10 things I learned after losing a lot of money | Dorothée Loorbach | TEDxMünster

Dorothée Loorbach used to be exceptionally successful in her job and earn a lot of money. And she spent even more, until she was broke, unable even to bake her little daughter a birthday cake. Dorothée Loorbach unmasks our relation to money and reveals her personal life-changing learnings from her six-month project of becoming financially carefree again.

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I used to be successful
according to society.

I had left a well-paid job in marketing
to become an entrepreneur.

And very soon, I could buy
anything I wanted -

not anything in the world, anything
I wanted, which was a lot still.

My impulse purchases
included a brand-new car and a house.

My entire life was just about fun,

and I can say I created
some amazing memories,

but it was just fun.

I wanted more. I wanted joy.

I wanted to do something that would last,
something that mattered.

So I started working with students,
and this was fantastic.

For the first time in my life,

people would come up to me and say,

"Thank you. You've changed my life."

And that was so valuable to me

that I would do it
for just a little bit of money

if they wouldn't pay me enough.

I would even do it for free - a lot -

until I reached a point

where even a small financial setback
could ruin me as an entrepreneur.

And of course, it did.

In the middle of summer of 2016,
when all schools are closed

and I wouldn't have any income
for another two months or so,

I received five envelopes
at the same time from the tax services,

demanding that I pay for my glory days,

immediately.

This cost me everything I had:
all my savings, all the money that I had.

And all I had left in an instant

was just a few coins that I found
between the cushions of the sofa

and in my coat pockets and in my car

and 3 euros and 97 cents in the bank.

Two days later,

my daughter would come back
from staying with her father.

She would come back on her birthday.

And I couldn't afford to bake her a cake.

What I wanted to do
was just to crawl into bed and cry -

which I don't like -

and just hide under the covers
until it would all just go away.

But I couldn't.

I didn't have time because I only had
48 hours to prove to myself

that I was better than this,

that I was a good mother.

So what I did was the most terrifying
and the most embarrassing thing

I've ever done in my life:

I decided to expose myself
publicly as a failure.

And I thought that the best place
to start would be rock bottom.

So I gave away my last bit of money,
and then I had absolutely nothing.

And then the only way was up.

I called it "the money project."

I published a video on Facebook,

stating that I had failed gloriously
as an entrepreneur;

that I was totally broke;

and that I was determined
to change my situation,

to learn anything I could about
entrepreneurship and business, money,

and enhance my financial intelligence;

and that I was determined
to become free of financial stress

within six months,

and to go from nothing to a fortune -

or at least discover
what the secret to doing that was -

and to become a successful entrepreneur.

And I would write a book about it.

And this book I would sell right away
for 10 euros a copy.

And that day, I didn't dare look
at the responses on my timeline,

because this was quite scary.

But that first day, I sold 64 books.

And I had a fortune.

Until this day, I've never felt
more rich in my entire life,

because this meant
I could now bake a birthday cake

and she could have a proper birthday,

which she did.

And then I read.

I've flogged. I blogged. I interviewed.

I learned anything I could.

And I succeeded.

Within six months,
I was free of financial stress,

and I could say that I was
a successful entrepreneur.

And all this time,

I had been thinking
that this money project -

what I called it -

was about money, of course, and business,

but deep down, it was about
something completely different:

it was about value and about life.

And I will share with you
what I learned about life.

Lesson number one: Money is important.

Quite a cliche. (Laughs)

But I was raised in a way
to believe that money is not important.

And I inherited this conviction somehow -
I can't blame anyone in particular -

but somehow it planted
a conviction in my head

that people with money
are not nice people.

So when I had money,
I would spend it as soon as I could.

And then when I found my purpose,
working with students,

I just didn't ask for it.

I didn't care.

I just wanted to change the world,

which I had no impact on whatsoever
with 3 euros and 97 cents.

And I also learned that money
doesn't make you a bad person.

It just makes you more of who you are.

So if you're a jerk with a lot of money,

you're probably a jerk
when you're broke as well.

And if I would have more money,
I would simply give more.

But if I have to worry
about money every day, all day,

I can't even take care of myself,
and I have nothing to give.

Lesson number two: Money equals time.

As soon as we start working,
we start exchanging time for money,

which is a problem

because we can always make more money
but we can never make more time.

And I started to exchange my time
for far too little money.

I could barely survive.

And at the end of the month,

there was nothing ever left
to invest in my future.

So I would have to spend all my time
to make just a little bit of money.

I'd probably have to do that
for the rest of my life

because there was nothing left.

And for the rest of my life,

I would have given away the one thing
that means the very most to me,

which is time.

Time with my loved ones
and time for myself.

So I decided that it was time
that I value my time.

I would spend it more consciously.

And when it comes to work,

I would have to exchange it for more money

so I could spend less time working
and more time actually living.

Lesson number three: Money equals value.

It took me two years to discover
that the money project is not about money.

It's about value.

And I've always seen myself
as a confident person,

but I didn't value myself.

Because the way you treat yourself

is a reflection of the way
you see yourself.

And I'd been treating myself like crap,

which I found a terrible example
to set for my daughter.

So changing my rates wasn't enough.

I had to change the way I see myself.

I had to start seeing myself
as a person of value.

And that was not easily done.

It's a process,
and I'm still working on it.

So I still, on a regular basis,
I still have to remind myself,

"It's okay, you're worth every penny."

And even now I find it hard
to say this out loud.

I get a bit embarrassed,

so I'm still learning.

I have to keep practicing.

Lesson number four:
What people say doesn't matter.

"You're a cheap whore."

"You're a fraud."

"How can you do this to your child?"

Just a few of the comments
that I received.

The hateful ones were
on my timeline on Facebook.

But the quiet ones,
they hid safely in my inbox,

confessing only to me
that they had screwed up too,

that they too had found their purpose
and wanted to change the world

and worked really hard,
80 hours a week, just like me,

and barely surviving.

But no one could know.

So they didn't go public,

because they were too ashamed
to be a failure.

But they were very glad that I went public
and exposed myself as a failure

because now they could learn
from my mistakes.

And I was thankful that I could help them.

And I was also thankful for the haters,

whether it was the strangers
on my timeline

or even some of my own friends
talking badly about me behind my back.

Because they taught me
that nothing is ever personal,

not really.

What people say about you
and what people think about you -

it comes from their view of the world.

It's from their opinions and their values
and their experiences,

and maybe they're having a bad day,
or they're very insecure or unhappy.

It has nothing to do with you.

And the way other people treat you
is not a reflection of who you are.

It's a reflection of who they are.

So now when someone says
something hurtful to me,

it still hurts,

but not as much,

because I know it probably
has nothing to do with me.

Lesson number five:
What people say matters.

What people say matters most
when people is you.

Because a person

with the most opinions about you -

the person who talks to you the most -

is you,

and you tend to believe yourself, right?

So be kind.

A few days into the project,
I asked my daughter,

"How do our money worries make you feel?"

And she said,

"We don't have money worries.

We just have less money
than most people."

(Laughter)

And then I realized
that until that moment,

I had been saying to myself,
on a regular basis,

"You're such a failure."

And then I realized,
because of my daughter,

that kind of thinking was not going to do
my circumstances any good.

And that's what they are - circumstances.

They don't define you.

Your response to them does.

And my response was to be kind to myself,

to say to myself,

"You'll be OK.

You can do this."

And then whatever it took, I would do it.

Lesson number six: It's really simple.

I learned so much about business
and entrepreneurship;

and compounding,
investing, entrepreneurship;

about scalability, our rates, sales,

low-hanging fruit, runway,
value propositions.

But to be honest, everything I learned,
I could have learned from my grandmother.

Because the essence is this:

spend less,

earn more,

invest wisely

and, most of all, value yourself.

But simple is not always easy.

Let me ask you a question.

Who makes more money today
than you did at your very first job?

That's quite a lot of people. OK.

Be ready: there's another question.

Be honest -

I promise I won't tell anyone -

but be honest.

Who still, at the end of the month,
sometimes is out of money?

Or a lot of times, maybe?

Yeah, it's quite a lot, huh?

OK, you're not alone.

And this is why:
it's called "Parkinson's Law."

Your expenses will always rise
to match your income.

This is why most people retire poor,

and why lottery winners

tend to end up with less money
a few years after they won

than they had before.

And about a year after I started
the money project,

I was earning a lot of money.

I was doing well,

but still, I didn't really have
anything left at the end of the month.

And I realized that
when it comes to spending,

I'm a 12-year-old.

So I should treat myself accordingly.

So, now, I hardly have
any access to my money.

As soon as money comes in,

most of it goes straight
to accounts that I cannot touch.

And I will probably have to do this
for the rest of my life,

and I don't care.

Because if there's one thing
that I learned from this project

is I can't afford to be poor.

Lesson number eight: Being broke sucks.

It does.

Two years ago, my entire life was urgent -

everything was urgent.

I had to be a full-time problem solver,
which is both exhausting and impossible.

It's a catch-22.

Because scarcity captures the mind.

Research shows

that when all you can think about,
and that was the case for me,

when all you can think about is

How do I get food on the table tonight?

How do I get money today? -

that takes up all of your thinking space.

There's no room left to solve anything
for tomorrow or next week

or to make a change next year.

You're stuck in the situation.

And my situation was that my brain
felt like a ticking time bomb.

I can still today hear the sound
of the bills dropping on my doormat,

and it still freaks me out.

And day and night,
I felt this blind panic.

I couldn't breathe.

There was no way out.

I was suffocating.

So the first thing and the only thing
that I could do was breathe.

(Exhale)

I freed my mind, and I made a decision

that I was going to be successful
in the direction of my purpose.

I found my focus.

I stopped sabotaging myself.

And I became successful.

Lesson nine: Stay broke.

Epictetus said, a very long time ago,

"Wealth consists not
in having great possessions,

but in having few wants."

The paradox is that
the more money you have,

the more silence and no Wi-Fi
become a luxury.

It's ridiculous how much money
rich people - money-wise rich people -

spend on going somewhere quiet.

When I had nothing, all I could afford
was to go somewhere quiet,

to just sit still or read a book
or go outside or go for run,

play with my child.

And in those moments,

I found my most profound
moments of happiness.

I learned that my daughter
doesn't need any money

or expensive gifts or fancy trips.

All she wants, really,

is a few moments a day
of my undivided attention.

And all I really want
is to be present in my own life.

So now that I have money,

(Laughs)

I choose to live as if I'm broke.

And without the worries,

I can finally say:

Money is not important.

(Applause)