3 Habits That Keep You Broke (And One Investment That Can Change Your Life)

Most people think they need to make more money—but what if the first step is changing what you do with the money, time, and attention you already have?

In this episode of The Budget Boys Podcast, Marlon Heard ("The Valiionaire") shares three common habits that quietly keep people financially stuck:

• 📺 Watching more TV than learning
• 😤 Complaining instead of creating solutions
• 🛋️ Doing nothing after work to build your future

You'll also discover why your Leak Score may be more important than your credit score, how investing in yourself can completely change your financial trajectory, and why developing new habits today can create opportunities tomorrow.

This episode isn't about chasing quick money—it's about becoming the kind of person who naturally attracts greater opportunities through learning, discipline, and intentional action. 

💙 Join the FREE Budget Boys Financial Education Community

If you're ready to stop wondering where your money goes and start building a real financial system, we'd love to have you inside our FREE community.

Inside you'll discover:

• 💧 Your FREE Leak Score Assessment
• 💰 Practical ways to keep more of the money you already earn
• 📚 Financial education you can actually apply
• 🤝 A supportive community of people improving their finances together
• 🚀 Tools and strategies to help you increase cash flow and build long-term wealth

Your financial journey doesn't have to be complicated—you just need the right system and the right community.

Join us today in the FREE Budget Boys Financial Education Community, and let's start building a stronger financial future together.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

What is going down? How you doing? It is Marla Heard the Valionaire or Coach MT, however you know me. Um back here with a late podcast entry this evening. It's about 10 30 here in Atlanta. And um figured I'd put some more of the value out there. Um, you know, one thing I've I've learned, I'm I remember when I learned this, I don't know if it's a verse in the Bible, but I think I learned it through church um or some sort of spiritual religious event, and it it was someone said that the word never comes back void. Right? Um They say your your words and your your thoughts from your brain send and receive more signals than any satellite dish in the world. All right, it permeates walls, it permeates all kinds of things. So, you know, your word never comes back void. So I'm I'm doing this to put the word out there. This is more for the universe than it is for whoever is listening to it because there's only so much I can do. I know I was created to share this information, or I'll be one of the individuals to share this information. That that's that's my purpose. Right now that you listen to this, or at the point where I recorded this, this is my purpose, so that you, the listener, can listen and maybe take the information further. Is it right? Like when you when you read a book or you you listen to some information or you buy a course or you get you pay for a coach, you pay for a trainer, they are training you to be self-sufficient. We call it sui juris, all right? Being able to do for oneself, sui juris. All right, you know, being over your own jurisdiction, being being being the god of your domain. Okay. Um uh, and that's what this is for you to create your own ecosystem. This is coming from something that I learned, and you you take it to the next level to work for you. Okay, so I know one of the biggest things that uh people talk about online or look for online is how if you want to make more money, all right, or if you want more money. Um, I I you know, living here in the United States, we live in a very capitalistic, I want more society. Okay, and what a lot of people don't do is kind of take a step back and see where they are, right? They want the glitz and the glam, but they have the habits of, you know, the homeless. Well, some homeless people are very efficient. Uh let me not knock them, but they they have the mindset of someone who is not in that position, put that with the opposite. All right, their habits don't show that. So, three things you want to avoid if you want more money. I didn't say make more money, I didn't say earn more money, I said if you just want more money. Okay, and this goes, uh, each one of these, I'm gonna clump into something that I've trained about extensively, and you can go look it up. Okay, if you watch, number one, watching TV more than learning. Okay, I'm gonna connect this to two things. All right, I'm gonna connect this to when we talk about your league score. Right? Your league score is bigger than your credit score. Because if your league score is low, your credit score is low. All right. So one of the things about Washington TV More than Learning is plugging some of your leaks. And sometimes some of your leaks are multiple um streaming services. Right? You got Netflix, you got Hulu, you got Prime TV, you got Paramount Plus, you got HBO Max, you got um, I know some of them are free, like Tubi and things of that nature. Uh you got uh YouTube TV, CNN, all this stuff. And some some people have six, seven, eight streaming apps. Each one is $20 plus dollars. Okay? So cut some of those off. If you got eight streaming apps, cut off four. You don't watch that much TV. And they replace that with learning. Right? Uh in the in the win formula, I talk about W stands for willing. And you have to be willing to learn, be willing to change, and be willing to give something up. So you have to be willing to give up half of your apps and replace that with learning. And learning is anywhere where you're getting new information. Now, on the success lifestyle ladder, if you want your lifestyle to change, the first step of changing your lifestyle is getting the information. But you can't get the information if you're watching TV. Now, if you're watching TV, that's giving you the information that you're that you're gonna need to make more money, that's different. But most people don't watch TV for that. Okay? Everybody's been telling me about Love Island. You need to get on Love Island, Love Island. My daughters watch it religiously, my ex-wife that she watches religiously. People that I worked with are like, oh man, you got to get on Love Island. And everybody's like, yeah, yeah. I have not even gone to even look to see what's going on. It sounded exciting, but I knew watching that is not gonna get me to where I need to be. Now, I'm not saying I don't watch any TV at all. I do, but I do it very sporadically. Okay, if I'm gonna watch anything, I'm gonna watch something intriguing that's gonna stimulate my mind. So, number one, you need to avoid watching TV more than learning. Number two, complaining. Whether you are, whether you can or whether you can't, you're right. Whether you can or whether you can't, you're right. So you might as well talk yourself into saying I can. But if you're complaining, you're just you your words are anchors that are leaving you where you are. And you're you're you're talking about your current situation. See, there's no future, there's only the present and what's already happened. The future's not here yet. The future is right now. Okay? The future's right now. Now, let's wait. Five, four, three, two, one. Five seconds ago, it's already gone. That's already passed me just counting is in the past. So there's only right now and what has already happened. There is no future. The future is right now. So when you're complaining, you are essentially creating your future right now. Because you're like, oh this, oh that, woe was me, I don't have this, I don't have that, they have this, they have that. And remember, your word never comes back void. Man, I man, I used to blow up. Oh my gosh, I was so emotional. I will blow up. I've blown up at work, I've blown up at my bosses, I blow up on people complaining about how stuff ain't, I think, how it's supposed to go. So I blow up. And it kept me stuck for a long time. I've lost relationships because of it. But then when I started to talk more as if how I want my life to look, right? I started changing my beliefs, and the three-letter word in the word belief is lie. I started telling myself some lies that I eventually believed. And as a result, that eventually came to pass. Eventually came to pass. So if you want more money, avoid complaining about the money that you don't have and talk about the money you do have. Number one, fix the money you do have, fix the money you're currently earning. Go get, find out what your leak score is. Your leak score is bigger than your credit score. If your leak score is low, your credit score is low. And everything in your financial life is low. So first you want to do is go get your leak score and then learn how to allocate. Learn how to put your money to work. Give it a job. And after a while, you won't have anything to complain about because now you're operating within a system. So you don't have a system. It's just make money, pay bills, and all whatever. But you don't have a well-oiled system where you're like, okay, I run it like this all the time. Whether I have to change percentages or not, the system runs the same. Okay? So choose some words and some phrases with I am. Anything you say if the I am comes looking at comes looking for you. Remember, your word never comes back void. So if you're complaining about your situation, the situation will stay. But if you start being grateful for the situation, uh Billy Jean, Billy Gene King, the famous tennis player, said pressure is a privilege. It's a privilege to be under pressure because if you use your mind, you come up with creative ways to come out of it. So number two, avoid complaining. Number three, doing nothing after work. So your work pays your bills. One of my mentors said your job pays you a wage, which is fine. Your business earns you a profit, which is super fine. Okay? If you want more money, when you get off of work, you have to do something. Something other than coming home, plopping on the couch, or coming home, turning TV, or coming home and start jibby-jabbing, jibby jabbing on the phone, or coming home and getting on the game, or going to happy hour. All that stuff are distractions that are keeping you from the trillions and gajillions of dollars that are flying around every day. It was set up like that on purpose. So you'd come home and do nothing. Now, I'm not gonna lie, there are times I have come home and I have taken a nap because I need to get some rest. I need a little siesta. All right, I get my siesta, 30 minutes, I'm back at it. But when you come home from work, you take 15 minutes. Take two 15-minute blocks and do something. Read a book, start learning a new skill. Okay, doing some research. Go get the book Rich Dad Poor Dad or Think and Grow Rich or The Power of the Subconscious Mind or The Four-day Work Week or the 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, or the Four Day Laws of Power, or The Art of War, and every day, 15 minutes, read the book. I can I I don't make any guarantees, but I promise you at the end of that book, you are going to be a different person. You are going to be thinking completely different than everybody around you. Everybody around you is going to sound like idiots because they they you've you've elevated your mind just a tad. And everybody's going to after a while when you read so many books and when people start talking, you're like, what? All you hear is just wa, wah, wah, wah, wah. But if you want more money, you have to do something. If you don't know what to do, just start doing research. You got AI, will, hey, what do you do? What's some good business ideas I could do? Well, hey, I'm good at this, I'm good at that, I know this, I know that, and it will it will walk you through how to set up your business. Get yourself a coach. Somebody's gonna hold you accountable. Okay? So avoid doing nothing after work. Work takes up a lot of your time, but if you want more money, you have to do more. You have to use your time and your money to get more time and money. If you want more of something, you got to use it. And here's a bonus: don't be afraid to invest in yourself. I don't care if you didn't get the results that you were desiring, you are going to learn something along the way. Don't ever be afraid to invest in you. If it's a course, a class, a mentorship, a certification, a licensure, whatever it is for you to get there, find a way to get the money. I don't care if you got to save it up, and go and learn something. All right. Go and learn something. Don't be afraid to invest in you. It's not you, you're not gonna always get the money after the investment. The money comes later. You you you have to become the individual to attract the people and the opportunities to earn the money. You're not that person yet. You just want it. That's why the lottery is so dangerous. You give people that kind of money to somebody who has no idea what to do with it. So read a book, learn new skill, invest in you. And I ain't talking about going to go buy none of that feel-good stuff. I'm talking about a book, a course, a coach, something like that. A book, course, or coach you want to be investing in. I remember someone said, whatever you've invest in one year, the next year, you're your that's added on to your monthly revenue. So I was like, okay, I mean, one year I invested $6,000. I invested $6,000 in this um YouTube training. Now I'm not saying you have to do this, but I'm just I'm I'm doing it to paint a picture. So for six months, I was on a call every week with these guys, and they were just, we were digging around YouTube. That next year, my YouTube channel blew up to 20,000 subscribers from 2,000, and I was making an additional $5,000 per month as a result of that $6,000 course. And then I was able to take some of that $6,000 and invest more. So then that next year I invested uh maybe like $12,000 or $15,000 in trainings and courses and mentors and things of that nature. That next year I broke $20,000 a month. And it stayed at $20,000 for about three years. Right? And then everything came crashing down. I had to start over. I wasn't smart at that time, but I did learn something. Okay, do not be afraid to invest in yourself. Because when you invest in yourself, it never hurts. And it's never enough. I know we're talking about things to avoid, but I'm gonna give you one thing: invest in you, get you a good get invest in some books, invest in some courses, invest in some coaches. I remember when I used to just invest in books and courses, then I had that $6,000 to invest in a coach, and it changed everything. Okay, so uh Marlo Heard, the value nair here with the budget boys. Come join us in the free budget boys financial education community. Um get your money right. When your money's right, you you I promise you you'll sleep better at night. I promise you. Especially when you get to the point where your money is uh uh uh uh taking care of you, and you ain't got you can wake when you're done sleeping. I'm telling you, your morning routine will start at nine. Now I know some people, I'm up at 5:30. Listen, my morning routine used to start at 9 o'clock a.m. after the sun came up. I would work a little bit, help a few people, get a few calls, and then I'd be on a flight to Vegas for a week. Telling you. But you you gotta avoid doing these things. Okay? So um a lot of what I talked about, we have a whole podcast episode, you know, the win formula. Look that up. Uh, desire plus skill times faith and the success, the finance, uh, the success ladder, um, or lifestyle ladder. I forget what we call it. So, hope you got some value today. Make sure you leave me some fan mail. Um, you know, join us, follow up, follow me on here. I'm gonna continue to bring some good stuff. So, uh the value, we'll see you on the next episode.