I'll never forget the first time I read Carter G. Woodson's The Mis-Education of the Negro. I was sitting in my small apartment, already years into my journey of financial self-education, and it felt like someone had reached across a century to describe my exact experience.
Woodson wrote in 1933 that Black Americans were being educated to serve a system, not to own it. He said we were being trained to be consumers, not producers. To work for others, not to build for ourselves. And here I was, 100 years later, realizing that nothing had fundamentally changed.
The Same Chains, Different Packaging
Growing up in the projects of Long Island, I was taught the same script that millions of Black kids are still being taught today: get good grades, go to college, get a good job, and work hard for 40 years. Nobody—and I mean nobody—ever sat me down and explained how wealth actually works. Nobody taught me about ownership. Nobody explained that the stock market wasn't just for "rich white people." Nobody told me that I could build a system that paid me instead of me always paying into someone else's system.
That's not an accident. That's exactly what Woodson was warning us about.
He wrote: "When you control a man's thinking you do not have to worry about his actions. You do not have to tell him not to stand here or go yonder. He will find his 'proper place' and will stay in it."
Read that again. When you control someone's thinking about money, you don't have to physically stop them from building wealth. They'll stop themselves. They'll say things like "investing is too risky" or "the stock market is gambling" or "that's not for people like us." I said those exact words for years.
The Modern Miseducation Playbook
Let me break down how this miseducation still operates today, because once you see it, you can't unsee it.
First, they teach us to fear ownership. We're told that buying stocks is risky, but nobody mentions that not owning assets is the biggest risk of all. We're comfortable spending $200 on sneakers every month, but terrified to invest $200 in dividend-paying stocks that could pay us back for life. That's not natural—that's trained behavior.
Second, they teach us to worship jobs instead of building businesses. Don't get me wrong—there's nothing wrong with having a job. I've had plenty. But when a job becomes your only strategy, you're building someone else's dream, not your own. Woodson saw this coming. He wrote about how we were being trained to be "hewers of wood and drawers of water"—essential labor, but never ownership.
Third, they teach us that wealth-building is complicated. It's not. You know what's complicated? Being broke. You know what's complicated? Working two jobs and still not being able to afford an emergency. Building wealth through dividend investing is actually simple—buy shares of profitable companies, collect the dividends, reinvest them, repeat. But if they can convince you it's too complex for you to understand, you'll never even try.
What Woodson Didn't Live to See
Here's what breaks my heart: Woodson died in 1950, before the Civil Rights Movement, before the explosion of the modern stock market, before technology made investing accessible to everyday people. He never got to see a world where a person with $100 and a smartphone could start building a dividend portfolio that pays them every single month.
He warned us about the problem, but he didn't live to see the solution become this accessible.
That's why I wrote The Financial Mis-Education of Black America. Because we're living in a moment that Woodson could only dream about. The barriers that existed in his time—legal segregation, outright exclusion from financial markets, lack of access to information—those are largely gone. What remains is the mental programming. The miseducation.
Breaking the Cycle Starts With Truth
I'm not here to sugarcoat this. The system was designed to keep us dependent. Woodson was right about that. But here's the truth he would want us to know: understanding the system is the first step to beating it.
You can't change what you don't acknowledge. If you're still telling yourself that investing is "not for you," that's not your voice—that's the miseducation talking. If you're still waiting for someone to give you permission to start building wealth, you're still playing by their rules.
I grew up with nothing. I was taught nothing about money. But I asked different questions. I challenged the narrative. And over 20 years of study, trial, error, and relentless commitment, I figured it out. Not because I'm special—because I refused to accept the script I was given.
The Next 100 Years Starts Now
Woodson's warning was clear: if we don't control our own economic education, someone else will control it for us—and they won't have our best interests at heart.
So here's my question for you: Are you going to let the next 100 years look like the last 100 years? Or are you ready to rewrite the script?
Because the tools are here. The access is here. The information is here. What's missing is the decision. The decision to stop accepting the miseducation. The decision to learn how money really works. The decision to become an owner, not just a consumer.
That's what this trilogy is about. That's what the Wealth Builders Mastermind Group is about. That's what this entire movement is about.
Woodson gave us the warning. Now it's our job to heed it.