How Making My First $1,000,000 At 18 Changed Me (In My Teens)

Hey, my name is Iman Gadzhi and I made my first million at the ripe age of 18 years. Old. Sounds like a bit of a fairy tale, huh?

Well, not exactly as the saying goes more money, more problems. And I can do that. Definitely attest to that.

Sitting here at the age of 20, having made multiple millions more. I firmly understand that I pretty much know nothing about life, but there's still so much more wisdom to be bestowed upon me. So many more failures, so many more lessons from life.

But I will say I'm definitely in a very unique position, starting my agency at the age of 16 and scaling it over the past four years, as well as all the sort of spinoff businesses that have come from that. I've seen a lot in my time and there is a big misconception around money. So I wanted to reveal how making my first million dollars at the age of 18 really just changed me.

Let's start off by talking about the most obvious thing lifestyle. Now, when you start making money, one of the biggest traps that people fall into is lifestyle creep. This is when you continue to inflate your personal expenses as a percentage of your total income.

Now making money at an early age, you can start to feel like a bit of a kid in a candy store. Everything is so new. Everything's so exciting.

And especially when you're experiencing all this, and you're still hearing the echoes of people talking down at you, people telling you you're going to fail. You're never going to succeed all this stuff. When you first start out with your business or your venture or whatever, when things started finally working for me, I wouldn't say I was one of those big, you know, F all my haters.

Uh, you know, I told you guys this, that, but there is definitely that era of look, you guys all set out, fail. You guys said I was an idiot. You guys would talk down at me when I spent years and years building up my successful habits and my discipline in order to set me up to do something great in life.

And although I didn't have the results to back it up at the time, I knew I was destined for something great. And all you guys did was throw in my face. So, you know, when, when things finally take a turn for the better, there's that part of you that wants to shine, that wants to enjoy your spoils.

So I found that in the first couple of years of making substantial money, and definitely when I made that first million dollars at the age of 18 lifestyle creep was definitely something that I was starting to experience. You know, it's crazy because when you're, I vividly remember when I was 16 years old, I was reading Tony Robbins money, master the game. And I'm going through this book, I'm doing the exercises, you know, where you talk about like your absolute, your final, your ma like your dream life.

And, um, I came out to 50 grand a month. And by the time I turned 18, I was making that per month. And once you get to 50 grand a month, you realize that at the end of you're actually still a tiny little fish and that, and the things that you didn't even know existed before now come into your orbit, you know, cars that you didn't even think about before coming in.

You know, I don't tend to stay at 20 years old. I actually still don't even own a car cause I'm like-Cause I live in London. And to me it's just a few tile expenses, just unnecessary.

But as I said, once you get into that position cars, you know, you start to look at different sort of cars or even watches, you know, until the age of 18, I didn't even know what a Richard was. I didn't know what a Nautilus was, but a Royal Oak was, and this stuff starts coming into your orbit stuff that when you're younger and you don't have as much money, you know, you don't know what brands like Loro Piano and Zenya, or, and as I said, once you start making more and more money. It's, it's funny because as you get to a point of financial freedom, and even further than that, you start to realize actually just how small you are.

So one of the big things that happened with my lifestyle was definitely this aspect of lifestyle creep as a percentage of what I was making entirely over the first couple of years. And after those two years of feeling like a kid in a candy store, and you kind of just realized that as my tattoo says here, wherever you go, there you are, you know, you can buy whatever you want and you generally buy something. Not because you're like materialistic or want the rush or this or that, but just because you're just like, I genuinely really liked this thing, but it gets to that point where even growing up, I knew for a fact that money does not make you happy.

And I understood that concept. But at the end day, you need to go through a paradigm to fully internalize it. And you just get to a point where you get tricked enough times where you're like, ah, actually, you know what, this thing, I think it would make me pretty happy.

I would really enjoy this thing once I get it. And you get tricked enough times to realize that it's never really the case and this leads into one of the biggest lessons I can bestow upon you. Now I know my demographic on my YouTube channel.

It's usually 18 to 30 year old males, as well as I run a YouTube channel, all about entrepreneurship, business, advertising, marketing, and things like bio hacking and horology and these sort of side interests that I have. But my point is that my average listener is either on their entrepreneurial journey where they're already making substantial amounts of money. So I know there's a lot of you guys making 20, 30, 40, 50, a hundred K a month plus watching this video right here.

And as I said, my bad, best, best piece of advice to you is take your time. And don't try to get too big for your boots. Even if you can afford something.

What I've realized is once you, you started making money at a young age, it's kind of like you tick off all these boxes. And it's like, what's really left after that. And it can be a really isolating feeling because it's like you've checked off all the things that people will wait 40, 50 years for.

And then as I said, then a day, it's kind of just like, okay, what's left. I'm, you know, maybe someone watching this is 28 years old, you know, you're making multiple five figures a month. You buy all the watches, you buy the car, you buy the house.

And it's just kinda like . I'm 28. I've pretty much accomplished everything that, you know, I would want to accomplish.

What's really left. And that's where you'll start to feel very, very jaded. So my best recommendation is take your time, as well as look, if you are in the privileged position to work your butt off, to have the discipline and the focus to attain wealth at a relatively young age.

For me, anything below 30, even 35 to me is like attaining wealth at a young age. All I can say is relating back to my point, take your time. Because as humans, we don't really compare ourselves against either ourselves or sort of the wider population.

We kind of compare ourselves to our surroundings. You know, that's one of the biggest reasons that I still feel like a tiny fish living here in London. You know, I live in a place called Knightsbridge and I just will not see a house for less than $3 million.

So I can just, it doesn't happen, but you will see a lot of 10, 15, $20 million houses and, you know, living in a place like this, you really realize that like, hell, I'm a small fish. But when I look at that, I'm comparing myself to 40 50 year olds. Most of my good friends that have been my friends for four or five years, they were there for me when I had nothing.

There's no point in me living beyond my means because at the end of the day, I already live such a gregarious and extravagant lifestyle. Even if I'm being on a budget compared to the people around me. And that's kind of what I'm trying to say is at the end of the day, most people compare themselves to the people around them.

And if you are young, and as I said, you've had the privilege of working your butt off and attaining wealth. Realistically, you're going to have a much more extravagant lifestyle already than the people around you. So there's no need to, you know, then go buy that next watch and that next watch or that next car and the next car and, you know, designer this and designer that just, just take your time.

And that's something that I always have to remind myself. And I think, you know, even the car, that's one of the reasons that I haven't bought a G wag or a rolls Royce or a McLaren, because I think that I realized what the other areas of my life, you know, even one of my biggest hobbies, my, my watch collection, Oh, you know, before the age of 21 owning multiple protect Felipe's APS, Rashad mills, Rolex is like the, you know, the most ridiculous watch collection you've ever seen. And to be honest, some twenties, so like kind of what's.

Left. And I. Kind of actually almost regret the way I went about my watch collection.

Part of me doesn't because I actually make money on my watch collection is sort of like little investment side hobby to me. But the other part of me is like, . You should've just taken your time.

So. As I said, if you were watching this one of the best piece of advice that I can give to you, if you start making money at a young age is take your time, relax, enjoy it. You have decades and decades to buy that car, that house, take your time, enjoy the small things.

And I said, that is one of the biggest reminders I have to give myself every single day. The next thing that I learned by making my first million dollars by the age of 18 is you have to watch over your shoulders socially. You know, obviously that's a big, big part of your life and making that amount of money at a young age can feel extremely lonely at times, because at the end of the day, it's really hard to know who you can actually trust.

And in my life, if I look at my close friends, they fall into one of two categories. People who were there for me when I had absolutely nothing or other very, very successful business owners, artists, industry leaders, in their given fields, people who don't need anything from me, our relationship is mutually beneficial because we are two very solid people. And that's kind of the two archetypes of my close friends.

But nonetheless time and time again, I have realized crap. I have to be very, very careful with who I surround myself with because although I've always thought I have an incredible judge. The character, sometimes you slip up.

And even with that. The people who you know are kindhearted and we're there for you. You know, when you had nothing, there's always a very fine line between sharing your blessings and, and being taken advantage of.

And one of the sort of hardest things I kind of had to learn over the years, because I'm a very hard person to get close to like actually genuinely close to, but the people who are close to me, like I would, I would give anything to, to my brothers, my sisters, the people who I love, you know, apart from my mom, I don't really have any family in my life. So for me, my close friends, those are like, that's my family, but you also need to understand a concept known as seeds of resentment. One of my buddies actually told me about this and it helped me understand my life a little bit better.

Why it's crazy. Cause sometimes the thing, the people who you do the most for will end up taking advantage of you and we'll end up presenting you the most. And as I said, it was a crazy, crazy thing to experience in my life.

And it all comes back down to this lesson of look, share your blessings, of course, share your blessings, but also be very, very careful that you're not being taken advantage of or that you're not causing those seeds of resentment. And as I said, that is a balance that I'm still trying to find to this day. And once you experience all this, as said, it just ties even further into this level of unease because cause even the most kindhearted people, when you have attained a certain level of wealth, you gotta be really, really careful.

You genuinely do. And I've learned that more and more over the years. And I think I've become more and more cynical over the years because, because over the years I've had so many people tell me, look, be careful who you surround yourself, Baba.

The, that be careful, no one takes advantage of you. And I've always said, no. I have an amazing judge of character and my close friends at the end of the day, they were there for me when I had nothing.

And those people have always been a hundred. Those people have always been I've I've never had issue with that archetype of people. I've never had issue with the archetype of people who are already super successful and we don't need anything from each other.

The only group of people that I've ever struggled with are sort of the newcomers into my who, who you think you can trust. But sometimes, you know, inevitably their true colors show. Now the last way the money changed me in my teens is it forced me to really look at myself in the mirror.

You see when money is no longer an excuse for your current state, then you start to have to question a lot of things in your life. As I said, I have that tattoo that reads wherever you go, there you are, which means it doesn't matter whether you have, you know, a thousand dollars in your bank account or a million dollars in your bank account, $10 million in your bank account. Humans are funny.

We adapt to situations. And at the end of day, we always come back to an emotional set point that we have. So it doesn't matter if you make all this money at the end of the day, if you do not fix your emotional state, absolutely nothing will change in the quality of your life.

And I genuinely mean that. In fact, it can even be more crippling because look at the end day, you know, when your life is not where you want it to be and your emotional state is not where you want it to be. And you know, things around you, your external is not where you want it to be able to.

Then you can just blame it on that. Ah, you know, once I make money, blah blah, this is that, you know, there's a saying that goes there and it, you see it on all these ridiculous, dumb Instagram pages that are, I'm just being entirely honest, run by people who have never attained wealth or success. And like, they don't actually know what it's like to live that life.

And you're the saying, you know, people always say, you know, I'd rather, um, they see money, can't buy happiness, but I'd rather cry in a Lamborghini than a, a Prius. I actually don't agree because when you are crying in your, after spending five, 10, 15 years of your life chasing this dream, that is the lowest low that you could ever face because what you are facing in that moment is you. And that is the scariest thing that you, you can face.

You see when you're crying in that Prius, you're crying and you're thinking, ah, whatever, I'm in a Prius, you know, once life changes, everything will be fine. And D like, you have hope. When you go through all of that pain and torture, and you're still.

Crying in that Lambo, that's it like. You have no hope it is pure display. Are at that point.

So, as I said, that, that, you know, Instagram quote or whatever it can is literally the farthest thing from the truth. So once you go through this journey of attaining wealth and, you know, you enjoy the spoils of it and you realize that it really, it really doesn't change your life at all because your emotional set point is your emotional set point. And that is the thing that you have to work on.

Well, then it's this weird sort of cliff edge that you get to when you're staring out into the abyss and you're like, what's next. And that's where you really have to decide, what do I want from life outside of, you know, all the external in the material world and this and that, what do I want from life? Where do I want my emotional set point to be?

What is my mission? What is my purpose? And that is a much scarier question to answer.

And that is a much scarier endeavor to go down. Then, ah, I'm going to go down the, the, the journey, the endeavor of attaining wealth. That's a pretty, I don't, that's not an easy journey, but it's a, it's a simple journey to understand.

The other journey is very open-ended and it takes a lot of mental anguish and a lot of questioning yourself and having that sort of experience at such a young age is it's crazy. Because as I said, you know, most, most people, they live their life with this hope and these dreams and their aspirations. And, you know, they're constantly working towards something and you see it all the time sort of midlife crisis is, you know, at 35 40, you know, people realize like, ah, crap, you know what?

Maybe my life was meant for something else, but to have, you know, for me personally, to have that at like 18 or 19 where it's genuinely like their money, that's it like money is not a thing anymore in my life. It's I know everyone listening to this, I'm like, Oh, poor, you, are you mad about all this? But no, January, as I said, then it poses a very different question of like, what do I want from my life?

And that is a very, very extensive question to ask. So, and as I said, it's a very debilitating question. Cause it's just like, you have no more excuses.

It's, it's honestly a pretty crazy feeling, as I said. So ladies and gents, for those of you guys starting your entrepreneurial endeavors or who are already successful entrepreneurs, these are some of the things that you can expect in the horizon. And I wish I had gotten this specific important information when I was 16.

All of you guys watching this will inevitably face these sort of issues on your road to building up your business, your career. And as I said, having more and more financial freedom and flexibility in your life. In fact, that is one of the things that I prepare my students in agency incubator for, because they said it's a, that some of the agency incubator members are, are making five, 10, 20 grand a month.

Hell. We even have students making a hundred K a month plus in profit from their agencies. And I said, that's incredible.

Like that's, you know, that's, that's amazing. That's now one part of your life sorted, but coming from someone who has had to navigate this path without really any sort of guidance in my program, I really want to prepare my students to not only attain wealth, but then manage it and carry themselves accordingly once they have it. So ladies and gentlemen, if you want to get started with running your own online marketing agency, even if just like me, when I was 16, you have zero startup capital.

You have zero past experience, and you're really starting this on a whim. Then go ahead and click the link down below and check out the sales page on there. Actually do a 15 minute demo of the product.

And I show you guys behind the scenes, what it's like literally module by module, plug and play by plug and play the community. Everything. Because when you have an incredible product, you are not afraid to show it off.

So apart from that, I hope you guys enjoyed this video as always down below, there'll be a comment to be drawn into the gadget giveaway. So big congrats to today's winner. And all you have to do is subscribe, turn on post notifications and comment within the first two hours of the land's video going live.

And you'll be automatically drawn into when a piece of apparel. I hope you guys have found value from this video and I'll see you guys next time.