If you were a successful start-up entrepreneur and sold your company for millions, what would you do with the money? Build your dream home? Buy the sports car you always wanted? Pay for your kids’ college?
Tuan Nguyen sold his first company for millions. Then he gave the money away.
Tuan Nguyen is the host of the Biz Dad podcast, a TEDx speaker, and an extreme philanthropist. Tuan has an incredible story that begins as an infant escaping Vietnam, to growing up poor in an immigrant family in Canada, to his current life of sharing his wealth and his spirit.
Tuan continues to build successful businesses and give the money away to charity. In this episode, he talks about how generosity breeds success and what impact our generosity has on our kids.
Tuan Nguyen’s Story
Tuan’s parents fled Vietnam in 1975 just before it was taken over. He drifted in the seas with his parents at only twenty days old. He became so still and quiet, his mother thought she was carrying a dead infant.
Miraculously, a US aircraft carrier came by and picked them up just in time. They brought him to Hawaii and saved Tuan’s fragile life. He has physiological problems to this day, but keeps fit and healthy so his body won’t deteriorate.
Tuan’s family moved to Canada and started a new life in a completely foreign culture. He grew up speaking French, but his parents never learned the new language so he often served as the family negotiator and translator as a kid. He remembers most vividly how his mom was always a ball of positive energy and even though they had little to give, she taught him how to show appreciation.
Tuan’s first dream was to go to medical school because medicine is what saved his life, but at the last minute he had a change of heart. He had been doing lots of volunteer work and wanted to give back to organizations like the ones he needed throughout his challenging life. He withdrew from medical school to start his first online directory company that eventually sold for millions.
What You’ll Learn
- Why he gave all his money away to charity instead of keeping it to provide for his family
- What it was like growing up in an immigrant community
- How he lived among drugs, violence, and crime.
- How hanging on too tightly to the past and one’s culture can be limiting
- A message for those who feel like they’re “just surviving” in life
- How generosity helps solidify his belief in himself
- How resilience and generosity are connected
- How not to think of money and resources as finite, but abundant
- How to know what you deserve to receive
- Why you should face your challenges openly in front of you kids
- How challenges can create abundance
- How to teach kids generosity
RELATED EPISODE:
How to Magnify Your Presence with Your Kids with Jim Sheils
Tuan Nguyen’s Links
ResourcesThe Dad’s Edge AUDIOBOOK on iTunes or Audible
GRAB A COPY OF THE DAD’S EDGE HERE
Originally published on The Good Dad Project
Photo courtesy of author