About Ken

About Ken Honda

On a mission to empower you to live wealthier and happier lives by healing your relationship with money

Ken Honda is a leader in helping people grow and change for the better. He’s the first person from Japan to join the respected Transformational Leadership Council, a group of global leaders dedicated to making positive changes around the world. As such, he stands as a beacon of leadership and enlightenment in a global community of change-makers.

Ken is Japan’s most recognizable and influential money teacher, affectionately known as the ‘Zen Millionaire,’ and the ‘Happy Panda.’ With over 30 years of experience, he has inspired others to find happiness and success through his 120 books including the internationally best-selling book, “Happy Money (Simon & Schuster, 2019),” translated into 15 languages.

From his financial experience as owner and director of several companies, his writings are a fusion between finance and personal development. He offers a well-rounded approach to building wealth and finding fulfillment through self-analysis.

Since 2001, Ken’s books have sold over eight million copies worldwide, exploring the intricate relationship between money and happiness. Recently, he has expanded his reach to English-speaking audiences through books like Happy Money and True Wealth, aiming to spread his legacy globally. Alongside his literary contributions, Ken offers courses, captivating speaking engagements, and transformative retreats.

Ken's Story

AN EARLY START

Even as a child, Ken noticed the distinction between money that brought satisfaction and money that brought discontent.

When he was eight, he worked in his father’s successful accounting firm. Primarily serving tea to clients, which allowed him to get to know his father’s clientele.

He observed that some clients appeared constantly agitated and rushed, while others exuded a sense of calm and ease. Furthermore, he observed how, over time, some clients grew wealthier while others experienced financial decline.

One day, still a young boy, Ken discovered – the hard way – just how much of an impact money can have on our lives. After learning of a family friend who took both his own life and the lives of his family due to a run-in with loan sharks, Ken became determined to understand why something as ubiquitous as money could have such a deep influence on our behavior.

In college, Ken continued to observe this disparity among affluent individuals—some seemed fulfilled, while others appeared discontented. This observation persisted until he had a revelatory encounter at a party. A woman described the money in his wallet as ‘happy money.’

Ah ha!

A GIFT IS BORN

Ken was 29 when he first “retired” to welcome his newborn daughter into the world. At the time, he thought he was “done” with work. He had owned a prosperous consultant and accounting business.

Little did he realize his second “career”, impacting millions by helping them transform their reality by changing their relationship with money was born.

THE STORY OF HAPPY MONEY

That career started innocently enough on a beautiful, sunny day. Ken took his daughter to the park to play. While there, he witnessed a mother and her young daughter, who was about the same age as Ken’s daughter, fighting.

The mother was upset and in a hurry. She yelled, “Your mom has to go to work! So, let’s go home.” But her daughter kept saying, “We just got here. I want to play more. Please?”

After a few minutes of battle, the reluctant girl was dragged home.

Ken felt so terrible for the little girl and her mother for having to choose her job over an afternoon playing with her child, he decided he needed to do something. Not just for that mother but for all the parents and people struggling to make ends meet. He wanted to take away everyone’s pain and frustration and stress around money.

So, that day, after he finished playing with his daughter in the park, he sat down and wrote an essay about all the wisdom he gained over the years about making money and becoming prosperous.

That essay was the start of what would become Happy Money, the book you see here now.

Money is Energy

It can be either happy or unhappy.

When you adjust your perspective on money, you can see it as a positive or negative flow, depending on the energy you possess when you are receiving or spending it.

Receiving and spending money well generally contributes to a happy life. Conversely, if you consistently feel tension or fear surrounding spending and receiving money, chances are you carry that energy into most situations.

“Happy Money” serves as your invitation to release the unhappiness associated with money and embrace the influx of happy money, leading to a new world of abundance.

“Whatever happens, you can say thank you. Thank you are the two most powerful words that will help you start to transform your relationship with money.”

– Ken Honda

Ken’s LifeWork Passion

Ken has firsthand experience of life's greatest offerings and is driven by a passion to inspire you to also create the life of your dreams with ease.

Today, many of us believe that wealth is a direct result of hard work – a notion amplified by the economic uncertainty today. If you’re among those who believe that career and money alone lead to wealth, my book, True Wealth will challenge your perspective and shake things up for you.

The hard work and hustling mindset is an outdated belief system that actually amplifies scarcity thinking.

It pushes you to operate from a place of lack and to believe that there’s never enough – whether it’s money, time, or opportunities

So, what’s the answer to becoming truly wealthy then?
I believe it begins with discovering and embracing your Lifework and fundamentally transforming your understanding of abundance.

Lifework, as I describe it, happens when you align your every action with the person you intuitively desire to be, the work that makes your heart sing, and your soul life vision.

For the first time ever in English, I introduce concepts that I believe are crucial for your life today like how you can consciously attract more synchronicities and luck to your life.

Embracing these principles not only elevates your experience of life but also cultivates ease, intuition, bliss, and abundance.
Meaning, a life that is also rich in authentic connection, fulfillment, purpose, and perpetual joy.
Are you ready to embrace the true richness of life that awaits you?