The wallet that came back.

My wife lost her wallet in a New York City cab three weeks ago.

Not misplaced. Not stolen. Just gone. Left in the backseat of a yellow cab somewhere between a restaurant in Midtown and our hotel.

When she realized what had happened, she was devastated. Not just because of the hassle of canceling cards and replacing her driver's license. But because her wallet had meaningful stuff in it. Pictures of our dogs. A handwritten note I'd given her years ago that she still carried around.

And there was also $450 in cash to pay our pet sitter when we got home after the weekend.

I could see her mentally preparing for all of it to be gone forever.

But I told her something that probably sounded pretty insane in that moment:

"Someone's going to return it."

She looked at me like I'd lost my mind. This is New York City we're talking about. Her wallet was in a cab that could be anywhere, and the odds of getting it back were pretty darn slim.

But I couldn't shake this feeling that she would.

The bet he made

Four days later, a small FedEx box showed up at our house.

Jennifer opened it in the kitchen. Everything was still there. The photos. The note. Her cards. Even the $450 in cash. I've never seen her look so relieved.

The guy who found it was in his early twenties. He'd tracked Jennifer down on Facebook, went out of his way to overnight it back, spent his own money to mail it, and sent us all of the tracking information.

We Venmo'd him $500 in return. Through a Facebook message, he told us that it covered his rent in a small apartment he shared with friends outside of Madison Square Garden.

Here's the thing that keeps messing with my head: This kid had $450 cash in his hands. He could have just taken it, thrown away the wallet, and no one would have ever known.

But he made a different choice. He bet that doing the right thing would work out better than taking the money.

And he was right. The $450 he could have taken would have almost covered his rent. Instead, he got $500 and the knowledge that his bet paid off.

That's not luck. That's the same pattern I see in every successful entrepreneur I know.

What I keep seeing

The most successful entrepreneurs I know are givers.

Not in some performative, post-about-it-on-LinkedIn way. They're just genuinely helpful people who show up when someone needs help.

They promote their friends' books and businesses. They make introductions to other helpful people. They share what they know without worrying about someone stealing their ideas.

They return wallets.

A few weeks ago, a guy from Nigeria booked a call with me on Intro. When we got on, he told me he didn't need consulting. He just wanted to say thank you. He'd followed advice from something I wrote years ago, built a successful business, and bought his dream house on a golf course.

He paid me $750 just to say thank you for something I'd written that I didn't even remember writing.

I see this same thing happening with other successful people I know. They help people for years without keeping score, and then opportunities show up out of nowhere. Introductions. Partnerships. Deals. Not because they were "networking strategically," but because they made someone's life easier once, and that person remembered.

It's the same bet the 22-year-old made. Do the right thing. Trust it'll be a better move than the alternative.

And the math works out more often than not.

The takers exist

Look, there are takers out there.

I've helped people who turned out to be the wrong kind of people to help. I call folks like that a "Tom Sawyer." They'll get you to do the work or support the thing, and they have no intention of helping you back.

Some people see generosity as weakness. They're usually the same kind of people who would have taken the $450 and run.

Are there complete assholes who are wildly successful? Of course. But I'd wager they're outliers. And the ones I've met seem miserable in ways that money doesn't fix.

The takers usually get what's coming to them eventually, not in some cosmic karma way, but in a very practical way. Word gets around. People stop taking their calls. Doors start closing.

Meanwhile, the givers keep compounding. The 22-year-old made one choice to return a wallet, and now he's got $500 and a story about how doing the right thing paid off. Next time he finds himself in a similar situation, what do you think he'll do?

That's how this all works. You make the bet once, it pays off, you remember, and then you keep making the same bet over and over.

The bottom line

The wallet came back because a 22-year-old kid bet that doing the right thing would work out better than taking the cash.

He was right.

And I think the most successful people I know have been making that same bet their entire careers. Not simply because they're saints or whatever. But because they're kind-hearted people, and the karma it creates is simply the cream on top.

The givers win in the long run. Not always. Not every time. But consistently enough that it's the better bet.

So here's my question: What's the bet you're not making because you're afraid it won't pay off?

Reply and tell me. While I can't reply to everyone, I read every response.

That's all for this week.

See you next Saturday.

P.S. The 22-year-old is a server at a restaurant trying to get into sales. I told him to ping me when he needs help. His bet will likely continue paying off over time.