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4 Reasons Why Your Parents Don’t Believe in You (and Only One of Them’s About Money)

David Kimbell
3 min readMar 15, 2022

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Got eye-opener of an email this week from an A-list copywriter.

About how his mom called him an Embarrassment To The Family.

She wanted him to get a proper job. He insisted on copywriting.

Familiar?

Justin Goff is an A-list copywriter.

Done incredibly well for himself.

Easily a decade of 6-figure turnover years, plus his own supplement company, flipped for $millions.

Sweet, eh? Must be nice?

Wasn’t always that way. 👇

When he graduated, he was offered a $45k/yr job with a recruitment firm.

But he was already making $100’s a month affiliate marketing. Figured there were bigger bucks where those came from. So he turned the job down.

Mom. Not happy.

And she got progressively madder as the months rolled by, her friends’ kids were holding down “proper jobs” and behaving respectably …

And HER kid was making $20–30k, just “wasting his life”.

HE WASN’T WASTING HIS LIFE …

He was figuring out how the game was played.

You only figure out the game by making mistakes.

And making pennies while your pals are making 10X or 100X.

NOW, of course, Mrs Goff’s changed her tune.

But don’t think our A-list copywriter has forgotten his mom screaming at him.

Never believing in her own son.

What do you think is going on here?

Several things:

1️⃣ Mom’s Got Screwed-Up Beliefs About Money

She thinks:

  • Rich people are assholes. (Most people do. It’s easier than facing your own failures square-on.)
  • Rich people are just lucky. And greedy.
  • “Money isn’t everything, y’know!” (Rich people never say this. They know it’s true. But they also know: Money isn’t nothing, either.)
  • Risk is always bad. A four-letter word. Avoid, avoid, avoid.
  • You HAVE to work hard to make money. That’s just life.

2️⃣ Mom’s Playing The Status Game

She’s comparing herself with her friends.

‘Cuz that’s what we all do. Don’t pretend it’s not true. Pecking order in the world, doncha know?

Moms whose kids have turned out well … get to brag more.

This is why every mom wants her kid to be a doctor or a lawyer.

MAXIMUM bragging rights.

3️⃣ Mom’s Insecure Like The Rest Of Us

Dads too. (I am one.)

Constantly worrying about our kids. Are we bad parents? Have we done a good job. Is my kid screwed up because I did … you know … way back when he was tiny?

Always on the lookout for reassurance.

If the kids have settled down, respectable jobs, kids of their own …

SIGH OF RELIEF

Even though we hated our parents’ expectations levied on us.

4️⃣ Mom Doesn’t Know The World Has Changed

New rules, new game. (They’re constantly changing.)

What worked when she was a kid …?

NOPE

Think she knows that?

Even if she does, d’you think she likes it? D’you think she accepts it?

So that’s why your folks struggle to believe in you and your hair-brained ideas

Cut them some slack. They mean well.

(Every few months, MY mom asks me the same question:

“Have you applied for a job with the govt yet?”

That’s her world. Stability, and bragging rights, in her world.)

But don’t YOU quit believing in yourself.

Don’t YOU quit believing that there’s a better way.

MORE money to be made, for LESS work, LESS time.

Peace out.

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David Kimbell

Curiosity. Questions. Simplicity. Principles. Meaning. The Vital Few, not the Trivial Many. Be your own Chief Questions Officer.