level of security thing, right and everything wrong, right? What happened to me when my body came out what happened in my business? Did my business go up? Or did it go down? Yep, totally went down. Yeah, and it started breaking down. So now while I was breaking down, my business was breaking down, I'd had no energy or anything effort to put in the business. And it started crumbling and bad things were happening with maybe bad business partners. And a lot of this had been in situations like that never happened to me. Exactly. But because when you're not paying attention, so what happened is this where it's been studying this money, this private money and been building this wealth, and I had, you know, some beginnings of assets at that time, it had some cash and things. It was that money that ended up saving my life. Sure, because I had the money, and I had some passive income that was able to pay the bills. So that just created this new awareness of like, Oh, what is the money for? One money is to live a really good life. Yep. And money is so that you have money when you need it. In this situation, so it's my private stuff over here on the side that I was studying. So I was doing this money, that actually ended up saving me not my business. Not my success, in fact, was so amazing. Just our egos. You know, my ego is, I'd say pretty big at the time, because I was I was so important. But do you think the industry waited round for me to get well? Or did they go on and find the next Mike Koenigs girl and the next girl in the next few Krisstina Wise seconds, right, two seconds flat. So I wasn't even even as important as I thought I was. Yeah. So coming out of the whole experience, what I realized is that there's so much this money equation, especially for entrepreneurs. That just doesn't, it doesn't make sense. And so, so many entrepreneurs and founders is they're working so hard, but they don't have anything to show for it. And that's what I call the entrepreneur trap. The entrepreneurial trap is we just make money. The mouse, we, the more money we make, the more expensive our lifestyle gets. So we go back to make more money to have a more expensive lifestyle. And that lifestyle is really awesome. But every month we go to work is to pay for the cost of our expensive lifestyle. And then we keep working harder and harder and hustling more and more. And then Wednesday, we just wake up tired and burn out and think What the hell am I doing this for? Why am I taking all these risks? Why am I not sleeping at night? Oh, my God, I need to make payroll again, over and over and over again, thinking one day, it's just gonna all work out? Yeah, the truth is, it usually doesn't. So that's why I do what I do today, is to really help entrepreneurs understand money, get good with their money, to build Real Net Worth and wealth so that they're not trapped by their business. Mike Koenigs Yep. Well, and I'll give everyone full disclosure here. You know, we've worked together we've known each other a long time I've watched you go through at least one of your cycles that I'm aware of, I don't know if we were that close before where I got to see a previous one. But I knew you, you know, you've always been super straightforward. You like you have no shame in the sense of, yep, here's what happened to me. You're an open book. And you know, when I was telling you this, well, we're having a little lunch today. And I said, one of your greatest qualities is how curious you are, and how humble you are. And I think when you get close to death, that's a very humbling experience when you really have lost it all. And you've got to ask for help, and really figure out what works. And I look at you, and I've also had the good fortune of getting inside your business, interviewing a bunch of your clients and asking them like, what's the experience? What did you learn? What did you really learn? Like, what do you think you're buying? And what do you think you've got when they've worked with you? And that's part of what I want to talk to you about is I you know, I don't just want to know the story. I want to know how you've managed to do it and get it back. Basically, this is your third big when I call it. You know, let's say you made it last it made it last it made it. So that right there's been three times or two. Yeah, that's right. Okay. Okay, good. And, you know, it wasn't an accident at this point. And each time was a different thing, a different lesson to learn, right? And some people just quit. So I think before I get into some of your customer stories, I want to know what you believe makes you so resilient? Why do you keep on fighting other than the fact that you had two babies to feed? You get you? I mean, you had your kids. So that's certainly a damn good reason. And you're not a quitter. But what do you think it is? It just kept you going? Because he could have just quit it could have started some seriously bad habits run away. Krisstina Wise Yeah, I you know, it. I've never been asked that before. And I know Mike Koenigs I'd never thought of it. And I really want to know, Krisstina Wise I don't know, I think some of us are just wired that way. You know, there's, there's just that mentality that if it's up, if it's gonna be it's up to me type of thing. And, and I guess also in my head that, that anything's possible. Like, there's just not a quitter mentality. And there's always a solution. And everything's temporary. And even, we've all experienced dark moments, the lowest of low moments. But I always know that there's another side and, and then part of the journey is to understand that there's a lesson in every journey, and there's always going to be that good on the other side. So it's just you deal with the shit. Sometimes you have to hang with the pain for a little while, but it always serves a great purpose. And I don't know, maybe that's where that resiliency comes from, but just putting, it's never an option. Mike Koenigs Yeah, I can see that. I think, you know, the last time I saw you in in probably a dark place where you were really struggling some it was health related. Some it was a love loss, you know, it was combination of both. And I, you definitely don't lose hope. So something that we share is the optimism and hope, and genuinely believing, it's just going to work itself out. Like, that's something I'm I never fall apart for that. I just know, it's just going to be fine. And you kind of either think it's gonna work out, you're gonna be dead. And either way, you're really whatever. Right. So Krisstina Wise I guess it's just like an eternal optimism. Yeah, I always, always anticipate things are gonna work out and they're gonna be great. At some point. Yeah. Mike Koenigs Yeah. Well, that's good. Well, so I'm gonna ask you some specific questions, because I interviewed. I can't remember when we were working. The last time we interviewed him for six of your customers. And we asked him a lot of questions about working with you and what they learned. I don't even remember if we did all of them together if I did some separate ones. But the bottom line is, here's what I heard over and over again, was before your systems, they're confused, not confident, focused on top line revenue, which I've certainly Mike Koenigs heard you talk about. And I know for me when I talked to Vivian about money stuff, always good at making it. And you even asked me today, you know, like, well, how are you some of your investments going and I'll be like, my greatest, I'm going to call it my flat out investment mistakes have been making a bunch of money and investing in other people just like me more VC deals, I've got a dozen outstanding right now. One out of 1314 has really turn liquid and the other ones are people I know deals I know, be learn that VC deals are oftentimes unless you get really good at it. And that's a full time job. Even though statistically the numbers aren't that different. It's like they're high risk, zero interest, indefinite period loans with someone who might not grow and change with the times because a whole bunch of stuff gets thrown at you. And knowing what I know. Now, instead of being fearful of real estate, for example, I would have gotten involved a lot sooner. But back to your customers, structure, confidence, clarity, path, rule, set, and control and choice that came up over and over again. So I want you to sort of explain the frameworks you've developed why they consistently work so well. And then maybe we'll dive into a couple Mike Koenigs of some of the core lessons that I've seen and witnessed and also learn by going through your material. So cool. Yeah, that was a lot of stuff. Yeah, but I want to give you a lot of directions to go. So give you some time to think about, like where to take this first. All right, well, the Krisstina Wise first thing that I like to start with everyone, like where I was before, again, where I was, and part of that story to where I am today. And I was trying to think like what was the problem then? Because I was working on business, like I started working separately on money, but things were still completely screwed up. And everything fell apart. So I thought what was what was wrong there? Especially being the poster child of trying to do everything right. And what I landed on is like the fundamental problem is enough was never enough. So no matter where I got, or how much money I made, or how big the business was, it was never enough. So there was no there was no like destination, there was no place where it's satisfactory, where it's a place of fulfillment. And so that's where it was is like it's just more is better, more is better. So more money, more things, more status, more materialism whatever it is it just in I believe that so much of our just our cultural influences more is better. So that's where we always start is what I say it's, it's broken down into these kind of four places. And one is to understand that business and household are separate. So as entrepreneurs, we conflate these two, like, they're the same thing, like they overlap so much, there's no separation. So we can understand a business is for the sake of, like, when we're talking about in financial terms, hopefully, we like our business or some fulfillment in there, many of us, you know, we enjoy some of Mike Koenigs the elements, your work, deliver live to work kind of things, right, I get it the business at the end day, from Krisstina Wise a financial standpoint, it's to make an income, one income, and that one income from our business is called profit. And that's the money from our business. But business isn't about fulfillment, it might add some fulfilling things like if we're in our purpose and that type of thing. But it doesn't even have to be like if we make a lot of money. And, you know, it's just a good business. It's not like we're, I don't know, living our purpose, so to speak, but we're making a really good profit, where we enjoy our money is in our household. So when we pay ourselves enough from our business, we move that money to our household. And that's where we spend our money. That's where we buy as pay for our houses. That's where we pay for our cars. That's where we pay for our vacations. That's where we get to create memories with our family and friends. That's where we all the money that we spend, that actually brings enjoyment or actually has any type of really material worth to it, is household finance. But we're so focused on the business, that we're not paying attention to the fulfilling piece of money through his household finance. But what we do since we're not paying attention, we don't pay attention to the money in our household, we just spend all the money. And that money in that lifestyle becomes so expensive, that we have to go back to the business. And that's where I call this entrepreneurial trap is we make money in the business, we spend it all in our household, living our lifestyle, our lifestyle, it's really expensive to have to go back to the business. And sometimes it's like, oh, I need to even sell more, because I want to even spend more money. And that can go on forever thinking one day, it'll all work out, and I'll have enough money. But what we're not doing is we're not building wealth. We're just focused on making more money in the business, without understanding the income and wealth are different. So the truth is, is wealth isn't created our business, one income stream is created in our business. Passive income is not created in our business. Hard working income is that we're going to work. So our our business is to create our income our households to create our wealth, wealth is created in the household. And it's a four step process. So the first thing is, how much money is enough? Asking the question how much money is enough? And how much money is not enough? Pretty sure Ryan's of alien starts with the B. Not really. But that is to know the number. So everybody has a number? And that's a philosophical question, because how much money is enough is organized around? What is my good life? So your good life, Mike is different than my good life. So it's like really specking that out? And I call it lifestyle architecture is like, what is what is my lifestyle? And then how much does it cost to live it. And we need to know that number. So when we're looking at, like you said, the framework, it's really just four simple parts. First of all, it's to understand that I want to be wealthy. And what wealthy means is I want enough net worth that throws off enough passive income that covers the cost of my desirable lifestyle. That's not business income. This is asset income, because our business takes 40 5060 7080 hours a week for most of us. And we want to get out of that and have more control. So that's the first thing. So when we're looking at this, it's like, first I want to be wealthy. So the first step in this is we need to know how much money is enough how much wealth is enough? What is my net worth number, call it a freedom number, sovereignty number, we have financial independence number, but you need to have a number. But most of us were working our asses off and have no clue how much money is enough. Like what day we can say, I quit if I want to write. So that's step one is how much money is enough Mike Koenigs action taker mechanics here and I just wanted to interrupt for a second let you know that if you're ready to reinvent yourself and your business, go to connect to mike.com To learn more, and book a conversation with me right now. All right back to the episode. Krisstina Wise We have to know those numbers. And part of that is knowing what our gaps Mike Koenigs are one question has yours changed considerably? Is it gone up or down or stayed kind of the same? Krisstina Wise You know, I mean, it's it's, it's gone up over time, but it's been gradual. But the thing is, is it's gone up a little bit but not really because when we're doing how much money is enough, the weight of the lens to say if it never got better than This would be good enough. Yeah. So when you reach that number, and it what cost and what sacrifice also. But when you reach that number, it's like a little bit more like it might be better if that kind of thing. Mike Koenigs Yeah, I was curious about your psychology there. So keep on going. Krisstina Wise So So that's step one, how much money is enough? Step two, then there's a rule that says wealth is created in the margin. What that means is we have to create a surplus. So when we're paying ourselves for our business, and we move it to our household, the entrepreneur trap is it's called expense creep, or is called Parkinson's Law of money. And Parkinson's Law of money says expenses will always rise to match income. So that's just what's happened, business makes more money or lifestyle goes up, that feels really good, we have more status, we have more toys, we get to fit into a different group, then that keeps going up and up. So that goes on forever make more money in the business because we're working harder and be more successful, and we spend more, but wealth is created in the margins. So what that means is we need a margin between the money we pay ourselves and the money we spend. Yep, very simple, right? Yep. But the question we don't ask ourselves is how much margin? And that's based on some pretty simple math that we have to do. So that's step two, we have to know, we have to understand the principle is as well as creating margin and to how much margin do I need to build to create on an annualized basis, that I can buy assets and build future net worth? So then step three, is that we have to have a system that matches our strategy. And it's called the gap strategy. So we need to know what are gaps? That's part of that doing that? How much is enough? What are my income gaps? What are my net worth gaps, and how long is it going to take to fill this. So now we have to have a financial system that allows us to track our money to cash flow to make sure we're moving our money because money needs velocity, money needs movement, many of us for just so work, we work hard to make it our bill spend it. And that's how we do versus being intentional to move our money accordingly to make sure we're tracking all of the money, how it's working, where it's not working in if we're on track or off track, to hit our numbers. And then the final piece is we have to put our money to work, meaning we have to take the money from the margin, and invest it in places so it can compound and grow over a certain period of time. And that money's money is what makes us wealthy, not our hard work. So when we start using that margin, and and consistently, consistency is really the name of the wealth building game, and can continually build our net worth and buy those assets and build out that portfolio to hit our number and that number, then when it reaches the point of paying for the cost of our lifestyle, now we're financially free. So each one of those elements are always need to be at work, but very simple principles. We've all heard this before. But it's really now the final piece of the what how you, you know, wrap that and put a bow on it, it boils down to our mindset with money. Like really how we feel about it, what we believe about it, what our relationship is to it, meaning we want to manage it, we want to spend time with it, we want to grow it, and then our behaviors with money, what we do and don't do. And those those are all the ingredients for the recipe of if we're going to stay on the entrepreneurial trap, and just hustling it and just being financially stressed one way or another all the time. Or we're constantly creating that surplus and that financial success to financial, you know, security, and eventually financial freedom. So it's just very simple, Mike Koenigs right? Well, so I'm listening to going okay, that's the wax on wax off system. And now I really watched you teach this we did a joint event and I really got your sink into this and I was around a bunch of your clients and also I got to do this with Vivian so she really resonated with it love the psychology. So I want to just, again, put that in a box and say it's a really good process and it's so simple yet it's something you don't think about. Now one thing I've noticed about you if I jump into another topic is Mike Koenigs like how you've created your own wealth. So there's a lot of nuance in your thinking at least through my lens because I've watched you I've listened to you I've seen the way you do it and to me you do it effortlessly genuinely looks that way because you have a great simple lifestyle. You do basically whatever you want to do, as far as I can tell you don't have any have tattoos in your life. It's one twos, you know how you fire up your business, it's lifestyle compatible. And I don't want to forget to say this one of the things that we put together here is a gimme is a how much is enough worksheet. So I just want to remind, basically tell everyone right now, you can go to wise money method.com/free To get that so I didn't want to forget to drop that in but now I'm gonna get to the question I was leading up to which is the nuance so One of the nuances is where have you grown and accumulated your best net worth, that's given you the most freedom. And if you were going to do it all over again, knowing what you know, now, what would you do different or the same to get to where you are? And again, I'm going to just say, it's over eight figures. Okay, so you've got a great base of wealth. But what would you do now? What have you done? What's been most effective? And knowing what you've because you've been through enough cycles now you've been through the bull and the bear markets at least twice? So let's start there. And then I've got another follow on question. Okay. Krisstina Wise Well, I guess the answer to that question is a little bit more complicated. Okay, then, you know, it's not easy to answer. What I mean by that is because what I notice is that what the question I get asked most often is really in that Vedas, what did you invest in? Sure. Meaning if they invest, if people invest in the same thing I invested in, then they would have the same net worth I do. Of course, there's some shites some secret, no. Mike Koenigs And I Yes. And I'm glad you brought that up right away. Because I know that's not the answer. But I'm gonna get into the psychology of Krisstina Wise that. But it's to understand that we have the wrong question like what to invest in. It's like, if it were only that simple, yeah, because I've made a lot of bad investments as well, like everyone has. But again, to make sure just to reiterate, there's a very specific order. First of all, we need to know how much net worth is enough. So let's just say it's 10 million. Mike Koenigs I think that's pretty solid. For most people. I know, they know that. With that if they're making, you know, let's say anywhere from five to 10% on that money, Baba Baba bot, half a million million bucks a year. That's a damn fine living. And Krisstina Wise that's what we're looking at. So let's just take a $10 million net worth, and you're probably going to be looking at pulling out of that 500 to a million dollars just based on how much you're pulling out. So that's where we want to start with and then you have to look at how much time do I want to take five years? 10 years? 20 years? How long? Is it going to take me tomorrow? I Mike Koenigs would like it to be tomorrow. Yes. Krisstina Wise Right? If it only worked that way, that money takes time. And that's part of the compounding why we need to start because yes, we can put money in but when money starts working on money, it starts compounding like a snowball. So it takes years for it to really compound. But it's not like you just put it in there and forget it. That's really the long game if we want to shorten it. So there's three buckets of money that we're we want to pay attention to. And as entrepreneurs, most of all of our monies are our money focus is just in our business, and mostly just focused on Mike Koenigs money, it's no money, it's like, close the deal. And boom, I'm gonna have some cash, and then I'll pull out a little bit of that and stack up, you know, that's been my grind forever, which at the end of the day, I'd be like, you know, there's always plenty until there isn't exactly an emergency comes a lot. It's Krisstina Wise just this focus on revenue, more revenue, bigger revenue, growth, scale, bigger, and it's all revenue. And again, that's just a fatal flaw for entrepreneurs. One, we want profit, profit profit in our business to be the key metric, not the revenue revenue is a byproduct of knowing our our profit numbers, but profit, then how much profits enough. So what we need to do is if we have a $10 million net worth, and we know we probably need to invest a certain amount per year to hit that, well, we have to invest a certain amount of our business income that we pay ourselves into creating this net worth. Let's just say let's just say it's 100 grand a year. That means if we're paying ourselves 300 grand a year 100 of that straight off the top is going to build that net worth. So that means we can only live off 200 grand of it. But if we reverse engineering it, the numbers showed us that okay, we need to invest 100 grand a year, then I can reverse engineer from that and said okay, if I am going to invest 100 grand a year and the cost of my lifestyle is 250,000 year, and let's say taxes are 100 grand a year, that's 40 or $50,000. Now I need a profit for my business. Let's round it up to say half a million dollars. So now we say okay, my business at a bare minimum, I need a business strategy that profits me $500,000 A year and based on my profit margin. Now, let's just say it's a 50% profit margin. I need a million dollar a year business just to keep it easy, simple. So now we can say only need a million dollar business. So Mike, one of the people you talk to we you know, he was grinding and grinding and taken all these risks and investments to try to go from 1 million to 3 million to hit 10 million. And he lost everything. He has student graded a $3 million business. He's making his $500,000 a year. He was enjoying it life was simple, but everybody told him to scale. He reinvested everything started building some technology, everything went bust and he lost all of it. Yep. So for example, when we did this work together and he realize like, Oh, now that I know of reverse engineered, he landed on, I only needed two and a half million dollar business to profit, the amount of profit, I can do that in my sleep. It's super fun. Now I can organically grow up to that I don't have to make all these investments. And I get to live my lifestyle, and I'm going to hit my future self numbers. So it's just an example of we need to reverse engineer and we can get out of this more as better, we can actually know, do I need a million dollar business, a $5 million business a $10 million business just based on reversing and filling in all these numbers? Yeah. So that's, that's kind of the pieces. So we have our business lens. And we need to understand our profit and loss and our balance sheet and our business and understand what our profit numbers are based on how much is enough. Now we need to manage pay ourselves and manage that money, powerfully and intentionally in our household to make sure we keep that $100,000. And now the third lens is our investment portfolio. And if it is set $100,000 A year it's like where are we putting it? And that's the answer to your question. But it's understand, like when we're looking through money, there's one lens to look at our business, there's another lens to look through how we're managing it and passing it through our household, then the third lens is how do I create financial independence? Based on how do I hit this $10 million in this certain period of time, and that's the third lens. So the nuance to that is, like you said is that there's more to it, it's not like you just go invest in a few things. It's a strategy. So it's knowing that, okay, I have a strategy. Now, if you looked at my portfolio, there's like over time, and that's what I was showing at the workshop is like, I took this amount of money, I took this, I I took different pieces, I reinvested portion of that over here. So this or invested this over here, this million dollars turned into $3 million. And so I'm constantly moving the money there to really optimize each asset and investment and build up this portfolio. But the entire time I knew what I was doing. And not I mean, I made mistakes, I knew I knew the numbers I was after, yeah, so as always making these financial investment decisions, when to buy, when to sell, what to buy what to sell. And that's an always looking through it in that lens. But it was a very distinct and separate than these other two pieces. Good. So over time, you know, it's been a lot of real estate. It's been I've invested in different companies, the whole life insurance unit, there's just a really nice portfolio. And the way I teach that is you look at it like a pie chart. And I can send that out as well, that I can just maybe wise money.com forward slash pie chart. And I'll just show a pie chart of really good way to start making sure it's it's kind of balanced while balancing your portfolio. So that we're not over invested in maybe just VC deals, and we've got a really nice portfolio. But what you invest in is less important. It's really just all these other pieces and having a strategy and knowing your numbers, because I've made I'd say most of my wealth in real estate, but some of my peers that have the same net worth I've done they've done it in stocks, or they've done it in crypto, they've done it in different places that have kind of been their expertise. So if you asked them they said oh, do it in the stock market? Yes. Me. I'm like, Oh, do it in real estate. Yes. Somebody else is like, Oh, do it and such and such. Yeah, what you invest in is least important. It's really again, just having a strategy and making sure that you're following your plan. And none of this is rocket science. It's just that we don't do it. Mike Koenigs Yeah, I would I think about this as you're talking. Again, getting back to the nuance. So I think the biggest thing I'll do, I'll tell you what my biggest mistakes have been and what I've observed in other people who think like me, which is make more money, make more money there, you can always pull up more and just take as much as you can and invest it. Shoot that doesn't work out well. And, and it I just hadn't I had no set amount other than Vivian was ritualistic and sucked it away. You know, it was like, the story I tell is one day I went into our wealth managers set down they gave me a piece of paper. And I was thinking to myself as I walked in, you guys aren't aggressive enough. Okay. Well, I sat down and we literally had an extra $1.2 million I didn't even know about. I was like, Well, that isn't because of me. It's not my behavior. You know, I'm a good money maker as a terrible wealth crater was because Vivienne ritualist ritualistically took it out and put it into a vehicle that we didn't have to think about manage. But the other big mistake I made was, I'm going to build this business so I can sell it to get my number. So the my behavior was, Who cares how I live, who cares how much is coming out. I'm gonna sell this for 10 or $100 million and And that rarely works out, okay, out of five big sales I've had, like the amount I got the amount I kept after I paid everyone paid taxes paid the bills. Like instead, if I would have been using a very disciplined behavior and knowing what number I wanted to hit in 10 years, and it'd be like, Okay, let's say it was five or 10 million bucks, whatever it would have been, I know, I could have made that money intentionally and pulled it out and adjusted my lifestyle intentionally, I could have invested in something. And looking back at 57. Now, I would have started buying real estate a lot sooner, but I was afraid of it terrified of it. And I always looked, and my mindset was, it's just too expensive. What if it goes down and through the lens? Now I know, well, it doesn't stay that way. And not for long. You know, it's like there's always need for that, and the leverage, you get the tax benefits, but I felt my story was, I'll never get good enough at it, or as good as someone else, or it's too complicated. And I'd rather focus on the thing that's going to give me the big payday. I think that was a huge, foolish mistake. So when I look back, lack of a system, once you've got a system, I've watched it and observed it now seen it new, and the mindset of oh, I'm gonna wait for the big prize versus chip away at it every month or every year. And, you know, now we have the courage. This is again, not my not because I did it's because of Vivian, of developing in Mexico. And that thing is going to not only create a lot of wealth for us, it'll create a community, it will create a mindset and a behavior and a discipline, it's required a lot of discipline. And frankly, we've we've learned a lot and made a lot of almost mistakes. But I think, again, knowing what I know now listening to you and thinking about how you think, like, you are so curious, you're just willing to jump in and put the work in, that you're in, you know, you're fearless. That's another one of your greatest qualities. So I did a lot of talk in there. But okay, back to you. Well, I mean, Krisstina Wise listen to what you're saying. When you know your number. And that number becomes a strategy, then everything in the realm of investing is all part of that strategy to hit that number. And it becomes a business in and of itself. So you have your business business, you treat your household, like a business I teach you run, you run a household, Mike Koenigs brilliant, I've never seen anyone, like Krisstina Wise the profit versus the pay yourself model where you're taking a profit off this off the top is that 100,000, whatever it is, and that's what you invest. And then you look at your investments, it's your business. And the game is, is that it's so funny, like you don't even know this happens until it happens. But at first, you know, all the time is in the business. It's lopsided, especially when you're younger and earlier in your career and doing these things. And what's amazing, it's like, and it takes 80 hours a week or whatever you're doing, especially the beginnings and all that, then all of a sudden, there's this tipping point where your assets start getting closer equally in the amount of money that you make in your business for most small business entrepreneurs, that your assets take an hour a week to make the same amount of money. And that's where it's like this aha moments, like, over here, like even on a slow week, we're putting in 40 hours as a business owner. Yeah, I mean, that's, that's a low week, if you're only putting 40 hours in and this is a career of this when we're another managing people and putting money and making payroll and all the stress and time away from the family, even if we love it. Yeah. So that's what's amazing all this time risk, capital, over investing, reinvesting. And that's what entrepreneurs do. They put all the money they make, and they reinvest it back in the business to grow the business. So there is no divert diversification whatsoever. For all of a sudden, over here now your money's been working in the brick comes a day where it matches the income from your business at a fraction of the time. Yeah, it's like, that's where it becomes so obvious. It's like money is the best employee money is the best business. It just gives you money now does it take some management, if you're going to build a $10 million net worth usually like you have to spend some time and spend some time there and a half strategy and review your numbers and look at your assets and and make some switches? But I'm no rocket scientists and you know, I'm no a hedge fund manager. And I've done okay with my very simple brain. So I'm just saying anybody can manage assets to a place to create a $10 million net worth if you ask me to make a billion dollars Probably not that's beyond this body and brain's capacity. But 10 million is possible for everyone 10 or 20 million, it's not hard, it doesn't take some level of investor savvy sophistication to do it. You just have to have a plan and a strategy, and you have to be intentional. And you need to treat it like a little mini business. But it is the best business. Because like I said, it pays. And it doesn't take a lot of time. So now to manage the assets and do the things and stuff. It's super fun. Money keeps growing, it keeps building and compounding My business is so much harder to keep the same amount of income coming in. Right. So that's, that's what we're not realizing is that's what we're giving up by reinvesting everything back in the business. And maybe one day it will sell. But I'm like worst case, at least go ahead and build your portfolio to hit these numbers. And if you can still sell your business, but even selling your business, you're gonna have to put that money somewhere and put it to work. So I've sold businesses before I've been you know, I've been an entrepreneur, I've built so many businesses, and I've had a couple decent sells, you know, small sales. But that was money. It's like, oh, I took that little thing I built there created some some enterprise value sold it. Now I took that and I put that back money back in the portfolio, and it just expedited how fast I could grow it. Because I'm very intentional about growing that, that nest egg that portfolio. So that's where it's just it's a mind shift where we want to move just so much intention off the business. And at least take out a little piece of our mental real estate and time real estate there and put it over to having a desire to build this portfolio. And once you have the desire, I can teach everybody the basics again. It's so simple. Everybody has worked with me. I haven't had anybody yet that hasn't worked with me. They said, Krisstina, you're telling me I've been putting this off my entire life terrified thinking I couldn't do it in at all. Is this simple? I'm like, yeah, yeah. Because it's one big rigged system out there this trying to make it seem really complicated. So people can keep taking your money. Because nobody wants anybody to know that it actually is this easy. Yeah. So it just takes a little bit of time investment and learning investment to create this literacy that we can use to actually build a net worth. Mike Koenigs Looks good. Well, I wanted to do two things right now. One is I want to tell everyone where to go to get the how much money is enough worksheet and the pie chart. So that set first of all, wise money method.com/free Okay, there's some goodies there. And if you want to see Krisstina’s systems, which is wise money, method.com/shop there's a link on the website as well. But I want you to describe your business because yes, I know, it's hard like running and growing a business is never easy. But I think Mike Koenigs you've got a really cool business because you've got two core, what's three offerings you've got work on the personal side. So it's think right about your money and growing your wealth side, there's think right about your business. So you got one for personal one for business. But you also have to do the one on one where people get to spend basically a weekend with you and just do this all at once with you. First of all, I love the business model, because it's simple, and it's elegant. And also I've met your customers have interviewed them and talk to him because I wanted to really understand it. But what can you tell us about the kerb system and that part of the business just so people have a good sense of what it's like to work with you and what they get. Krisstina Wise Yeah, so kerbs is, it's an acronym, but basically that's the framework that I teach. And curb stands for something it's understand categories of money, and each money needs a job. It's uncover you stands for uncover which it's uncovering our behaviors, our mindsets and covering where the money's going, where it's not going and covering our gaps and covering how much is enough. So it's really uncovering what I say get to know your numbers and covering your numbers. R stands for ratio, like I said, like wealth is created the margin, and it's understand what is that ratio? What does that profit first? How much do I need to pay myself to build my future self nest egg and that that financial independence portfolio number that I want to want to grow towards and so in no the ratios and so it's understanding that there's actually a formula that we can follow to know how much money you start putting away. And then B stands for buckets. And as to with these different categories, money needs to be in separate places we need to give it just we need to separate it move it. So this money here is for this this money, there's for that this money over here is for that. And so that's what curbs is. This is very prescriptive money management cash flow system to make sure money is moving and has the velocity and we're setting it up to grow in these different categories. So that's what curves stands for and why it has an acronym. And it's funny like that curves doesn't have any meaning to it, but it's fun. and through it. Mike Koenigs The first time I heard I was just a terrible name until I had to sit through it and see the elegance of the system. And, you know, I, I knew you a long time before I got to dive into your systems and see like, I remember looking at going, God, damn, this is brilliant stuff and like, you didn't come across as being this systematic mindset he person like I could, I didn't know how to decode you until I understood more about what you'd accomplished. You're like, You're not an easy nut to crack. Honestly, that was likable immediately. You know what I was like? What I just I did not get it until I dug in and saw the elegance. Okay, how about the the working with you part of the show, because that's something that again, I think is brilliant. And you and I are alike on that. I think getting in and getting your hands dirty with real people is what sharpens everyone's blade. It's so fun to just work face to face one on one, you'll I learn more and get more out of doing that than the other person's the way I feel even though they say exactly the opposite. But once you talk about your experience, yeah, Krisstina Wise sure. So I really have three offers. And one, like you said, it's a one to one. And that's a weekend. And this is for those where there's more money than there's time. And we just want to get everything that I don't I teach done in a weekend. So that's my one to one, I only work with kind of a half a dozen people a year for that offer. And nobody just reach out to me if you want to do everything that I teach pretty much every weekend, but we get all of your finances set up, we we know your net worth number, we know all your gaps, we get your financial system set up, we get all your bucket set up, we get your QuickBooks Online set, like everything's done for you over the weekend, but you get very intimate with your numbers with the system. And then I have my entire financial team that will help make sure that we have everybody help you keep that going. It's like having the Coach and Trainer after you've put on your all your muscle mass to make sure you keep and stay on track. Mike Koenigs Yep, so I have a link to that too. It's wise money method.com/start. Krisstina Wise So that's, that's just the one to one. For those that want to do it over a longer period of time. There's there's money. Like I said, wealth is created in the household, not very few entrepreneurs pay attention to their money in the household other than paying their bills. Yep. So this is what I call curbs for household, which is the personal finance piece and understanding how much money to run through your household. How much money do we need to pay ourselves, setting up these different buckets, doing all the things that I teach, but it's really getting, it's to understand how to manage your money, according to these wealth numbers that you create. And we get all that set up systematically. And that's in a 12 week class and program and people go through as a class. And then business finance. So again, I work with so many entrepreneurs, they're working really hard, but they don't run a profit and loss. They don't understand the balance sheet. They're just spending money and reinvesting in the business. They have no metrics, they have no KPIs they're not and see what money is, especially in business. It's a mirror, it tells us what's working, it tells us what's not working, there's a certain amount of money we need to set up buckets in our business. One of those is an investment reinvestment, but bucket back into the business, we need to do a profit for system to make sure we're paying ourselves. But again, a lot of entrepreneurs love making money and they're, they're putting out fires and doing the things but they don't understand money. And ultimately, they're burning way too much. They're keeping way too little. My business owners I work with We usually bring six figures the bottom line just within a few weeks, because it's understanding how to look at the money and seeing where it's not where they're losing it where it's just being burned and not paying attention to Yeah, so that's the business class then there's the household class and then the one on one. Mike Koenigs Yeah, and it really comes down to it isn't just a system it's a whole bunch of very fascinating psychology that is non obvious. And again, as I listen to you I don't know how I'd interpret this interview if I didn't know you and I if I hadn't set through your classes if I hadn't spoken with your clients and customers because Mike Koenigs on one hand it's so simple it's but it's so elegant. And it there's a lot of uncommon thinking woven into it and that would be my message to you watching or listening right now. Just head on over just at least grab Krisstina’s tools like the you know the how much is enough worksheet. She's got a bunch of videos, she's got a really good podcast, a lot of great content if you want to do one of our classes. It's really worth it. It's really smart. I have some very close friends who one of which comes to mind. Very wealthy individual have really succeeded. And she told me, she learned so much. And it changed her mindset throughout. And then if you've got the inkling to work one on one head on over to wise many method.com/start. And so anything else that we should talk about before I let you go? Krisstina Wise I don't think so I just think, you know, what's funny is that in business, we talk money all the time, right? Like, let's five figure business exterior business, seven figure business, eight figure business, we throw, we throw millions around like nothing. And so it just becomes this kind of a pragmatic conversation like, Hey, what's your revenue, and here's my revenue and increasing your revenue. And maybe we'll talk about profit profits not talked about enough. But yeah, it's usually to revenue focused. But again, no big deal to talk for around this money, word in business. But once money goes to household, now, it's personal. So the work that I do, I do the personal side, that's where the emotion is. That's where I'm hearing the stories every day when I'm on the phone. Like, Mike Koenigs what's the it's the shame of a lack of wealth for high net worth, like you say, high income always broke? Is that Krisstina Wise high income broke people. Yeah, so the high income broke, means we may be having a lot of success and status in our business and faces, you know, can be very influencer. And I get behind the scenes stories of in household, the shame, the guilt, the fact that, you know, they had to put more money in the business the the mounds of debt that have been just adding up over time to so much debt. You know, the truth like the true behind the scenes behind the curtain is that arguments with the spouses, the fear, the you know, the reality even though things look great in the business. So that's again, that's where we want to clean things up. And like you said, so much of it is mindset in psychology, it is the behaviors and the feelings. And so what I say is, for anyone listening, we work so hard in our business, and it's to understand money is a mindset, but money is a skill, like it's knowledge, as we're illiterate, when it comes to money. We don't understand it, even though we're great at making it it's it stands to reason that we're good with money all together. It's like, no, there's something to learn. There's something to do. So if there's any financial stress, or fear or uncertainty, when it comes around money. It's easy to fix. And that's what I do I help people fix their money. Mike Koenigs Yeah. Well, in the org, I'll add one more thing. This is a good shameless plug for you, that I really like about you is for anyone who's got an audience and you want to bring in an entertaining and engaging, thoughtful, emotional, Female Speaker, okay, because great, finding great talent, who are engaging is always difficult for someone, you have something very complimentary to any business. We're talking today, one of the things that we're doing is we're reaching out to someone I know in the financial business, who it makes sense to bring you in because the best there's, there's two ways to create retention in a business. One of them is make sure your customers are alive and healthy. And the other one is make sure they can continue to afford you. Okay, they're going to be grateful. So bring in Krisstina as a speaker, and as an entertainer in a high engager. That will create an enormous amount of loyalty to you. How's that? Where did they go to to engage with you? Just to talk to you as a speaker? Glad I remember that. Krisstina Wise Yeah, exactly. That's a good thing. I mean, for everybody listening here. Yeah, I would just say to to email me. Yep. Probably the best thing to do, which is just Krisstina krisstina.com. That's a que and two s's like kiss. Mike Koenigs You got krisstina.com? K r i s s t i n a? No kidding. Good job. All right. Well, I'll put that in the liner notes as well. That was fantastic. Okay, well, let's wrap this thing up. I want to thank you. I adore you. I love you. You're one of my favorite people on the planet. And All right, good. And few few kids at home, you know what to do, head on over to Krisstina’s website, engage with her, I guarantee you're just not going to regret it. And more importantly, you're going to make a really good long term friend on top of it, someone who's going to be there for you and evolve with you because she's always growing, evolving and engaged in something that will be complimentary to you and your life as well follow her on all of our channels and podcasts too. So with that, this is capability amplifier. If you've enjoyed this, make sure you share it with your spouse, someone you care about because money matters. Where are the biggest arguments? What's the biggest cause of divorce? What causes the biggest problems in your business relationships? I guarantee it's this and This is a great way to fix and heal that wound as well and get you and your spouse on the same page. So with that, thank you so much for listening, watching and make sure you star share, et cetera, et cetera. Thank you. I'll see in the next episode. Let's say goodbye to everyone. Bye. Bye bye