For the entirety of his career, David Bolno has always taken his position as a leader very seriously.
After earning his undergraduate degree from Duke University, Bolno went on to earn his law degree from Temple University. He did this all while holding down a full-time job. In the years since, he’s worked closely with a wide range of different figures in and around the entertainment industry. This includes not only musicians and artists, but athletes and other high net worth individuals as well.
He’s taken great care in developing his skills to help people evaluate their cash flow and income streams. He’s been intimately involved with developing and executing business plans for startups. He’s had his hand in record companies, publishing organizations, and more. He’s even done production and tour accounting.
All this is in service of one of his most important goals of all: to help as many people as he can maximize their financial return, all while preserving wealth and creating a legacy for themselves and their family members along the way.
But one must keep in mind that all his professional affairs are just one small part of a much larger story. David Bolno’s goal – to help people create a legacy for themselves – does not change. It is the mechanism through which that change is born that evolves over time.
This is one of the reasons why he’s always made philanthropy not just a point of pride over the years, but something that he sees as almost an obligation. By any conceivable metric, David Bolno is a success in the professional world. But to take care of the other side of that proverbial coin – to be as successful and as fulfilled in his personal life, too – he needs to look outward, not inward.
That means giving back and making an impact on as many people as he can, in any way that he can. Getting to this point has always required him to keep a few essential things in mind.
The Ways in Which We Measure Success
Different people naturally measure success in different ways. For some, it’s all about wealth and material possessions. Others have a strong desire to hit a certain point in their career, or to shatter any perceived ceiling. There are people who measure success based on the quality of their personal relationships, or the amount of education they have, or similar metrics.
For David Bolno, the point to all of this is that regardless of how you choose to measure success, there will come a day when you have achieved your own personal sense of victory. You’ll objectively have a lot of money, or a certain number of houses, or specific personal possessions you’ve always wanted. You’ll have reached a specific point in your career that you always dreamed of. You’ll have those personal relationships, or will have transcended that top tier of education.
Rather than taking all the effort you were spending on yourself and simply moving the goal posts (“Now I want to have even MORE money or personal success!”), it is instead time to focus it outward on others.
Using Our Success to Impact Those Around Us
For the sake of example, let’s say that you don’t have the ability to donate a portion of your earnings to a charity you like or a cause you believe in. For David Bolno, that’s okay. He wasn’t always able to do so, either – but that didn’t stop him from being philanthropic.
Just as there are many ways to measure success, there are a practically infinite number of ways to make an impact. You could volunteer your time to a cause you care about, for example – something that is always a great opportunity to give back. You could mentor someone in your field, taking the lessons you’ve learned and the experience you built in your career and sharing them with someone who isn’t as far along as you are.
Even simply supporting local businesses over their large, national counterparts is a great way to make an impact on your community. The more you support local businesses, the more they’re able to create jobs. Those jobs boost the local economy, which ultimately helps out everyone.
If you’re lucky enough to be given a platform – either in “real life” or on the Internet via social media – use it to raise awareness for the causes you support. Spread your message far and wide in the hopes that you’ll impact at least one other person. Sometimes, that’s all it takes.
Why the Never-Ending Journey is a Good Thing
In the end, there are two major lessons that David Bolno hopes others take away from both the personal and professional efforts that he’s been a part of over the years.
First, even if you’re a self-made individual, you didn’t get to where you are in a vacuum. We all had help – be it from our friends, family members, or those in the surrounding community. Hopefully, you were lucky enough to have support from all of these at the same time.
The point is, the opportunities that we’ve taken advantage of in our lives were not exclusively created by ourselves. While it’s certainly true that the “can-do” spirit you possess has gotten you far, it wasn’t the only thing that got you to where you were today. One must not overlook the good things that happened in their lives that came from outside themselves, nor should they be so quick to shut the door on the idea of passing a bit of that onto others.
Therefore, it is in our own best interests to give back to those around us whenever possible – in the hope that by making the community stronger, we also empower ourselves as individuals. You do not have to be a wildly successful individual in order to do this. Yes, many organizations in your area can use all the financial support they can get. But by volunteering your time, or even by participating in the types of local events that may require you to step out of your comfort zone, you can achieve much the same effect albeit on a different (but still important) scale.
But more importantly than that, David Bolno helps that people understand you can never “do enough” to help those around you. There are always challenges to be overcome and problems to be solved. You will never have a shortage of causes that you care about that could use your support in literally any way that you are able to do so.
The minute that you think you’ve “done enough” – that you’ve exhausted your bandwidth in terms of what support you must lend – is the minute that you’ve given up on a cause that you once held near and dear. Even something as seemingly simple as going out of your way to do something nice for someone you know – or a stranger – can make a major difference in that person’s life.
If you make a difference in one person’s life, maybe they’ll venture out into the world and do the same. Those people will then go out of their way to positively impact someone else. Before you know it, you have a snowball effect in the best possible way – which is truly what making an impact is all about.
