Financial freedom – the ability to make life choices without fearing for the future of your finances – is a dream that most people hope to achieve in their lifetime.

Nicole Victoria33-year-old self-made millionaire and financial coach, shared three rules to help everyone take control of their finances and achieve this virtually universal goal. Their suggestions may not meet your expectations.

Here are 3 surprisingly simple rules you should follow to achieve financial freedom, according to a self-made millionaire:

1. Being good with money is not what you know; this is how you behave

“Knowledge won’t get you far until you can learn to get out of your own way so you can actually apply it,” Victoria explained.

Knowledge may be power, but without action, knowledge is useless. You can learn everything there is to know about finances, read every business book, and listen to countless investing podcasts, but until you apply the information, nothing will change or will not improve.

“Think of it this way,” Victoria said. “We all know that vaping is bad for us and that we should eat more vegetables. We know that drinking alcohol makes us feel like shit. But we still do it. It’s not enough to know something… You can know everything about money and still be broke.”

So if you were looking for a sign to take action, put your finances in order and implement new financial practices, this is it!

“Remember, people don’t decide their future,” Victoria added. “They decide their habits, and their habits decide their future.”

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2. Value everything you buy based on how many hours it took to earn the money to pay for it

Imagine you earn $20 from your job and have your eye on a bag of $100. While this may seem like a good deal, consider that it’s 5 hours of work. Is it still worth it?

Money doesn’t just fall into our hands; we have to work for it. SO when considering purchasing an itemdon’t just think of the dollar amount at face value. Think about what you had to do to earn that money, how many hours you worked for it, and how many ungrateful customers you put up with.

“The money in your bank account is not money, it is a physical representation of hours of your life,” Victoria emphasized. “You trade your most limited resource – your life – for money, then let that money, that is, your life, slip away as if nothing happened.”

Is this unnecessary purchase worth it when you remember all the other things you could have been doing instead of working? Probably not.

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3. Stop falling for the “man in the car” paradox

According to Morgan Houselauthor of “The Psychology of Money”, The Man in the Car Paradox states that when people see someone in a cool car, they don’t think the person driving it looks cool.

Instead, they think that if they drove the same car, other people would think they were cool.

Essentially, people want to signal their status and wealth through material possessions, believing that others will admire them. It is a paradox because they believe that items such as an expensive car will attract attention and admiration while not reporting any of these things to the person they saw in the expensive car in the first place.

If you’re making a major purchase, it should be for yourself and not so others can think you’re cool.

“You have to learn that material possessions are not status symbols or signs of success,” Victoria said. “What’s the point of a luxury car if all it does is put you in debt?”

Just like the first rule, action counts. Knowing these rules will not help you achieve financial success, but rather help you implement them in your life.

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Sahlah Syeda is a writer for YourTango covering entertainment, current affairs and human interest topics.