Kei Tanaka on the "Wealthy Mindset": Imagine Vividly, Build Up Through Compounding, and Go Meet People One Level Above You

Okui began by asking Tanaka, who has dealt with many wealthy people, what the "wealthy mindset" means. According to Tanaka, at the very top are people with assets on the order of 10 trillion yen. Even among colleagues close at hand, there are a fair number of people who "pretty casually" pass 10 billion yen, and some who exceed 100 billion yen.

What Tanaka then emphasized was the question of whether you have ever "vividly imagined" what you are aiming for. It is fine if your goal is an annual income of 10 million yen or 20 million yen, or 100 million yen in cash. But Tanaka says you should first vividly imagine the state of having it. For someone who, like Tanaka, is happy just to run all over the world, airfare and running shoes are enough, as long as you aren't particular about business or first class. You might not need 100 million yen. So don't make money itself the goal. Tanaka's view is that people who truly need money should have a powerful driver that makes them need it, and without that, getting there is difficult.

Once you have imagined your goal, the next step is to reexamine whether where you are now is the right place. Tanaka points out that even if you work hard at your current company and become number one, if that is in a completely different direction from your goal, you will never get there.

As an example, Tanaka described working backward from wanting 100 million yen. Suppose you see a path: work for two years at a company that pays around 50 million yen in executive compensation. Even if that is far off right now, you think you could get there in about two steps. Which companies lie in between, and what kind of career do you need? What is your current career missing? Tanaka says that unless you break it down this way, you will absolutely never get there. What you can't imagine won't come true. Conversely, what you can imagine can be put into words, so if you break it down, what you need to do becomes clear. If you decide it is truly impossible, you can change course and aim for it through something entirely different.

The "people who made it" that Tanaka has seen always have their goal and current position in view and are on the right path. They sometimes stumble and take detours, but what characterizes them is that they take action every day. Tanaka called this "wealthy thinking."

One idea from Tanaka's book that Okui found interesting was applying "compound interest," a financial concept, to areas of life such as effort and trust. Tanaka mentioned the story that Einstein called compound interest humanity's greatest invention, and then explained it with numbers.

If you make yourself 1% better than yesterday every day for 365 days, starting from 1 you end up 37.8 times larger after a year. Conversely, if you get 1% worse every day, 100 becomes about 3. Tanaka explained that between someone who does something slightly positive and someone who does something slightly negative, the gap is "3 versus 3,780," a difference of about 1,260 times. The same applies not just to money but to every habit, including health, diet, and learning. If you learn something more than yesterday, even in just five minutes a day, you can grow 1%, while someone who lounges on the sofa playing mobile games and falls asleep probably goes down 1%. In Tanaka's view, that gap widens to around 1,200 times in just one year.

Out of this thinking, Tanaka took up the habit of reading a random Wikipedia page for about five minutes a day. Building up effort in your own area of expertise has meaning. But it has limits, and its benefits gradually diminish. So Tanaka decided to read pages opened at random, like throwing darts, and learn broadly about completely different things. "People underestimate five minutes," Tanaka says. Five minutes is enough to get quite knowledgeable.

This habit paid off in relationships. When talking with top-tier people, Tanaka's early-rising habit is interesting to those hearing about it for the first time, but if they say "I know," the conversation ends there. At those moments, opening with "So, this is something I read on Wikipedia yesterday" serves as an icebreaker. Above all, people who know a lot of obscure things are seen as fun. As a result, Tanaka says, invitations started coming in situations where "there's one seat open at a dinner between important people." These have increased greatly since Tanaka began current activities, and even back as a company employee, Tanaka benefited from being invited because "if we bring that guy, he'll tell some stories."

Okui noted that Tanaka is known for the "outrageous" habit of getting up at 3:45 every morning to run or swim, but confirmed that even a single step like looking at Wikipedia for five minutes a day is fine. Tanaka agreed and laughingly mentioned an Amazon review of the book that said, "In the end, it was a book of despair." Tanaka asks people not to look only at the results, since Tanaka tends to talk at length.

According to Tanaka, even a five-minute walk a day is fine. What matters is making a promise to yourself, and ideally to others and to society as well. Keeping the promise—"I did my five minutes"—makes you feel positive and builds self-esteem and a sense of competence. Once you can think, "I'm someone who can keep things up," you can start another new habit. In this way, you trick your brain into forming habits and then apply that to other things.

Wealthy people are good at building these systems, and even if not as extreme as Tanaka, almost all of them have their own routines. When Okui summed it up as "They run on routine, not motivation," Tanaka replied, "On systems." Human willpower is the weakest force, so there's no point relying on it. Design your environment, build systems, create a situation where you have no choice but to do it, and make promises to yourself, to others, and to society. Tanaka repeated this conviction here as well, one Tanaka says has been stated "about 150 times."

Prefacing it with "everyone loves this," Okui asked about networking—namely, where you can meet wealthy people. One method is to contact everyone you want to meet, one after another, not minding if you get turned down. But Tanaka doesn't really recommend that. Tanaka believes you should first "level up" starting with people one layer above yourself.

If you suddenly ask to meet someone at the very top, you'll just be ignored. Saying "someone like the president of that company over there" sounds rude, but you choose someone within reach with whom a conversation would likely click. And rather than approaching them directly, you have someone introduce you before you go meet them. At that point, Tanaka says, you need to have become somebody, at least to some degree. What have you worked hard at? With what aspirations have you come to meet them? What do you find admirable about them? What do you want to talk about today? And since it would be presumptuous to just listen, you show that you've also come with ideas of your own and might be able to help. Without this whole "package," they will think "what did you come here for?" and you'll be seen as a taker.

If you prepare, meet someone one step ahead, and they take a liking to you, they'll introduce you to people even higher up. They'll invite you: "If that's what you want to do, I'm having lunch with this person soon—want to join?" Tanaka says that as a result of climbing these stairs, invitations that would have been unthinkable a year ago now come in. As an example, Tanaka mentioned a dinner two weeks from then, for which there was one open seat. Tanaka gets "casually tossed" an invitation to a table that includes Mercari's Yamada, the president of the travel company Reiwa Travel, influencers, and Horie of dely, which runs Kurashiru.

What does Tanaka do at these dinners to get invited back? In response to Okui's question, Tanaka cited "insane research." Before going to a meal, Tanaka learns about the other person's company to the point of knowing more than its own employees. That includes the previous year's sales and profit, the number of employees, the company's history, recent news, and even its medium-term management plan.

When to bring this out takes skill, but Tanaka goes in ready to show familiarity when the other person raises a topic. Tanaka never shows up empty-handed. Besides a physical gift, Tanaka also brings a gift of knowledge in the head. If you can go as far as saying, "I think a service like this would be great to have, too," that's 120 points, Tanaka says.

If you keep steadily attending dinners like these, people start asking, "Why not come work at our company?" Tanaka values this. Now 43, Tanaka says that the older you get, the more you become a "naked emperor" within your company. What Tanaka fears most is becoming someone who can only work at that one company. The truly impressive people are those needed by any company, and so Tanaka lives in a way that always keeps about three "why not join us?" cards in hand.

Besides checking whether there are companies that want Tanaka to work for them, Tanaka also visits recruitment agencies regularly. With current skills and age, what kind of company could Tanaka move to, and at what salary? Tanaka takes stock and measures personal value like a "medical checkup."

According to Tanaka, when you try to do this, you realize what you lack: "I have nothing." Many people don't know where to start, but if you imagine or role-play what you'd be missing for someone to say "why not join us?" when you meet them, the areas you need to study become clear. After that, it's just a matter of "strength training" them. The destination doesn't have to be a company you truly want to join. If you get fired from your current company or it goes under, the place you hop and step to might turn out to be a company you're grateful for. Finding fulfillment from the very start is hard. Tanaka's view is that most people come to say "I'm glad I got to work at this company" only after the fact, as they get praised and needed by those around them and start thinking they might like it or be good at it. Since more people lack something like Shohei Ohtani's "for me, it's baseball," it's fine to go along easygoingly, Tanaka said.

As something you can do starting tomorrow, Tanaka first recommended creating a "personal history." From birth to today, take stock of everything: what you were like in elementary school, what you liked and were good at, what you disliked, and even what kind of people you respected.

Okui wondered why, when talking with people in finance, almost all of them hand over something like a personal history. Tanaka replied that this approach isn't original. Anyone who has received coaching is always made to do it. In coaching, you're basically made to keep taking stock of yourself, digging into questions like when your heart was moved the most, and who you want to be surrounded by and in what state when you are about to die. Through this, you search for what you want to do now and how you want to be. Tanaka said that not just people in finance, but anyone who is reasonably successful has probably reflected on and excavated themselves at least once.

What Tanaka recommends most strongly right now is a diary. At this point, Tanaka had kept one going for about 41 days. Every day, write about what happened—anything at all—in at least three and at most about five lines. Just the events and a little of what you thought is enough.

The reason lies in Tanaka's own experience. When speaking in public, Tanaka recalls tough periods, the Goldman days, and notable events from the past year, but 99% of it has been forgotten. If it had been recorded somewhere, Tanaka could have told many more stories; letting that asset slip away is far too wasteful, Tanaka says. You can also study for reskilling-type certifications, but a diary takes five minutes to write, and since almost everyone throws this away, Tanaka urges people to do it.

The diary you build up may seem worthless now. But Tanaka says that if you share it modestly through your own social media or similar, even within a radius of about three meters, one or two people who take an interest will start to appear. Even then, don't sell it for something like 100 yen; just keep sharing.

Tanaka posts on X every day but doesn't charge for it. Tanaka feels that the content tweeted over the half-year since May 18 is more useful than the published book. Tanaka sees it as putting out for free something that, as a 2,000-yen book, might sell around 300,000 copies.

Tanaka then offered a hypothetical calculation. If Tanaka were to start a note account now and announce one article of 2,000–5,000 characters a week, a 1,000-yen monthly subscription could potentially sell to several thousand people, or possibly tens of thousands. At 1,000 yen for 10,000 people, that's 10 million yen a month, or 120 million yen a year in income. While adding "I'm not going to do it," Tanaka sees that as being within reach now. After half a year on X and appearing in the media this year, Tanaka strongly felt that 1,000 yen × 10,000 people is within the range you can reach through effort. That is exactly why Tanaka argues you should keep your records as a personal asset.

In addition, Tanaka says you should start one habit, ideally two, that builds something up—health, diet, learning, and so on. Tanaka is "a money person, an investment person," yet for some reason also a runner, and for some reason also a radio personality. Multiplying these three together created great value.

To keep going, here too it helps to make a promise to yourself, borrow other people's strength by starting together with others or joining a community, and make a promise to society. In Tanaka's case, exercise records aren't the goal in themselves, but they are made public as GPS data, so slacking off is immediately obvious. People watching will say, "You're a little late today," spotting even a 15-minute oversleep. Going that far is tough, but promises to yourself, others, and society make it easier to keep going. Tanaka's proposal was to start about two habits and also keep a diary. When Okui responded that it makes you want to live and take on challenges worth writing about in a diary, Tanaka agreed that this effect exists too.

The first questioner from the audience said they run a casting company that places celebrities and influencers in advertising. They also said they listen to Tanaka's radio show "Beyond K-point." Tanaka had recently said "I've been overexposed," and the questioner asked whether, going back a year, Tanaka would get the same exposure, and if so, how it should have been done.

Tanaka explained that the remark was half a joke. There were so many comments saying "your content has been worn out and we're sick of it" that Tanaka was just signaling awareness. There's no content out in the world that Tanaka particularly thinks was unnecessary. But Tanaka said they would have liked to control the speed.

Tanaka genuinely believes that "you fall at the same speed you rose." Looking at any celebrity or star, not a single one has kept rising; those who rise peak somewhere and then fall. Now at the end of 2025, Tanaka vaguely recognizes being at about the peak. Since the rise took a year, Tanaka expects a decline at about the same pace through 2026, and thinks it would be a miracle to keep going with the same intensity until the end of next year. Tanaka really wanted to enjoy it over about three years. So Tanaka would have kept the released content as is, but at about a third of the pace. Though not Tanaka's own decision, filmed YouTube videos kept being released every day in the same week. Tanaka reflected that one every two weeks would have been better. Tanaka added that editors apparently have reasons for wanting to release in a particular week, and that people who appear on many shows come across as "I don't know who they are, but maybe they're famous," which boosts viewership.

The second questioner was Suzuki, who said they had lived in a shared house with Okui for about five years. Picturing a "small-fry" wealthy person, not at the scale of 10 billion or 1 trillion yen, but someone with, say, 600 million yen in assets, they asked which of three options was best. Manage 100 million yen yourself to keep up your interest in the world economy, and deposit the remaining 500 million yen in one lump with a major private bank whose minimum is 500 million yen. Deposit about 400 million yen with one whose minimum is 300 million yen, and put the rest into a simplified private banking service that accepts from around 50 million yen. Or manage everything yourself.

Tanaka's answer was that almost none of the people Tanaka has seen use private bankers. Not just at 600 million yen—people in the 500 million to 1 billion yen class, and those with even more, don't use them either. According to Tanaka, private banking is a service for people who are "not really looking to grow it much more, but feel it's a waste to just leave it sitting." Its greatest value is having someone handle the tedious stuff; it is not something that grows your money in the most correct way. Tanaka says this is what everyone in the financial industry thinks, not just the wealthy.

There is also hardly any secret information you can get only through a private banker. What they do have are services like securing VIP concert seats only private bankers can get, or reservations at restaurants booked up three years in advance. A fair number of people deposit 300 or 500 million yen to use those—a kind of "nouveau riche move." But from the perspective of the people around Tanaka who invest, that is completely off. They all either invest themselves or put money directly into hedge funds that take risks and aim for high returns. Hedge funds normally only accept money from institutional investors, but some will take individuals at 1 billion yen, and while they charge fees, there's no private banker in between saying "I'll devise a strategy for your funds." Tanaka explained that this is how the people Tanaka has seen do it.

Finally, when Okui asked for a word looking ahead to next year as 2025 drew to a close, Tanaka said the following. For the past 30 years or so, year-end reviews of the economy and politics have been nothing but gloomy; they have never once been bright. So it can't be helped if the year closes on a gloomy note. But even so, inequality is widening, and the gap between those who acted and those who didn't keeps growing. That, too, is the truth.

By making the effort to come and listen on a weekday evening after work, the attendees have already taken action. Still, there's a big difference between "understanding" and "doing." Tanaka urged them to take home what people who watch finance and the economy are thinking, and to turn it into action starting today or tomorrow—investing if they're going to invest, doing it every day if they're starting a habit. If someone asked on social media tomorrow, "You heard the talk yesterday—did you start anything today?", it would be great if about 95% answered "I'm doing something." Coming here was itself a big step, so take that home as confidence. With that, Tanaka concluded the talk.