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You know, when I was a kid, I never imagined that a silly “yo mama” joke from my friends would completely change the trajectory of my life. But that’s exactly what happened. Growing up, I watched my immigrant parents sacrifice everything to make ends meet – cutting coupons, buying oversized clothes I could grow into, avoiding any branded items.
I was embarrassed at the time, ashamed of not having the trendy American Eagle shirts all the cool kids wore. But that night when someone poked fun at my ill-fitting, unstylish clothes, something shifted inside me. I made a vow that one day, no matter what it took, I would be rich. I would buy anything and everything I ever wanted.
At the time, I was worried how to make your first 100k seemed like an impossible fortune. But I was determined. What followed was years of relentless hustling – from silly clothing businesses in high school to flipping phones and tablets, applying for every opportunity under the sun. My journey took me from crashing failures to unexpected wins, and eventually across major mindset shifts that allowed me to quadruple that original $100K goal.
Earning six figures like $100K in your 20s is an incredible achievement that many people dream of. It represents financial freedom, stability, and the ability to afford a comfortable lifestyle. For someone who grew up watching their parents struggle to reach this milestone at such a young age is even more meaningful and satisfying.
This is the story of how a broke kid from an immigrant family soared past their wildest dreams to achieve real wealth – all by their 20s. It’s a testimony to the power of reframing your mindset, embracing risks, and taking real control over your future. If you’re ready for some real talk and tangible strategies, keep reading…
Table of Contents
The Early Hustle
A. Starting a Clothing Business in High School
At the time, I thought $100,000 was filthy rich, so I set that as my initial goal. In 2011, I took the first step toward the vow by starting an ambitious clothing business, despite the designs looking amateurish ( like a blind six-year-old made them in Microsoft Word). To my surprise, people actually bought the products, teaching very valuable lessons, about reinvesting profits and fueling their drive to make more money.
B. Flipping Phones, Computers, and Tablets
With the profits from the clothing venture, the resourceful author began buying and reselling (or “flipping”) phones, computers, tablets – anything they could get their “greedy paws” on. This side hustle allowed them to continue building their wealth and savings.
C. Applying for Every Opportunity and Internship
Determined to achieve my goal, I applied relentlessly for every available job, internship, and opportunity I could find, even going so far as to apply for positions outside the United States. After countless rejections, I finally landed a pivotal internship at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. This particular experience exposed me to people with stable, white-collar careers and incomes far beyond what I have ever had imagined. It also taught the importance of being “a sponge” and absorbing as much knowledge as possible from those they aspired to become.
The tireless early hustle, driven by the vow to overcome financial hardship and achieve wealth, laid the crucial groundwork for future successes. Through entrepreneurial grit, a willingness to take on any opportunity, and a drive to learn from every experience, I methodically built mine net worth, edging ever closer to their ambitious $100,000 goal.
The College Years
A. Saving $15,000 from High School Earnings
By the end of high school, I had saved around $15,000 from all my hustling and side gigs. Even though I had promised myself to buy nice things once I made money, it didn’t feel right spending it on myself after seeing how much my parents had sacrificed for me. So I decided to save that money for college, knowing my parents wouldn’t be able to afford it.
B. Awarded a Full Scholarship to Vanderbilt University
Then the most unexpected thing happened – I was awarded a full scholarship to Vanderbilt University! After all those applications and interviews for college scholarships, I was blessed to receive this incredible opportunity. When I told my parents the news, they were so proud because it meant all their sacrifices were worth it. My mom even said this cute Korean phrase, “Keep going, keep fighting.”
C. Multiple Side Hustles and Entrepreneurial Ventures
In 2013, I went to college with the goal of absorbing everything I could from the people I aspired to become. I applied for tons of summer internships while also working at the library for minimum wage. I started a photography gig, managed social media brands – anything I could do to keep making money and stay true to the $100,000 promise I made myself.
My most ambitious project was creating an app inspired by Yik Yak. After months of hard work, I brought it to the local entrepreneurship center for feedback. But what one of the advisors said completely crushed me – he basically called it the stupidest thing he’d ever seen.
D. The App Idea Rejection and Its Impact
Around this time, job applications kept coming back as rejections, and my grades were suffering because I was so focused on my side hustles. I was incredibly discouraged – my entrepreneurial drive was completely extinguished. I stopped everything I was doing and just focused on my studies.
The Pivotal Mentor Encounter
A. The Local Startup Executive’s Advice
Then one day, an executive from a local startup finally got back to me about grabbing coffee. Even though the timing was bad with an upcoming exam, I’m so glad I made time for that meeting. I told him about all my rejections and struggles, and his advice was invaluable. He said, “It doesn’t matter if you fail 100 times or 1,000 times, all it takes is one success to forget about all your past failures.”
B. The Power of Perseverance: “It Only Takes One Success”
Those words stuck with me – the idea that persevering through endless failures is worth it because you only need that one breakthrough success. It gave me a much-needed perspective shift during those difficult college years filled with rejections and setbacks. If I had given up then, I never would have achieved my goals later on.
The college years were a rollercoaster – going from the highs of scholarships and ambitious side projects to the lows of brutal rejections and crushed ideas. But key encounters like the startup mentor’s advice kept me persevering. Their wisdom about persisting through failure proved invaluable as I continued chasing my dreams of building wealth.
The $100,000 Milestone
A. Reaching the Goal in August 2019
After years of hustling and grinding through various side gigs and entrepreneurial ventures, I finally reached my goal of earning $100,000 in August 2019. When I first saw that six-figure number in my account, it was an overwhelming rush of emotions. I flashed back to that night in high school when a hurtful joke about my insecurity sparked this entire journey.
B. The Emotional Rush and Sense of Accomplishment
In that moment, I felt an immense sense of pride and accomplishment. All the sacrifices, failures, and uncertainties I had encountered along the way seemed worth it. I couldn’t help but think that my younger self would be happy and proud to see what I had become after relentlessly chasing this dream for so many years.
C. Key Strategies that Contributed to the Milestone
Looking back, there were several key strategies and revenue streams that enabled me to achieve this $100,000 milestone:
1. Become a Remote Sales Representative
One effective way to earn a substantial income is by becoming a remote sales rep. With the right skills, which can be learned relatively quickly, you can make over $100,000 a year through commission-based sales roles. Some of my own sales reps were earning $5,000 a month within just 5 weeks of starting with zero experience.
2. Flip Sneakers
The world of sneaker reselling is incredibly lucrative if you can educate yourself on it. By securing in-demand sneakers at retail prices and reselling them for markups of 20-30% or more, you can generate significant profits, even with models that may not be considered “hype” releases.
3. Start a YouTube Channel
While not everyone has the “it factor” needed for YouTube success, those who do can earn a remarkable income. With the right content and following, you can make $80,000 to $100,000 per month from AdSense alone, not to mention potential sponsorship deals worth over $1 million annually.
4. Drop shipping
Drop shipping, which involves marketing products online and having a third party handle delivery, can be a viable business model, especially when leveraging free traffic sources like TikTok. While profit margins may be slim, the low overhead makes it possible to earn $100,000 with the right winning product.
5. Create and Sell Online Courses
If you’re highly knowledgeable about a particular topic, creating and selling online courses can be extremely lucrative. However, it’s a challenging business that requires not only creating a high-quality program but also effective marketing to attract students.
6. Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing involves promoting products or services and earning a commission on any sales you facilitate. With the right brand presence or by leveraging free traffic sources like TikTok, you can potentially earn $100,000 or more per month through affiliate marketing.
7. Become a High-Impact Video Editor
As video marketing continues to surge in importance, skilled video editors who can demonstrate a measurable impact on metrics like watch time and retention are in high demand. By attaching yourself to the booming creator economy, you can earn a substantial income as a high-impact video editor.
These diverse strategies, combined with an unwavering determination to succeed, were instrumental in helping me finally cross that $100,000 threshold – a milestone that had once seemed like an unattainable dream.
The Three Key Mindset Shifts
A. Expanding Goals Beyond the $100,000 Limit
1. The Power of Aspirational Thinking
After hitting my initial $100,000 goal, I realized the biggest mistake I had made was setting that arbitrary number in the first place. By doing so, I had unconsciously limited myself and created a mental upper limit. However, once I expanded my goals to be bigger and more aspirational, it was like putting on a new pair of eyeglasses that allowed me to see opportunities for even greater wealth and success.
2. Seeing New Opportunities
With this shift in mindset, aiming higher than I ever thought possible, new pathways started to reveal themselves. Opportunities that I hadn’t noticed before became visible. While fear and doubt still crept in about such lofty goals, I knew my mind was simply a muscle that needed training to get comfortable operating outside my previous comfort zone.
B. Embracing Failure as a Learning Opportunity
1. The Importance of Developing Skills
Before I could successfully adopt this aspirational mindset, I had to reframe my perspective on failure. Our society conditions us to fear and avoid failure at all costs. However, by speaking with many successful entrepreneurs, I realized they all welcomed failure because they understood a core truth – the more you fail, the more you learn and develop valuable skills.
2. The Ability to Recover from Setbacks
Even if you lose all your money tomorrow, the skills you’ve developed act as a floor, a foundational capability that allows you to recover and rebuild. Since we’re paid based on our skills and abilities, nurturing that core skillset ensures you can always bounce back from setbacks or lost fortunes. Failure is inevitable when attempting something new, but it’s also the path to growth.
C. Cultivating a Sense of Control Over One’s Future
1. Breaking the Chain of Poverty
From a young age, having to navigate situations and translate for my non-English speaking immigrant parents instilled in me a sense of control that many people lack. Where others see obstacles like coming from a poor family as insurmountable barriers to wealth, I recognized that nothing would change unless someone stepped up to face those challenges head-on.
2. Overcoming Mental Obstacles
The harsh reality is that if you do nothing, your circumstances will remain stagnant. Mental obstacles like “Because my family is poor, it’s extremely hard to get rich” are just excuses that keep you stuck in the same cycle. But you have the power to be the one that breaks that chain of poverty by taking action and responsibility for your future.
Adopting these three mindset shifts – expanding aspirational goals, embracing failure, and cultivating a sense of control – were pivotal in enabling me to not just achieve my initial $100,000 milestone, but to continually reset my sights higher. With the right mindset and determination, any goal can be attained.
The Quadrupling of Net Worth to $400,000
A. Continuing to Implement the Successful Strategies
After reaching the $100,000 milestone in August 2019, I didn’t just rest on my laurels. I continued implementing the same revenue streams and entrepreneurial strategies that had proven successful – being a remote sales rep, flipping sneakers, running a YouTube channel, drop shipping, creating online courses, affiliate marketing, and offering high-impact video editing services.
B. The Impact of the Mindset Shifts
However, the real game-changer was the shift in my mindset that accompanied achieving that initial six-figure goal. By expanding my aspirations beyond the $100,000 limit, embracing failure as a learning opportunity, and cultivating a deep sense of control over my own future, new doors began to open.
C. New Opportunities and Ventures Pursued
Within just a few months of hitting $100,000, I had quadrupled my net worth to an astonishing $400,000! This exponential growth was made possible by relentlessly pursuing the bigger, bolder opportunities that my aspirational mindset allowed me to see. I took on new entrepreneurial ventures, negotiated more lucrative deals, and doubled down on the revenue streams showing the most potential.
While the specific strategies that comprised my multiple income flows evolved over time, the core principles remained constant – constantly learning new skills, persistently taking action, leveraging my strengths, and continually resetting my goals higher. My mindset transformation empowered me to think bigger, fail more bravely, and maintain unwavering belief in my ability to shape my own reality.
The quadrupling of my net worth to $400,000 in such a short span of time was the clearest validation that my mindset shifts had allowed me to shatter my self-imposed limitations. What once seemed like an unattainable pipe dream was now a reality, and the first of many wealth milestones yet to come.
Conclusion On How To Make Your First 100K dollars
A. Recap of the Journey and Mindset Shifts
We’ve covered a lot of ground, from my humble beginnings as the child of struggling immigrants to the years of nonstop hustle and grind to hit that first $100,000 goal. We explored the key strategies that contributed to that milestone, like sales rep roles, sneaker reselling, YouTube success, drop shipping, online courses, affiliate marketing, and high-impact video editing.
But the real game-changers were the three pivotal mindset shifts that allowed me to quadruple that initial six-figure net worth in just a few short months:
- Expanding my goals far beyond that arbitrary $100,000 limit and training myself to think in a bigger, more aspirational way.
- Embracing failure as a learning opportunity instead of fearing it, understanding that skills are the true currency that allow you to bounce back stronger.
- Cultivating a deep sense of control over my future and breaking free of mental obstacles and poverty mindsets.
B. The Potential for Achieving Even Greater Financial Success
My journey from a broke kid to a $400,000 net worth by my 20s is just the beginning. With the right mindset shifts, any goal is attainable – whether that’s becoming a millionaire, achieving financial freedom, or leaving a legacy of generational wealth.
The strategies and principles that fueled my exponential growth are available to anyone who’s ready to adopt them. It’s about constantly evolving, developing new skills, taking calculated risks, and believing you have what it takes to shape your reality.
C. Teaser for Additional Resources
Of course, this new aspirational thinking isn’t just a mindset, it’s a whole lifestyle shift. That’s why I’ve put together additional resources to help anyone who’s seriously committed to achieving wealth and success way beyond what you ever thought possible. My video on the “6 Reasons You’re Broke” dives deep into breaking free of the mental barriers and money blocks that keep most people stuck.
If you’re ready to start thinking bigger, bolder, and wealthier, that’s just the first step. Because once you’ve adopted the right mindset, you’ll see that your journey of exponential growth has really just begun.
