EP 180: Thank You to My 18 Year Old Self

This episode is dedicated to someone very special to myself - my 18-years-old self. After recently making nearly $40,000 in six days through stock trading, instead of discussing technical analysis and the stock itself, this time I want to focus on the journey, challenges, and decisions that shaped this success. From humble beginnings, early struggles, valuable lessons learned, and moments of perseverance, this episode is not just a reflection on financial success but a tribute full of gratitude for the young version of myself who believed, persisted, and overcame numerous obstacles. With my story, I hope to inspire and motivate viewers to envision their potential, take risks, and stay resilient on their own journeys toward financial freedom.

Transcript

Jason Brown [00:00:00]:
I made $39,539 in 6 days. And rather than talk about what I saw in the charts and the stock, I wanna tell you what was going through my mind and who I wanted to thank most for being able to make $39,539 in 6 days. And I appreciate this guy. You gotta meet him. Let's go talk to him. Do you

Jason Brown [00:00:31]:
feel like you were meant to live a life of financial abundance? Like, you know your money is supposed to work harder for you than you work for it. Maybe you heard about the stock market and the new millionaires being created and wonder why not me? Maybe you wanna invest in the stock market, but you don't know where to start. Maybe you have a 401 k or an IRA, but you wanna enjoy your money now, not just in retirement. Maybe you've already had some success in the stock market, but you wanna take it to the next level. Working for somebody else and watching free YouTube

Jason Brown [00:01:02]:
videos will only get you so far. To truly be financially free,

Jason Brown [00:01:02]:
it takes a strategic game plan and truly be financially free, it takes a strategic game plan,

Jason Brown [00:01:08]:
an investor's mindset, and a willingness to take calculated risk.

Jason Brown [00:01:08]:
When you're ready to get out of the rat race and go on to the fast track, join

Jason Brown [00:01:13]:
us here where we break

Jason Brown [00:01:17]:
down how to manage money, how to navigate the stock and options market, and how to approach investing with the right mindset. I'm Jason Brown, stock market coach and options trader, and this is the 5 Year Millionaire podcast.

Jason Brown [00:01:34]:
So when you make roughly $40,000 in 6 days, what do you say to yourself? How do you feel? Well, in this episode, this YouTube video that you're watching, I'm gonna walk you through a trade where I made $40,000 roughly in 6 days. And rather than do what I normally do when I share my account, because I don't like to share my account that often, but also like to share to show people what's possible and what's real out here with respect to the stock market. But I normally walk you through the technical analysis and look at the chart and talk about what happened from there, but nope. Not this time. And this time, I wanna speak to you as if I was speaking to my 18 year old self and say, what would I say to myself going back to being 18 knowing, where we would be right now? So let's take a look at the account right here. So I have my Charles Schwab account pulled up. If you know anything about Charles Schwab, they don't offer paper trading accounts. So I am going to hit refresh right here and just refresh the app.

Jason Brown [00:02:44]:
Gonna switch this to the last, 30 days. Or what is the current month? This is the current month. We'll hit search from there. So you can see right here, this is the last 30 days. We're in October at the time of this recording. And if you listen to the audio version of this, obviously, you can't see it. But for those watching on YouTube, here we go. October 1st to October 28th.

Jason Brown [00:03:08]:
And I did a trade. I'm gonna bring up my drawing tool here. I did a trade that I wanna walk you through the psychology of. So in this trade, you can see we made $39,539. So I'm just rounding it up to roughly $40,000. Couple other things you wanna pay attention to is we entered or I entered the trade. I was speaking we because this is my business account. But, I entered the trade October 8th, and I exited the trade October 14th.

Jason Brown [00:03:43]:
So that's 6 days. 6 days that I'm in the trade went in. And so in 6 days, made roughly $40,000. Now a question that I get often is, you know, how much money did you put into the trade to make that type of money? So you can see right here, I put $57,000 700 $57,755.35 into the trade. And then we pulled out $97,294.65 for those who like to go down to the penny, which equated to $39,539.30 of profit in just 6 days. And so rather than talk to you about, you know, what trade was it you could see was a option trade on, SPX on S and P 500. Couple things I want you to take away from that is when you look at my account and I go back to the last 30 days, you notice that there's only 1 trade in here. There's only 1 trade in here.

Jason Brown [00:04:50]:
And I think that's important to know because people have this misconception that traders sit in front of the computer all day long trading. At least not me. That's not my thing. I wanna come in and use the market for what it's for, which is to grow my account, take calculated risk, low risk, high return trades, and bring out money that it would normally take somebody 6 months to a year to make work in a full time job. That's how I like to treat the stock market. I don't wanna treat it like a job that I'm sitting in front of the computer all day trying to make $500 or $50 and and day trading in and out because that's a job. You're sitting in front of the computer, you're stuck, you're tied to your desk. If you got a job, you're probably not paying attention at work.

Jason Brown [00:05:34]:
This is what I call power trading, putting a lot of power behind a trade and then making the type of money that literally would be full time job, full time income. So what I wanna do is talk to myself as if I was speaking back to 18 year old Jason Brown. And I think the first thing I'd say to myself is thank you. Thank you, Jason Brown. I always knew we would be here someday. I think that's the first thing I would say to my 18 year old self is just, hey. Thank you. Someday someday, we will be here.

Jason Brown [00:06:12]:
Someday, we will be at a point where we can make a yearly income or somebody's yearly income in 6 days. Even if you make $80,000 a year, we made 50% of your income in 6 days. I would say thank you, Jason Brown. I knew. I knew. No. You knew. 18 year old Jason Brown, you knew someday we would be here.

Jason Brown [00:06:38]:
So thank you. I would say thank you for not quitting when things got tough. You know? People see people on social media, YouTube, podcasts, and you see videos like this, and, like, they made how much in 6 days? But make no mistake. Things were tough. Things were not always this sweet. There was times I doubted myself. There was times I questioned, is this industry real? Question if it could work for black people? Question if it could work for young people? Question if it could work for me being from Detroit. Quite you know, I had all these things swirling around in my head.

Jason Brown [00:07:16]:
And then when things didn't go right and things got really tough for me in the stock market several times, which I'll talk about in my new book that's coming out 5 year millionaire, I would just say thank you for not quitting. Thank you for not quitting. Because in life, when people quit, nobody's writing a book about the quitters. Nobody's interviewing the quitters. It's the people who figure it out, who push through the difficult times, who keep going. That's who you are. Like, how did you do it? How did you know? How did you keep going in the face of adversity? Well, now that I'm on the other side, I can look back. I know the answers to those questions.

Jason Brown [00:07:54]:
But right now, I just wanna say thank you, 18 year old Jason Brown, for not quitting when things get tough because they're gonna get tough. I would say thank you to my 18 year old self for having the vision that I had. You know, I started with $2,000 of my graduation money from high school. And when I went to that well known bank and gave him the $2,000 and said, I wanna invest, and the girl just like, what's your goal? I'm like, to be rich. Like, why else do people do this? And she said, so you want aggressive funds? I'm like, yeah. I'm 18 years old. I want aggressive funds. Only 2 questions she asked me.

Jason Brown [00:08:30]:
What's your goal? So you want aggressive funds? That's it. Come back two and a half years later, that $2,000 dwindled down to $700 for those of you who know my story. Spent $200 on some gym shoes, and I had $500 left. And I said, give me my money back. I can do this myself. I coulda lost my money myself is what I said. But I will say thank you, 18 year old Jason Brown, for having the vision at 18 to even take your life savings. It was the 2,000 was definitely my life savings and to have the foresight to say, like, I wanna invest.

Jason Brown [00:09:05]:
I wanna get into the stock market that everybody's talking about. I want to thank me for knowing that even though I started with $500 that I knew that one day we would have $50,000 to invest in the trade to make this life changing returns. You see, so many people was like, what you gonna do with $500? That ain't no real money. So many people to this day, they don't wanna get started with what they have because they're like, it's not that much. But 18 year old Jason Brown said, it ain't that much right now, but it's what it represents that it will grow to someday because I knew I would one day be 20 year old Jason Brown, 30, 40 year old Jason Brown with a family, with kids, with a wife, with a mortgage. And I said, we gotta start now. We gotta figure this out now so we can live life like nobody else later. So thank you, 18 year old Jason Brown, for having the vision with your graduation money and having the vision with the $500 you had left after things went wrong.

Jason Brown [00:10:15]:
I told you it was gonna get tough. I would say thank you for keeping your head up when some customer was yelling at you over a $20 car charger. I remember working at Sprint and then later working at Verizon Wireless, and, man, them days was tough. Days was tough working every holiday, standing up on your feet, customers yelling at you over a $19.99 car charger. I mean, just talking to you like you're not even human. Do you know how much money I spend here? And go get your boss. And do you know who you talking to? And I'm a business owner. I mean, I never if you never worked retail, that's a tough gig, man.

Jason Brown [00:10:58]:
I mean, people just think I don't know what people think. They just talk to you like you're not human. Some days, it was my toughest days because I always knew, like, I I I I I wanna be careful with my words because I respect retail. I respect the time I spent there, the opportunity it gave me, but I just knew I wouldn't be there forever. Let me just say it like that. And I knew I wouldn't be dealing with these nasty customers forever, but thank you for keeping your head up when customers was just bitching you out about a $20 car charger, man, and making you feel like you was just less than human. I remember one time a guy bitched me out so bad, like, over a car charger or something, a phone, and I I just I had to go in the bathroom and take a minute. My eyes teared up.

Jason Brown [00:11:48]:
Because if you never worked in retail, you stuck between a rock and a hard place sometimes. You're like, you got this nasty customer. They're being rude. They're yelling at you. They're berating you like you're not human. But then you got the standard from the company that's like, we gotta get a 10 on the survey or, you know, what could you have done to turn it around? And you kinda be part be caught between a rock and a hard place sometimes where it's like you get written up because you didn't figure out how to deescalate somebody that's just being flat out rude to you when you really just wanna tell them, like, look, somebody that's just being flat out rude to you when you really just wanna tell them, like, look. Go take a hike. Get out of here.

Jason Brown [00:12:21]:
We're not servicing you today. But it ain't your company and your paycheck on the line, your job on the line. So them were some tough days. So thank you, 18 year old self, for keeping your head up when customers were just, man, yelling at you. There were some tough times right there. I would say thank you for not doing anything stupid enough to get you locked up and change the course of your own life when you were out there running with gangs. You know, I had joined gangs at a young age. It might not have been as apparent to my family.

Jason Brown [00:12:53]:
They might be listening to this episode, like, what? You was in a gang? But, yeah, it was in gangs. We was banging. We was carrying the flags and all that stuff and doing some stuff that we probably shouldn't have been doing at those age at that age, but I remember thinking to myself, like, don't do anything that'll alter your life forever. Don't get locked up. Don't get caught up in no foolishness, and I eventually transition out of that lifestyle. But thank you. Thank you for having the foresight to say, one day we're gonna make it out of this situation as well, and that I'm not trying to be the kingpin of a gang. This is something we're doing to survive right now.

Jason Brown [00:13:37]:
I would say thank you to my mom. Your mom would be proud of you. You did it the legal way. You came up from humble beginnings. Your dad passed when you were 2. Thank you for not using that as a crutch. Thank you for not using that as an excuse. Thank you for listening to your mom.

Jason Brown [00:13:59]:
Thank you for not judging your mom even though she did the best that she could with what she had. She wasn't rich. She didn't have a stock market, but she always gave you love. She gave you a roof over your head. Right? So your mom would be proud. So thank you for doing it the legal way and not the illegal way. Thank you for being humble enough to move back home and be focused. I remember when I lost all of my money around age 25.

Jason Brown [00:14:33]:
I'm living the high life. Lexus, coupe, living in the suburbs, blew up all my money. I talk about it in the book, quarter $1,000,000. Just went up in smoke. Just, no. Just blew it. Just blew it. Trading, gambling in the stock market, not focused.

Jason Brown [00:14:54]:
And then when that happened, oh, it was tough. It was a tough time in my life. I'm like, no. I thought I lost my life savings before. I really lost my life savings. But thank you for being humble enough to say, okay, Jason Brown, you're young. You can rebuild, but you gotta stop digging the bigger hole. You gotta let go of the house, the cars, the eating out.

Jason Brown [00:15:19]:
Oh, and by the way, you gotta get a job. So thank you for moving back home and being humble. Thank you for swallowing your pride and going to get a job again after being out of work for about 2 to 3 years, full time trading. Thank you for going back to get a job. That was a life changing experience. Going back to get a job. Because you got that job, you end up using tuition reimbursement to go back to school and get your degree. So thank you for being humble and going back to retail and selling cell phones.

Jason Brown [00:15:52]:
Man, you met some cool people along the way. I would say thank you for being open to documenting the journey and sharing. When you lost all your money, you had a crazy idea to start a YouTube channel and say, I'm gonna record myself making the money back. And although some people may troll you on the Internet and some people gonna say this ain't real. This ain't true. Somebody's gonna get it. They're gonna see your videos. They're gonna hear your podcast.

Jason Brown [00:16:19]:
Somebody's life is gonna be changed forever. So thank you for being vulnerable, for documenting it, for putting it on the Internet, for putting yourself out there. It's not easy. You could just make your money on the stock market and keep it quiet and go on about your day. But you chose to share with the world, the process, the system, the stocks, the charts, the mindsets, the ups, the downs, the paying off the house, the buying the exotic cars. You chose to do that, or you will choose to do that someday because you made a decision at 18 to get involved with the stock market, and you continue to grow and develop and be vulnerable and be open to documenting the process. I would say thank you for making our ancestors proud. Man, they'd be smiling from ear to ear.

Jason Brown [00:17:11]:
I mean, can you imagine what our ancestors are thinking? 18 year old Jason Brown, you getting involved with the stock market. You had no idea what leads you to where we're at today. And our ancestors have looked back and say, what? From slavery, from picking cotton, from working in the field, in their extreme heat, to sleep in, in some of the worst conditions, to being treated less than humane, to sit in front of your computer, printing money that our ancestors couldn't even imagine people of color would be making. They couldn't even imagine that you'd be sitting here right now in 6 days printing $40,000 I don't I should look up how much money is that back in, you know, slavery times. How much is $40,000 worth back then? They couldn't imagine our ancestors couldn't imagine you'd be sitting at home on a computer making 60 $40,000 in 6 days. Just incredible. Incredible. I would probably I would say thank you.

Jason Brown [00:18:22]:
You might not know it, but someday, you're gonna inspire men and women, inner city kids and suburban kids, 18 year olds to 70 plus year olds. You are gonna reach across age lines, race lines, sex lines, color lines, because the game that you talking about, the stock market game, the money game, it knows none of that. Everybody's interested in it. Kids, adults, men, women, every ethnicity is interested in that game. And because of you, you're gonna inspire people that you've never even met yet, that you've never even met yet. Man. And it's gonna be an incredible journey. And so I would just say to my 18 year old self, thank you for reading the books.

Jason Brown [00:19:19]:
Thank you for studying. Thank you for listening to audiobooks in your car instead of music. Thank you for carrying Think and Grow Rich with you while you're standing in line on your lunch break and you're reading the book while you're in line to order your food. Thank you for working and going to school. Just thank you, man. You put in the work so that this Jason Brown could have this opportunity. Thank you.