For the bulk of my life, I was optimizing my time to improve my skill set so that I could rent it to an employer at a premium. I thought to myself, if I am going to spend 8 hours a day working, I might as well get paid a lot for it. I would spend my time doing personal coding projects that were just challenging without any real-life application. I would check what skills the market needs and optimize for them. After a lot of work, I was able to market myself to employers and got a decent salary. However, in no time, I came to the realisation that this approach would never scale. I will always have these golden copper handcuffs. No matter what I do, I will never reach financial freedom. I will always have to exchange my time, my most important asset, for money.

Around the same time, I stumbled across Naval's writings and understood that I was doing it all wrong. I was optimizing for the wrong thing. I had been playing the wrong game. What I should be optimizing for is building my own personal wealth machine. I should be building something that will generate wealth for me while I sleep. I should be building something that will provide me with the freedom to do whatever I want, whenever I want to do it. I should be building something that will provide me with the security that I need. I should be building a wealth generation machine.

Nobody gets wealthy without a wealth generation machine. A wealth generation machine is an asset that you own that keeps appreciating with time. Unlike your income, it provides you long-term security, consistency, and freedom. You don't spend time operating the wealth machine, but you let it run while you eat, sleep, and travel.

Probably this isn't news to you, but it is always hard to execute. When we talk about wealth machines, we aren't talking about small boi stuff like investing in the low-cost ETF or leveraging all your past and future savings in a mortgage. We are talking about real wealth generation machines. Think Warren Buffett's investments or Zuck's Facebook.

The question becomes where to find or create these wealth-generating machines. I like three types of wealth generation machines. These are not the only ways to create wealth; there are others, but these are the ones I like.

1- Investments

Straight up, most people don't invest. When they invest, they invest in the most recommended investment of all time, the S&P 500. What most people don't realize is that you can literally invest in anything. But then people decide to follow the herd and take the easy way out. Yes, the S&P 500 returned 7% (adjusted for inflation) per year for the last 10 years. But when we are looking for a wealth generation machine, we are looking for way more. We are looking for Tesla in 2010 or Nvidia in 2022 or something better. Yes, there was something better that you could have invested in. Abercrombie & Fitch returned 600% from mid-2023 till mid-2024. That is a 6-bagger in under a year. That is the kind of investment we are looking for.

Investments don't necessarily need to be about investing money in a company. They can involve investing time for ownership. This works best when you are part of an early-stage startup. At this point, you have the opportunity to get a significant amount of equity in the company. Since you are part of a small company, you have the opportunity to make a significant impact on the company's success. Investing is my preferred way of building wealth-generating machines. I personally find it very enjoyable. However, if you are looking for some fame while building the machine, the next option is for you.

2- Media

We live in a world of media; attention right now is the most valuable currency. The moment you have an audience, you have the most competitive advantage a person can have. With this audience, you can understand their needs and create a product they like. You can easily market to them what you build. You can easily get feedback and improve your product. Even if you don't want to build something, hundreds of brands will be willing to partner with you to get access to your audience. The media wealth generation tool is very powerful, but it is not as powerful as the next machine.

3- Software

In my opinion, software is the most powerful wealth generation machine. It is the one with the most scale, the most leverage, and the most potential. With software, you can build a product that can be used by millions of people. Unlike media, you don't need to keep producing new content. Unlike investments, you don't need to keep up with the market. Software is the ultimate wealth generation machine. However, due to its sexiness, it is extremely competitive. This is why we need to be very careful when we are building a software product. Product-market fit is the key to success in software.

There is a sea of opportunities that has just opened up. With the rise of AI, new ideas will emerge. Think of how every domain in our lives will be disrupted—the opportunities are endless. In addition, building software has never been easier. There are so many tools that make it easy to build apps, websites, and more. You can now build a software product in a weekend.

The reason I started Pillow Payday blog is to document my journey in finding and building a wealth generation machine. This blog is an opportunity for you and me to think outside the box and find a wealth generation machine that nobody has found. We will be the first to find the opportunity, and we will be the first to take advantage of it. To achieve this, we will look where nobody is looking and be contrarians in our thinking. If you are on board with me, subscribe to my newsletter, and let's find the wealth generation machine together.