TLDR Summary

I write building and living an extraordinary life that's built on God's purpose for you, combined with your terms, including wealth and a meaningful living.

I call it the 3rd Life: Business, Money & Purpose for God, where:

Our 1st life is when we’re born into the natural world…2nd Life is when we find Jesus and invite Him into our life, and 3rd Life is when we COMMIT to biblical wealth creation (earning/saving/investing more) so we can live a more generous life to ourselves, loved ones, worthy causes and most importantly, all-in pursue our purpose and calling in God.

What truly bothers me is good, hardworking Christians and believers being stuck in their 9-5 day jobs, being slaves to bad money habits such as not saving, not investing for passive income, keep buying things on loans and locking themselves into long debts, and worse of all:

No wonder Les Brown said that the 2nd richest place in the universe is the graveyard, where dreams, talents and purpose die, never to see the light of day.

No, no and NO! This is not why God placed us here on earth.

Each of our lives have purpose and we are called into that specific purpose and assignment. If you are bound to your desk, your cubicle, your job, your loans to pay until you're 65 and you're thinking of stepping into your purpose when you MAYBE retire...

Your 3rd Life: Business, Money & Purpose for God

Your third life allows you to live a life that you truly enjoy and love, where you have more options in life, where YOU CAN BE MORE

1. generous with yourselves: we can stop working or be more selective (or at least, choose to ignore politics at work or fire bosses), pick up stuff that we used to be more price conscious about, travel more comfortably, *choose to become rich

2. generous with our loved ones, maybe

   1. retire your parents or spouses

   2. afford having private education

   3. engage personal training or personal chef

   4. afford luxuries that we'd been putting off

3. *most importantly, be able to pursue the calling and purpose that God has placed in our hearts

Maybe it’s me working in healthcare, I KNOW professionally how our human lives are frail and short, and that’s what is fueling my deep desire on why we shouldn't and cannot waste our lives on living below what we're capable of or what we're called for.

To add to that, you must know that at the end of our lives, we all have to account to God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit

• 2 Corinthians 5:10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive his due for the things done in the body, whether good or bad.

• Matthew 12:36 But I tell you that men will give an account on the day of judgment for every careless word they have spoken.

• Hebrews 4:13 Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight; everything is uncovered and exposed before the eyes of Him to whom we must give account.

• 1 Peter 4:5 But they will have to give an account to Him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.

• Galatians 6:5 - For each one should carry his own load.

Long Version

I wasn’t born into business, money or wealth.

It’s funny because often people think I come from money. Maybe it’s because I look well-fed ha!

Yes, I am blessed enough that I have parents who love each other and have four kids (I'm #2), but they're obviously lacking in education, financial literacy and opportunities.

Their focus was risk-averse: they had survive and ensure their kids had food on the table, a better chance in education and life, and all four of us completed our university education, of which I am very grateful for.

That being said, there was a lot of instances where I had front row seats to frustrated money fights over shortages and what we would need to forgo, and to little 9-year old Nigel, this made me grow up very quickly about money, and we had lots of monologue on how “money don’t grow on trees.

Because of that, I became very sensitive about spending (their) money, and do my best (at 9 years old, what could I do, right?) to ration and share food, try not to buy so much clothing (think repaired pants, bags, shoes, socks) so that everything can last as long as it could.

Little 10-year-old Nigel’s Money Promise

Interestingly enough, when I was 10 or 11 years old, I remember making a deep promise to myself about money:

1. Firstly, is that I would never lack money.

2. Next, I would never argue with my spouse over money, because it's me and her versus the problem, not me versus her.

3. I would have the problem of more than enough.

It’s unusual because this memory is so strongly embedded in my heart and mind, I think experiencing money problems at such a young age truly have a strong imprint in me.

So How To Get Richer?

I knew that I cant go to my parents to learn how to get richer - they’re broke and argued about money often. Money was also a tense topic, and shouted about in frustrations or arguments.

Next, church - we go to church every Sunday, but church don’t talk about money. In fact, they seem to frown upon wealth and money, like they’re bad words. When I started attending City Harvest and read the versus in the bible such as

Deuteronomy 8:18 New King James Version (NKJV)“And you shall remember the LORD your God, for it is He who gives you power to get wealth, that He may establish His covenant which He swore to your fathers, as it is this day.

and brought back these teachings to my parents and my church in Malaysia, they just…kept quiet and starting telling me that it’s prosperity gospel and it’s not biblical!

Goodness.

BUT! Jesus was a master carpenter business owner, and His ministry was supported by rich patrons AND He even had a treasurer…I do believe if any organization has need of a treasurer…that means that there is a treasury ie treasure and money.

The only person I knew who was rich was my rich uncle Dekotiu (that’s his title, not his name ha), but our families weren’t close, and he’s always flying between countries working, so I cant access him easily.

Chance Finding

By ?chance or by God’s grace, when I was 11, I found a book that wrote on money and our subconscious, and though I cant remember the name of the book anymore, I remember doing my best to remember this:

Money and wealth are circulating freely in my life, to me.

I remember reciting that over and over, for a good 1-2 years of my life, until I forgot about it (hey, I was 11 years old!).

10 years later, during my 2nd year of occupational therapy studies in Nanyang Polytechnic, I would chance onto a book called Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki (affiliate link, which means if you purchase through this link, Amazon may pay me a small commission - please refer to affiliate disclosure in Tools section) who taught me the importance of understanding what an asset is/does, how to get richer and what the rich thinks about money…and the importance of learning how to build a business.

I would start a business 3 years upon graduating from school in 2008, and it’s really during this time (even till today) that I learnt so much about business, money, personal growth.

Going From Zero To Mini-hero

I went from being a broke kid who knows no one, from a poor-to-middle class family who has zero network, hustling and making all the mistakes in the book and yet still managed to build a 7-figure gross-revenue business that was sold for $1.8M back in 2014.

(Will cover some stories and lessons on selling to private equity when the time is right too, it has pros and cons).

I went on to build another 7-figure business in mid-2019, battling and surviving the plague called COVID-19, and by God's grace, I'm still managing and scaling up to hopefully higher heights - how I run my business today in 2025 is vastly different to how I ran my business in 2015.

I didn't do it on my own though, though I worked really long hours (16+ hour days) with elements of luck and support from people, and lots of prayers and insight from reading the bible and hearing from God.

How To Build Biblical Wealth (aka Get Rich)

I learnt firsthand how I view money can be very different to how others view money - nowadays, for me personally, this is how I will build biblical wealth:

1. earning more with a business (or for those with a full time job, to start a side hustle) and

2. take portions business profits to

   1. learn how to earn more (upgrading skills)

   2. reinvest into the side hustle or business

   3. invest into assets that put passive income into your bank account on automatic

3. Rinse and repeat.

But I see people taking their hard earned monies at the end of the month to pay minimally for all the existing debts, then either spend the money and/or take more debts by

• splurge on expensive meals

• buying expensive clothes or products or skincare

• take holidays

• buy car/home/phone/TV/devices/bicycles/etc

They justify to themselves that they worked hard and earned it.

I mean, yes, they work hard, but we all do…there is no easy job. And by spending all one’s monies, going deeper into debt without saving for rainy day or investing for passive income…just furthers locks yourself into your job.

Once your debt and lifestyle get so deep, you’re stuck, either looking for the next high paying job (assuming you dont get retrenched, oh the stress) or so stressed you need to spend to get some retail therapy relief.

It’s a vicious cycle that’s keeping you away from fulfiling your calling and purpose that God has set for you!

Simple But Best Boring Way To Wealth & Money

The slow, diligent and boring way is the best way - in fact, it’s biblical too.

• Proverbs 13:11 – “Wealth gained hastily will dwindle, but whoever gathers little by little will increase it.”

• Proverbs 10:4 – “Lazy hands make for poverty, but diligent hands bring wealth.”

• Ecclesiastes 11:2 – “Invest in seven ventures, yes, in eight; you do not know what disaster may come upon the land.”

• Proverbs 28:20 – “A faithful person will be richly blessed, but one eager to get rich will not go unpunished.”

Getting biblical wealth is profoundly simple, just that it can be immensely boring and requires a lot of patience:

1. Earn more by starting a side hustle or business that can scale

2. Save more by optimizing spending and preventing mindless/wasted spending

3. Invest more in cash-paying passive income assets

4. Repeat until passive income is more than spending.

Once you hit your passive income freedom numbers, you’re free.

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