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You should always keep something to yourself. You should never lay down your whole hand. You should always keep an ace in the hole.

An “ace in the hole” is something about you that no one else knows or understands. An ace in the hole is not about what you do. It is about WHY you do it.

In his book “No More Mondays”, Dan Miller writes about a time when he was broke and he had creditors coming to his house daily, threatening to take the house if he didn’t pay up on some of his debts (debts that he was trying to pay off). He explains that during this time in life, when everyone was trying to get every ounce of property that he owned, he always left a $100 bill in his pocket to remind himself that he was never broke. This $100 bill was an ace in the hole.

An ace in the hole gives you confidence and it gives you leverage. Once you have played your ace, you usually can’t play it again, so choose wisely. It is always wiser to wait. The very fact that you don’t show your cards is what gives you leverage. You keep the ace in the hole to yourself, only sharing it with a few people, and even when you share it, they still won’t understand what it is. To the outside, it might look like a regular $100 bill. To Dan Miller, it was the confidence to stay strong for his family. That’s an ace in the hole

What’s my ace in the hole? Well, if I told you, it would no longer be my ace in the hole. I’m not going to show you my hand. I might reveal little whispers here and there, but I’m not playing my aces. I’m holding them close to my chest. I might drop them at age 34 or 35, but not at age 27.

I meet so many people who I am convinced have an ace in the hole, and I have no idea what it is. There is something about them that makes them tick, that makes them do what they do, and I don’t know what it is. I walk around and I wonder: what ace is that person holding? What is their secret that, even if they told me, I probably wouldn’t understand?

The ultimate reason to leave an ace in the hole: watch the video below (you may have to click on the video to get it to play, depending on your browser). This is what happens when you leave people guessing. It’s all about leverage.