Jeff Olson is an experienced businessman and the author of the best-selling self-help book The Slight Edge. He hails from Albuquerque, New Mexico, where he was raised by a single mother, nicknamed “Matter-of-fact Rose” for her consistency. She worked a low-wage job as a church’s administrative assistant and kept a regular, diligent schedule to raise her children, eventually saving enough money over her lifetime to quietly become a millionaire. His father, a World War II veteran, passed away at the age of 41 when Olson was only 11 years old. Olson has two siblings, and they were raised with a modest lifestyle. Because of his mother’s continuous frugality, Olson never knew his mother achieved financial freedom until he brought his finances up to her many years later.

Before achieving his current success, Olson meandered along different paths, like doing manual labor on a golf course in Florida, where he was known as Gorgeous George (2). Olson refers to this version of himself as a “beach bum” because his daily habits weren’t moving him forward. Though he worked hard every day, he made no progress toward the life he wanted to live.