I was given nothing, ever. Nor did I have any artificial network of help. I learned very early that I was a very, very good salesman. Rather than use that to sell things, I turned it into selling business deals. At 22 years old, I talked a guy into putting up the land (in St. Augustine Beach, FL) for a RE dev't I wanted to do. I talked an engineer into taking a small % of the upside to do the project engineering work. I talked a contractor into taking a small piece to put in some roads, etc, etc. I then sold out my first real estate development.
For the next 15 years, I bought and sold real estate developments .. typically risking everything, everytime. I had the confidence that I could sell my way out of any problem I got myself into.
There's an old story known as 'Nail Soup.' That story epitomizes how I got my start.
(No offense taken, btw)
Thanks for the reply and you don't have to explain yourself to me or anyone else for that matter, but thanks again for the reply.
I just grow concerned about the middle class. In my experience, I've interacted with a lot of different people from lower-middle class to upper class families and here are my observations.
Growing up in West Valley City, most people are blue collar, they work hard, but their view of the world is myopic. It seems like no one really knew what was possible. About half my graduating class was either first or second generation Mexican or Polynesian and success to them (I include all races in this statement) was sports related or staying out of trouble. I never really thought much about college-- and graduate school, to me, was always something that would never happen because my parents couldn't afford it.
Fast forward to Utah State University, most kids were from the east side, Park City, or locals in the Cache Valley area. Most of them were white and mormon and had really solid families. The difference between the average person at Utah State University and the average person from Granger High is immense. Granger is mostly brown, there were a lot of fights (11 in my first week of school) not overly mormon and getting stuff stolen or getting intimidated by a tongan dude or drugs or whatever was not uncommon. At Utah State, most experiences revolve around the church and being overall a wholesome individual. It's annoying, really. Still, even though USU has people that are from solid families and are white and mormon, it's not really all that smug or rich. Kids generally come from parents that are white collar but nothing audacious.
At Texas A&M and especially in my graduate department it's on a whole other level. Virtually every student in my department is either the offspring of a wealthy lawyer or doctor or business person. I taught a kid in one of my courses who's father is one of a few billionaires in Dallas. This is where the difference became very clear to me. The kids that are raised in areas like Plano or Clear Lake, gated communities that are essentially archipelagos of the wealthy, know exactly how to navigate through life. From the minute they are pulled from the womb, parents are conditioning their children to be active, to think critically, and to challenge the status quo. For better or worse, they're never satisfied. When they arrive at college their ACT test scores are 30 plus and their grades are >3.8. But here's the kicker, they're not really all that smart. Trust me, I grade their work.
The difference is just their attitude and their personality traits. You can tell who comes from wealthy families, and the contrast is stunning, really.
My point is not to disparage the wealthy, and in reality, I think I may have just corroborated how great they are, but I do want to point out that someone from a lower-class background has an unbelievably steep hill to climb if they ever want to reach the same levels as those who come from money. The system really is stacked against them, and not for reasons inherent to the system, rather, these kids are just not trained at equivalent levels that rich kids are.
At Granger, we were told all the same things that everyone else was, "you work hard, you'll make it". I had a physics teacher that made a fortune in the oil and gas business who would always tell us what opportunities there were for us out there and that there is a whole big world out there. But as I look back on it, I understood what he was saying and I understood the logic, but I didn't
feel it. It seemed like that was something was just different than what was expected from me and that there were a lot of people out there that are a whole hell of a lot smarter than me. I don't think a lot of wealthy kids feel this way. They expect great things, they demand it. It's a part of the culture they are from and an advantage that most people from lower to middle class don't really have.
Fast forward 7 years and I'm finishing my master's degree working on geochemical properties of marine sediments at a tier 1 research institution. I meet daily with people from Stanford, MIT, Harvard, etc. I'm a genuinely hardworking guy, but it would be lie to say that I received no help at all. I was lucky to have loving parents who took care of me and genuinely had my best interests at heart. I received a full scholarship from Utah State, but my parents paid for my housing. I'm out at A&M and have a stipend and scholarships, but my dad still sends me 50 bucks here and there in the mail. I have no debt. When I compare that to what some of my buddies had at Granger, it's an abundance of riches.
So that's partly what I mean when I talk about background and I'm assuming just about everyone on this board that posts about receiving nothing in their life is not telling the whole truth, I hate to say it, but even moreso if you're from an upper-class family.
