Achieving financial freedom is a big goal, but a goal that can be achieved through consistent efforts over time. Becoming wealthy is possible with the right formula and process. In this post, you’ll learn about steps to financial freedom and financial success.

Are you looking to become financially free? Does financial freedom sound amazing to you? What if you could become financially free?

What if you could skip your commute and spend time with your friends or family uninterrupted all day? Wouldn’t that be fantastic?

Make no mistake, financial freedom is quite a lofty goal, but is possible. If you decide financial freedom is what you want, there are a number of personal finance habits you can cultivate to become wealthy.

If you want to become better with your personal finances, you’ll definitely want to read this post all the way through.

In this post, I’m going to share with you a seven step plan to get to financial independence – the ultimate personal finance goal.

First though, let’s talk about what financial freedom is and why becoming financially free should be a goal of yours.

What is Financial Freedom?

Before talking about the steps for achieving financial freedom, let’s talk about what financial freedom is and why you should care about financial freedom.

Financial freedom, or also known as financial independence, is the ability to do what you want with your time and energy without having to worry about money at all.

Being financially free could mean having enough money saved up in bank accounts and investments where you don’t need to work anymore.

Financial freedom could also mean owning a number of businesses which provide you with enough cash flow where you have your bills paid each month without having to work.

Becoming financially free is something everyone wants deep down (whether they consciously know it, or subconsciously know it), but not everyone knows how to get there, or knows why it would be empowering.

For me, financial freedom means being able to do what I want to do when I want to do it. No silly corporate meetings, no talking to pushy co-workers, no commutes – only working on hobbies and my passions.

What do you think? Wouldn’t it be great to be able to wake up each day and do what you are passionate about?

This is what financial freedom is all about. Now, let’s get on to the steps to financial freedom.

The 7 Steps to Financial Freedom

You may have heard of the seven steps to financial freedom before. Maybe you haven’t. There are two versions of the seven steps to financial freedom I’ve come across over the past few years.

One is by Dave Ramsey and the other is by Tony Robbins.

Dave Ramsey’s 7 Baby Steps to Financial Freedom

The first seven steps to financial freedom is from the one and only, Dave Ramsey.  Dave Ramsey, for those of you who don’t know, is a personal finance and money management expert with a radio show and many courses and workshops that help people get their finances in order.

Dave Ramsey’s 7 baby steps to financial freedom are:

• Baby Step 1 – Build a $1,000 emergency fund
• Baby Step 2 – Pay off all debt using the debt snowball
• Baby Step 3 – Save 3 to 6 months of expenses in savings
• Baby Step 4 – Invest 15% of household income into Roth IRAs and pre-tax retirement
• Baby Step 5 – College funding for children
• Baby Step 6 – Pay off home early
• Baby Step 7 – Build wealth and give

I like these, and completely agree that for most people, these steps are great for building wealth and reaching financial freedom.

If a person doesn’t have $1,000 in the bank, then that should be goal number one on the way to financial freedom. Next, pay off your consumer debt and start saving for the future.

Finally, become fully debt free and share your wealth with the less fortunate.

If you follow these steps, you will be wealthy – I have no doubt.

Tony Robbins’ 7 Steps to Financial Freedom

The second set of seven steps to financial freedom are from Tony Robbins. Tony Robbins wrote Money: Master the Game a few years ago and goes over his seven steps to financial freedom in it.

Tony Robbins’ 7 steps to financial freedom are:

• Step 1 – Make the most important financial decision of your life (Decide to be the investor, not a consumer.)
• Step 2 – Become an insider: know the rules before you start investing
• Step 3 – Make the game winnable through knowledge
• Step 4 – Make the most important investment decision of your life (dollar cost average, asset allocation)
• Step 5 – Create a lifetime income plan (consider insurance and annuities for income)
• Step 6 – Invest like the 0.001 percent (model the portfolios of hedge funds)
• Step 7 – Just do it, enjoy it, and share it!

I read Money: Master the Game a few years ago and I really enjoyed it.  While there was quite a bit of fluff, there were many actionable tips and takeaways for me to implement in my life.

Step two of Tony Robbins’ steps is all about managing fees, how financial advisers may not be the best route to go, and buying and holding are all things to know and consider before investing.

Finally, he talks about alternative routes to income and wealth once we have a substantial nest egg. It’s one thing to have a lot of money, but it’s another to have a lot of money that is protected from disaster.

I want to be unique with my content and ideas. Both of these plans have a lot of merit, and I’ve built off of them and created my own seven step plan to financial freedom for you.

Our 7 Step Plan to Financial Freedom

Coming up with a seven step plan was tough. Everyone’s situation is different – and with anything you read or consume, it’s important to take a step back and see how it can fit into your life.

All I can share and point to is my seven step plan to financial freedom. The following list is what I’m personally trying to do to grow my wealth, and get on the way to financial freedom:

1. Build an emergency fund
2. Pay down consumer debt
3. Save 10% of my income
4. Learn about investing
5. Invest in yourself and grow your income
6. Stay consistent
7. Give back with your time or money

Let’s go into each of these in more detail.

Step 1 for Financial Freedom: Build an Emergency Fund

An emergency fund is most important for your personal finance success.

It’s truly tragic – around 70% of Americans don’t have $1,000 in their bank account.

What happens when the furnace or AC goes out in your house? What happens if your car breaks down, or you get sick? There’s so many unplanned emergencies to account for.

Having a safety net will be beneficial for your financial well-being, and will also be great for peace of mind.

Saving up 3 to 6 months expenses, or even having $5,000 saved is a great starting point for your emergency fund.

Step 2 for Financial Freedom: Pay off Consumer Debt

Debt sucks. Debt is a restriction on your life, and does not allow you to live the life you want and deserve to live.

Getting out of debt is possible by spending less money, and applying debt payoff strategies.

After getting your debt knocked out, you can start focusing on offensively building your wealth.

Step 3 for Financial Freedom: Save 10% of your Income

After building an emergency fund and destroying your debt, the next steps are to start saving. Take 10% of your income, and start saving it for the future.

After paying off your consumer debt, take that money and start directing it towards investment and savings accounts for the future.

Get your savings rate up!

Step 4 for Financial Freedom: Learn about Investing

You need to learn how to invest.

Financial freedom isn’t going to come through investing in CDs. The only thing guaranteed about a CD is you are guaranteed to lose money due to inflation! (Okay, in some situations and rate environments they are okay – but not right now)

Do you want to be an active investor or passive investor? Active investors should look at starting businesses or buying real estate. Do you want to sit back and watch your money grow without much work? Stick it in the stock market.

These questions are worth asking yourself.

After figuring out your goals, next learn about the different fees, downfalls and traps in your chosen market.

For example, paying a financial adviser 2% over 30 years could amount hundreds of thousands of dollars lost!

With these information, you can wisely grow your wealth and become wealth over time.

Step 5 for Financial Freedom: Invest in Yourself and Grow Your Income

The best investment you can make is in yourself.

Your level of success will rarely exceed your level of personal development, because success is something you attract by the person you become.

If you are looking to make more money and be successful, then you will have to work on yourself.

If you increase your income, you will be able to save more. By saving more, you will be able to increase your investments.

All of these steps go back to investing in yourself and improving as a person.

Step 6 for Financial Freedom: Stay Consistent

Paying off debt and then going back into debt isn’t going to help on the way to financial freedom. Saving $5,000 in one year isn’t going to amount to much.

BUT, saving $5,000 a year for 30 years and investing it in something returning 5-7% a year can grow to hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Consistency is the key to everything.

Step 7 for Financial Freedom: Give Back

No matter how wealthy you become, there’s one thing you should always remember: IT DOESN’T MATTER UNLESS YOU SHARE IT WITH OTHERS.

Giving you time, money, and knowledge can help others achieve their goals and dreams.

We make a living by what we earn. We make a life by what we give.

With these 7 steps, you will be on your way to financial freedom. However, if you are still struggling to get past step 1, below are 2 easy steps you can take for personal finance success.

2 Easy Steps to Take for Financial Success

Make no mistake, becoming better with your money and personal finances can seem tough.

However, there are two easy steps you can take for overnight financial success:

1. Tracking your income and expenses
2. Learning about personal finance

Step 1: Track Your Income and Expenses

What gets measured gets managed.

Knowing where you are financially is so important to financial success.

Consider the following example of two people: Mark tracks his income and expenses every month, and Lisa doesn’t track her income or expenses at all.

Mark wants to retire in 15 years, and has identified that by saving $500 a month, he will reach his goal with average market gains.

Lisa also wants to retire in 15 years, but doesn’t know she needs to save $500 a month, and as a result, is only putting $250 into her retirement account each month.

Mark saves $400 a month right now, but has identified he can cut $100 out of his food spending each month and put that towards retirement.

Lisa spends $300 a month on random shopping expenses (of which she doesn’t know the dollar amount), and doesn’t realize that she doesn’t need these random shopping expenses.

Who do you think will be successful? Mark, who tracks his financial situation, or Lisa, who doesn’t track her financials at all?

I’m going to guess Lisa will be mighty disappointed at the end of the 15 year period.

How to Track Your Income and Expenses Each Month

Each month, I pull all of my transactions from my Mint account into my income statement spreadsheet.

I categorize my transactions and see exactly where my spending and savings rate landed during the month, and look to see if there are any trends forming.

You could download these transactions from your bank directly, you could use similar tools to Mint, or you can analyze your income and expenses through your online banking application – all are acceptable.

For me, I see the importance of tracking my income and expenses by looking at my spending in various categories. I typically spend $300-400 on food and drink a month.

I know this as I’ve spent $300-400 a month for the past 18 months consistently. Some months are worse than others, and in those months, I may spend closer to $500 on food and drink.

If I didn’t know how much I was spending on food in a given month, maybe I’d continue to spend that amount month over month, or even start spending more.  Let’s say, somehow, I started spending $300 more a month on food and drink because I wasn’t tracking it.

Now, all of a sudden, I could end up spending an additional $3,600 a year ($300*12 = $3,600) on food and drink, just because I’m not keeping track of my expenses!

That’s a lot of money that could be better served somewhere else.

Tracking our cash flow also makes us think more about our finances.  If I wasn’t tracking my expenses, I wouldn’t have this mental trigger to keep my spending down on food and drink.

There are a number of tools and apps you can use to track your income and expenses.

If you aren’t already tracking your income and expenses, and you don’t want to click through to my other post, I have a spreadsheet for download which you can get by putting your email into the box below.

Step 2: Be Consistent, and Learn with Books, Blogs, and Podcasts

Consistency is the key to being successful in this world.

Consistency involves working, learning, and growing a little bit each and every day on the way to your goals.

It’s not enough to invest $100 one time and let it sit.  It’s not enough to cut expenses one month, and then revert back to your previous spending habits.

I can guarantee you short term success will not lead to long term success unless the short term actions are internalized and made into long term habits.

Consider this example: would you rather receive $1 million dollars today, or would you rather take a penny, but have it double every day for a month? Naturally, most people would say, “Give me the million bucks!”

But if we step back and actually analyze the other side, we can see what a big mistake that might be.

The first day, you have 2 cents, the second day, you have 4 cents, the third day, you have 8 cents… two weeks in, you have $81.92. Well, guess what? At the end of the month, you’d end up with over $10 million dollars. You only started off with a penny, what happened?

Yes, you started off with a small amount, and for a long time, you didn’t have much, but 30 days later, boom, $10 million bucks – much more than $1 million!!!

This is the same concept as the power of compounding over time.

If you save $10,000 a year for 30 years and achieve a 7% rate of return, you will become a millionaire.

This is a mathematical fact.  It’s the power of consistency and compounding at work.

Applying Consistency and Learning in Your Life

The penny example we just went through above can be applied to the base of your knowledge on personal finance, not just investing or savings.

I’ll be the first to admit, I’m not a personal finance expert.

I have no idea the intricacies of Roth IRAs, 403(b)s, or how 1031 exchanges work in real estate. That being said, I know that I could learn any of these things if I wanted to. There are millions of words published in text and voice out in the world and on the internet.

While hopefully this site will be a great starting point for you, there’s so much more out there. For example, there are so many personal finance resources which all have something to offer.

Reading these different personal finance blogs, listening to podcasts, and reading books are great ways to increase your financial knowledge.

If you want to become an expert on the stock market, take a step today. Maybe you want to build your understanding on different forms of debt – take a step today.

For you, if there is anything you want to accomplish this year, or in life, just take a step. That’s all you can do initially.

No one goes from 0 to 100 in an hour or a day.

But, by going from 0 to 1 to 2 to 3, you can get there over time.  It’s about taking baby steps to start, and as you get more comfortable, you can increase the pace – in other words, you sometimes have to slow down to go fast!

What you do today matters. What you do every day matters.

Successful people are those who understand that the little choices they make matter, and because of that they choose to do things that seem to make no difference at all in the act of doing them, and they do them over and over and over until the compound effect kicks in.

Start Tracking and Improve Your Financial Situation

Tracking your income and expenses, and having a hunger for knowledge, will get you firmly on the path to financial success.

Start with identifying your why, then start tracking your income and expenses with a spreadsheet or online tool – and continue to learn about personal finance, investments, and building wealth!

Having these two steps in mind will guide you on your path to your financial goals.

Over time, by having your why and a plan, you will be able to make smart financial decisions and stay on the path to personal finance success.

Get on the Path to Financial Freedom and Become Financially Free

With the information presented in this post, you now have three different, seven step plans to financial freedom to draw inspiration from and put into action.

After reading this, take a step back to reflect on these different plans, and how they may align with your own plan.

If you aren’t quite yet on the path to financial freedom, implement the 2 easy steps to take to become better with your finances, and you’ll be in a better place financially soon.

Take action today and get on your way to financial freedom!

Having balance in life is very important. Working too much and always being on the go can be detrimental for you. Likewise, being lazy and ignoring responsibility can make it hard to achieve your goals. In this article on living a balanced lifestyle, you’ll learn about 8 tips you can apply to live a balanced life and how to find the right balance in life.

Becoming better as a person, or becoming better in a certain interest can be overwhelming. Balancing new information, past experiences, and the rest of your life can be difficult.

Balance is something I think about most these days when looking to live a fulfilling life.

Being balanced in life can help solve so many problems.

I ask myself, “am I in balance or do I need to reassess where I’m at in my life? Do I need to take a break, or should I push through?”

How to live a balanced life and how to find the right balance in life is hard, but can be done with the right guidance and patience.

What I’ve learned is balance is incredibly important in life, and in this post, I’ll be sharing with you why balance is so important, how to find the right balance in life, and 8 tips you can use to create more balance in your life.

Finding The Right Balance is Very Important for Success

Balance is one of the most important things to create in your life. This may be obvious, but having the right balance is very hard to do in practice.

For example, too much work will result in becoming burnt out.

Too much play will result in no work getting done.

Spending too much time with friends could lead to a lack of identity.

Spending too much time alone could lead to loneliness and one way of thought.

Too much sleep can lead to a number of health issues.

Too little sleep and your energy and work will suffer from lack of clarity and focus.

Doing too much exercise will lead to overuse injuries, and sitting on the couch all day will lead to small muscles and droopy skin.

You probably know the saying, too much of a good thing can be a bad thing? Well that’s what we are talking about here 🙂

Balance is key and important in life because with many things, being extreme is typically a detriment to living our lives the right way.

Many of these things we know, but don’t take action to find the right balance.

The Many Areas Where Balance Can Be Ruined

While it might be impossible to be completely balanced in life, there are many areas, some of which we’ve touched on earlier, where balance could be ruined.

Being completely balanced in life is almost impossible, but these areas can give us a better picture of what to focus on if we want to find balance in life.

The areas where you need to focus on balance the most are the following:

• Being Out of Balance at Work
  • Getting yelled at by your boss, working 80 hour weeks, or not having work at all might not be the best for your long term well being.
  • Balance at work is having time for development, some busy times, some fun times, and opportunities to do what you want with your time (as ultimately, you spend more hours at your job than you probably do anything else other than sleep!)
• Being Out of Balance in Our Sleep
  • Always being tired, because you go to bed too late, or sleeping in every day might not be optimal. Over time, over and under sleeping can take a toll on your body and mind.
  • While on the weekends, it is nice to sleep in once and a while, doing so every day can affect your focus and productivity.
  • Likewise, too little sleep, and you really will be dragging!
• Being Out of Balance in Our Health and Exercise
  • This might be an obvious one: sit on the couch all day, and you’ll quickly find yourself out of shape. Work out all day, and you may get injured from overuse.
  • A balance between activity and rest will lead to a healthy lifestyle.
• Being Out of Balance in Our Eating Habits
  • Another seemingly obvious one: eat only junk food, and you’ll get a stomach ache. Eat too much, and you’ll start to put on pounds. Eat too little, and you’ll lose muscle. What about too healthy? Eating too healthy… well, some things can be good in moderation!
• Being Out of Balance in Our Relationships
  • Sometimes it’s great to see your friends, and sometimes to great to be alone.
  • If you are with your friends all the time, work and responsibility will be put aside.
  • If you spend a lot of time alone, sometimes that will keep you narrow minded and not in touch with reality. There’s a lot of world to see out there people!

Like I said above, there are many things in life we need to balance, and this is just the start to finding the right balance for a great life.

Finding balance is an exercise in self-awareness and knowing where you are in life.

I’m going to share with you where I am in my life with my thoughts and actions, and then will talk about the tips for you to find balance in life.

Finding Balance and Trying to Live a Balanced Life

Over the past few years, I’ve been trying to find balance in my life in my work, my play, my exercise, my diet, my sleep, and my hustles.

Recently, I’ve been thinking a lot about balance in my work and play, and also in my sleep.

I’m pretty busy, with a few side hustles, and a day job.

During this past winter, I got into a habit of going to bed between 11:30 and 1, and getting up at 8 am, right before scrambling off to work. With the usual winter morning darkness, I struggled to wake up at any time earlier than 7 (even if I went to bed early), and decided that it would be better for me to stay up later and sleep in.

Now, I’m finding that with the sun coming in at 5 am, I’m able to wake up if I need to, and also sleep in if I please.

Some days, if I’m really busy, I’ll get up at 5 am. Other days, if I’m tired, I’ll sleep in and get up around 7:30 or 8. I’ve found a balance between more sleep and less sleep.

Similarly, I’ve found a balance in my diet and exercise, where I eat well most of the time, and exercise a few times a week. With this, I’ve stayed relatively in shape, and am still able to play pick-up sports and not be too tired.

I’m sure you have some of the same thoughts about activities in your life.

You want to become a Rich? Drop the 9 to 5 and Start Working 95

About a year ago, I came across an interesting article talking about Grant Cardone, a super salesman, entrepreneur, and millionaire. In the article, he says, “Most people work 9 to 5. I work 95 hours (per week). If you ever want to be a millionaire, you need to stop doing the 9 to 5 and start doing 95.”

This quote has stuck with me ever since, if wealth accumulation is my goal, then it’s crucial for me to start putting in more and more hours to get to this goal.

I want to become financially independent. At the end of the day, ultimate failure to me is not being able to support myself and my family.

If I could have 1 thing in life, the ability to provide for my family is the only thing I could ever ask for.

As my wealth and abilities grow, my tune has started to change. I feel very confident I can become rich without sacrificing as much in the short term.

I can sleep 8 hours, exercise, see friends, and still reach my goals.

My mindset towards grinding has changed through reflection and reading.

My friend Matt, the founder of Optimize Your Life, talks a lot about finding balance in life. Matt says,

“If we want both success and happiness, we need to make sure to give attention to all of the different areas of our lives. We cannot ignore our marriage to further our career success. We cannot ignore our health to have more time for our relationships. Ignoring our finances to further our friendships will not lead to success.”

I’m trying to find balance in my life right now. I have my goals and my purpose. There’s so much I want to experience, to learn, and to do.

At the same time though, I need to be cognizant of what is also important to me: my relationships, my health, and my finances.

Now, I want to discuss an interesting topic: the pressure of expectations.

How to Deal with Expectations When Trying to Find Balance

In a number of conversations I’ve been having with friends about their thoughts on their goals, I’ve been bringing up balance and trying to discuss the expectations around the situation.

When I set out to do something, a lot of it is from within and what I want to do with my life. Maybe I’m a little bit of a rebel, but these days I try to stay grounded and not influenced by outside opinions or expectations.

I stand up for what I believe in, and stand down for things I need more information on.

With some of the struggles of balance I’ve been learning about with others around me, I try to understand a little more and ask if the struggles are coming from the inside or outside.

Are you driven from within to go and accomplish your goals, OR are you driven to accomplish your goals because you are trying to impress others and make other people happy?

I’ve found that rarely will looking to impress others leads to a happy and fulfilling life.

At the same time though, at work, there are tasks I have to get done for others and I’ll do those happily because my paycheck helps me achieve my financial goals.

After figuring out if the pressure is internal or external, you can start to go down the question rabbit hole.

If the pressures are external, is there anything you can change about the situation to reduce this pressure? Could you change jobs? Change scenery? Is the community you are surrounding yourself with the right community?

If the pressures are internal, why are you expecting so much out of yourself? Could you do more? Are your priorities in the right place? Are there things you could be doing which would allow you to work smarter, not harder?

Starting with this question can help with the question of how to balance your life to better align your actions with a less stressful and more fulfilling experience.

Now, let’s get into the tips for creating balance and living a balanced life.

8 Ways You Can Find Balance in your Work and Leisure

Are you looking for more balance in your life? Are you looking for the right balance for happiness and success in your life?

Here are 8 steps you can take to live a more balanced life and to find balance in your life:

1. Breathe and relax
2. Figure out what’s important to you
3. Take actions to reduce noise in your life
4. Become more self-aware and understand yourself
5. Understand the purpose of setting goals
6. Let things go
7. Understand progress takes time and it’s okay to take breaks
8. Live life at your own pace and adjust over time

Let’s dive into each of these 8 balanced living tips below.

1. Take a deep breath

First, take a deep breath and collect yourself. Everyone gets stressed out from time to time, and that’s okay.

Breathing allows you to slow down, get your bearings, and relax.

Your brain needs air to think and process information! Give your brain what it needs! 🙂

By relaxing, breathing and slowing down, you can then start to think rationally and game plan to achieve the balance in your life that you want.

2. Figure out what’s important to you

Next, it’s important to figure out what matters to you, and to assess where you are in your life right now.

What’s causing the imbalance in your life right now? What would your life look like if you were in balance? How would you feel?

Figuring out what is important to you and aligning your actions with your goals and wants is something I think is a necessary ingredient to happiness and fulfillment.

3. Take Actions to Reduce Noise in Your Life

Many times when we get out of balance, it’s because we have taken on too many things with work, at home, or with friends.

Reducing noise can help you focus and allow you to not be distracted or overwhelmed with negativity and stress.

For me, I’ve removed noise by not watching the news or TV, by unsubscribing to marketing emails, and through spending time only on things I want to do.

What makes you happiest? How are you spending your time? Is your time being spent in a way which brings you happiness, or is it being blocked by other things in your life?

By reducing noise, you can start to do more of the things you like, and spend less time on the things you don’t like.

4. Become More Self Aware will Lead to What You Want in Life

After you’ve taken a deep breath, reduced noise, and came up with a thought for what you want in life, now it’s time to make some adjustments.

Self awareness, maturity, emotional intelligence – all of these things develop over time and have been a constant struggle for me.

There are times where I get wrapped up in a conversation and all of a sudden, I lose focus for a second and get annoyed by some minor comment or action. I’m sure there have been times where you’ve had a similar experience.

It’s tough to always be on and present in the moment but can be worked on.

Similarly, I’ve had experiences where I’m so focused on getting my work done and I lose track of time. All of a sudden, an hour later, I notice I’ve been sitting for a few hours straight – something not good for my health.

Or if I’m exhausted and keep pushing. It’s okay to take a break and sometimes very necessary! There’s no point in pushing through exhaustion if it will lead to a cold or the flu.

If the people around you can’t handle you taking a break when necessary, then maybe it’s time to surround yourself with other people (people with demanding and unrelenting bosses, I’m looking at you 😉 )

My point with this post is to focus again on that it’s okay to relax and have a break from the grind. Of course, action is important, but again, balance is what will lead to great success.

5. Understand the Purpose of Goals

I want success in my career and finances at a relatively younger age, and through these overarching thought, I’m someone with a lot of goals and ambition.

Some of my goals are a little over the top, and if I don’t hit one, sometimes I feel down.

That being said, here’s the thing: life happens. It’s okay if I miss a goal, or a sub-goal.

Goals are so incredibly essential for someone who wants success.

One of my main mantras and principles which I live my life by is “simple daily actions and disciplines WILL result in massive success over time”.

Do some sort of exercise each day and I’ll be fit.

Read each day and I’ll grow my knowledge base.

With this philosophy in hand, ideas become actions. Actions become habits. Habits become my or your life.

At the same time, it’s okay to take a break if you need it.

Going 100 miles an hour to get to some arbitrary mark or goal might not be the most beneficial or sustainable if it’s going to rob you of your energy, time, health, relationships, or focus.

It’s okay to take a break. It’s okay to not always be on with your A game.

6. Let The Little Things Go

Speaking a little more generally here, it’s okay to not always be on in terms of personality, exercise, relationships, money or work.

One of the keys to my success has been the ability to let things go and move on to other things that matter.

Some people might call this apathy, but the ability to simply shrug things off is a great ability to have.

There are so many triggers out there waiting to get you… social media notifications, controversial news headlines, an accidental bump by a passing stranger…

The other week after work, I was walking to my bus. To my left, there was the patio of a bar downtown and to the right, the tall office building.

Up ahead, I saw a guy walking and talking on his phone. The interesting part here was he was talking on his phone and walking backwards on a busy sidewalk.

As we got closer, I was minding my own business just going to my bus. We ended up bumping shoulders a little bit because the sidewalk was tight.

After a few seconds, I was crossing the street with a bunch of other downtown walkers and I hear, “Hey! Watch where you are f***ing going you b****!”

I could have turned around and yelled back. Maybe I should’ve said something first.

I just kept walking and didn’t let it bother me. It was after work, I just wanted to get home safe, and if someone bumps into me on accident, I’m not going to get worked up over it.

While obviously that guy should’ve been watching where he was going, accidents happen. Recognizing accidents or random meaningless things are happening to you and being able to move on is a great skill to have.

There are many things we can’t control in life, but also many things we can control.

7. Understand Progress and Finding Balance Takes Time

Nobody is an overnight success.

Things take time to develop and take shape.

Working through the struggle and working towards balance will take time, but it definitely will be worth it 🙂

As I’ve looked to simplify my life a little more, I had a thought which I’m going to share with you now: you can take a break if you need one.

There’s a quote I’m sure you know: Rome wasn’t built in a day.

Your six-pack and dream body is not going to get created from 100 push-ups done 1 day.

You probably aren’t going to become a millionaire in the next month.

Just by mindset, you might not be able to overcome your fear of public speaking.

However, do 100 push-ups for 30 days in a row, and you’ll see progress. Save and invest $500 a month for 20 years, and you’ll be close to a million dollars. Practicing your public speaking over time will lead to more confidence.

Things take time, and being patient will lead to you feeling good about your progress.

8. Live Life at Your Own Pace

Finally, it’s important to live life at your own pace if you want a balanced life.

When looking out into the world, it seems that everyone is going one million miles an hour and you need to do the same.

Even though I’m someone who prefers taking action and getting out into the world, first, it’s important to start by asking and understanding what YOU love doing and what will bring YOU joy.

You and I only have one life (as cliche as that is, it’s true).

The key to balance is living life at your own pace. 

Figuring out that pace might be a little bit rough at first, but it will be worth it for living a fulfilling life.

There is absolutely NO reason why this should make you feel like you should live at a faster pace (if that’s what you want).

If you want to take it easy on a weekend, do it! Splurge on that ice cream shop down the street! Do what’s necessary to keep you sane and happy!

At the same time, if you are goal driven and want to live intentionally, then it’s important to get back to work after you’ve had your fun.

Balance is so critical in life for leading a fulfilling and happy life. Balance in all areas (relationships, work, money, stress, etc.) can be managed, but will require you to turn inward and seek the truth from within your powerful mind and spirit.

What’s important? What isn’t important? What makes you happiest?

Balance has been on my mind and will continue to be on my mind. I’ll figure it out and I hope you will too.

While you can be successful without balance, it will be very tough to sustain that success as a large wind can blow you off the balance beam at any time.

Figure out what’s important to you and look to find balance between work and play, friends and alone time, creation and consumption, healthy food, exercise, and junk food.

Find Balance in Life and Live a Fulfilling and Great Life

Now, it’s time to take actions to figure out what’s important to you and how you can reduce the noise of what’s bothering you to let the signal come through.

Take a deep breath and collect yourself. Everyone gets stressed out in life from time to time (and that’s okay).

What’s causing the imbalance in your life right now? What would your life look like if you were in balance? How would you feel?

Many times when we get out of balance, it’s because we have taken on too many things with work, at home, or with friends.

Out of these things, what’s important? Is there anything you could remove to get back your time and energy for what matters?

After reducing the noise in your life, think back to what what’s most important to you and your life. Focus in on what makes you happiest, and you’ll start getting back into balance.

Unfortunately, this process may take a few weeks.

Rarely will things happen overnight.

Maturity and patience is required here as things take time to develop and take shape. Working through the struggle will be worth it though 🙂

Readers: how do you keep balance in your life? How do you decompress? Do you find there needs to be a balance between work and play, friends time and alone time, and creation vs. consumption?

What differentiates good companies from great companies? Why do some companies grow over time, while others seem to stay stagnant? How can a good company become great?

In today’s world, there are many solid companies.

Each quarter and each year, they are profitable, but they aren’t amazing. They are good, but aren’t going to be your portfolio’s all stars.

What is stopping companies like these from becoming the media’s darlings? Maybe, asked a better way, what is keeping these companies from going from good to great?

Good to Great, by Jim Collins, presents the conclusions after studying a certain subset of publicly traded companies to identify key attributes of how companies go from good to great.

Collins wanted to answer the question, “How can good companies, or even bad companies, achieve enduring greatness?”

The rest of this post includes a summary of Good to Great, takeaways from Good to Great, and a reading recommendation for you.

Book Summary of Good to Great

For many years, Jim Collins wondered if there were any companies that went from mediocre to great, and what made this transition possible.

He started forming the following research question:

If these companies existed, what were the defining attributes which allowed these companies to outperform their competitors and the general market?

In the late nineties, Collins and his team of researchers set out to answer this question.

First, they had to define what exactly mediocrity looked like, and what greatness looked like. They didn’t want to study companies that were always great – he did that in his book Built to Last.

Instead, he wanted to look at a set of companies that made a leap from average or below average results in the stock market, to great results which needed to be sustained at least 15 years.

What was surprising, was these good to great companies generated cumulative stock returns that beat the market by an average of seven times in fifteen years, better than the results delivered by an index of the world’s greatest companies (Coca-Cola, GE, Intel, etc.)

Next, the research team contrasted the good-to-great companies with a carefully selected set of comparison companies that failed to make the leap from good to great.

Over five years, the team analyzed the histories of all twenty-eight companies in the study.

After sifting through an absurd amount of data and thousands of pages of interviews, Collins and his crew discovered the key determinants of greatness.

How can Companies go from Good to Great?

After the study was completed, the research team found 7 main conclusions:

• Good to Great companies have level 5 leaders in their organization
• Good to Great companies get the right people on board, and then act
• Good to Great companies confront the brutal facts
• Good to Great companies apply the “hedgehog concept”
• Good to Great companies build a culture of discipline
• Good to Great companies employ technology effectively
• Going from good to great can take a long time

Let’s dive into the key findings in  more detail.

Good to Great Companies have Level 5 Leaders in their Organization

The first finding in Good to Great is how Good to Great companies employ level 5 leaders in their organization.

Level 5 refers to a five level hierarchy of executive capabilities, with level 5 at the top. Level 5 leaders embody a paradoxical mix of personal humility and professional will. These leaders are ambitious, to be sure, but ambitious first and foremost for the company, not themselves.

Level 5 leaders look out the window to attribute success to factors other than themselves. When things go poorly, however, they look in the mirror and blame themselves, taking full responsibility.

The comparison CEOs often did just the opposite – they looked in the mirror to take credit for success, but out the window to assign blame for disappointing results.

Another finding in the study was how larger than life celebrity leaders who ride in from the outside are negatively correlated with going from good to great.

Ten of eleven good to great CEOs came from inside the company, whereas the comparison companies tried outside CEOs 6 times more often.

Good to Great Companies get the Right People on Board, and then Act

The second finding in Good to Great is how Good to Great companies get the right people employed, and then act.

The good-to-great leaders began the transformation by first getting the right people on the bus (and the wrong people off the bus), and then figured out where to drive it.

The comparison companies frequently followed the “genius with a thousand helpers” model – a genius leader who sets a vision and then enlists a crew of highly capable “helpers” to make the vision happen. This model fails when the genius departs.

The study uncovered three practical disciplines for being rigorous in people decisions:

• When in doubt, don’t hire – keep looking. (A company should limit its growth based on its ability to attract enough of the right people)
• When you know you need to make a people change, act. (First be sure you don’t simply have someone in the wrong seat.)
• Put your best people on your biggest opportunities, not your biggest problems. (If you sell off your problems, don’t sell off your best people.)

By having the right people on your team, you can accomplish so much.

Good to Great Companies Confront the Brutal Facts

The third finding in Good to Great is how Good to Great companies confront the brutal facts of their situation.

All good-to-great companies began the process of finding a path to greatness by confronting the brutal facts of their current reality.

When you start with an honest and diligent effort to determine the truth of your situation, the right decisions often become self-evident. It is impossible to make good decisions without infusing the entire process with an honest confrontation of the brutal facts.

Creating a climate where the truth is heard involves four basic practices:

• Lead with questions, not answers
• Engage in dialogue and debate, not coercion
• Conduct autopsies, without blame.
• Build red flag mechanisms that turn information into information that cannot be ignored.

Leadership does not begin just with vision. It begins with people willing to confront the brutal facts and to act to make things better.

Good to Great Companies Apply the Hedgehog Concept

The fourth finding in Good to Great is how Good to Great companies apply the Hedgehog Concept.

Going from good to great requires a deep understanding of three intersecting circles:

• What you are deeply passionate about
• What you can be the best in the world at
• What drives your economic engine

The key is to understand what your organization can be the best in the world at, and equally important what it cannot be the best at – not what it “wants” to be the best at.

The Hedgehog concept is not a goal, strategy, or intention, it is an understanding.

The good to great companies are like hedgehogs – simple, dowdy creatures that know “one big thing” and stick to it.

The comparison companies are more like foxes – crafty, cunning creatures that know many things yet lack consistency.

By sticking to doing what the good companies know how to do, they set themselves up for greatness.

Good to Great Companies have Built a Culture of Discipline

The fifth finding in Good to Great is how Good to Great companies have built a culture of discipline.

To continually succeed and have sustained great results, companies depend on building and maintaining a culture full of self-disciplined people who take disciplined actions.

These disciplined actions need to also be consistent with the three circles of the Hedgehog Concept.

Bureaucratic cultures arise to compensate for incompetence and lack of discipline. Typically, cultures which lack discipline arise from having the wrong people on the bus in the first place.

If you get the right people on the bus, and the wrong people off, you won’t need to worry about bureaucracy.

Good to Great Companies Employ Technology Effectively

The sixth finding in Good to Great is how Good to Great companies employ technology effectively.

Good to Great organizations think differently about technological change when compared to mediocre ones. How a company reacts to technological change is a good indicator of its inner drive for greatness versus mediocrity.

Great companies respond with thoughtfulness and creativity, driven to turn unrealized potential into results. On the other hand, mediocre companies react and jump around, motivated by fear of being left behind.

Good to Great organizations avoid technology fads and bandwagons, yet they become pioneers in the application of carefully selected technologies. The idea that technological change is the principal cause in the decline of once-great companies (or the perpetual mediocrity of others) is not supported by the results from the study.

Certainly, a company can’t ignore new technologies and hope to be great, but technology by itself is never a primary root cause of either greatness or decline.

Going from Good to Great can take a long time

The last finding in Good to Great is how going from good to great can take a long time.

Good to great transformations often look like dramatic, revolutionary events to those observing from the outside, but they feel like organic, cumulative processes to people on the inside.

The confusion of end outcomes (dramatic results) with process (organic and cumulative) skews our perception of what really works over the long haul.

No matter how dramatic the end result, the good-to-great transformations never happened in one fell swoop.

There was no single defining action, no grand program, no one killer innovation, no solitary lucky break, no miracle moment.

This just shows and proves once again how overnight success is 10 years in the making.

“You can accomplish anything in life, provided that you do not mind who gets the credit.” – Harry Truman

Takeaways from Good to Great

With every book you read, it is a must to have takeaways and actionable items to implement in life.

I really enjoyed Good to Great. As someone who is looking to work his way up in Corporate America, but also looking to pursue different entrepreneurial interests, Good to Great had a lot of fantastic points that I want to incorporate in my career going forward.

One of the most important things I’ve noticed in my career so far, both in my entrepreneurial efforts and at my day job, is having the right people in your organization.

Good to Great confirmed my assumption that having the right people is most important. Once you have the right people, then you can start to build towards your end result. Without the right people, you aren’t going to be able to do it.

It’s critical to find people who are going to be there for you and who are going to grind each and every day. People who don’t carry egos and want to be a part of something great.

Another takeaway for me was applying the Hedgehog Concept.

Essentially, I need to do what I know how to do, and do it well. Everything else is not important.

So many times I have a great idea, but need to stop and ask myself if I should be the one to take action on it.

Our Recommendation for Good to Great

Good to Great is a fantastic book for entrepreneurs and people interested in business.

If you are a business person or a manager in a corporation, Good to Great is a must read. Good to Great gives you a road map to building a great company.

If you are interested in business and history, Good to Great is a great history lesson of many public companies. If you are someone who is an investor, or manages others and is looking to build and grow your organization, Good to Great is a book worth reading.

There are so many amazing great tips and points Jim Collins makes which can be applied across a number of industries.

Check out Good to Great for more details on this book.

Getting out of debt is a great goal. When starting on your debt pay off journey, things can look tough. By making a debt pay off plan, and using the debt avalanche, or debt snowball, method, you can get out of debt faster and get on to living your best life.

What would life be like if you didn’t have debt? How would you spend your time? What would the freedom feel like?

Being in debt restricts your ability to be free.

Being debt free allows you to do what you want – without being tied to the expectations of a bank or another individual.

Many people ask, “How can I become debt free? What are the steps to becoming debt free?”

In this post, I will be answering those questions, talking about what debt actually is, and providing you two great strategies for eliminating your debt. You will learn how to become debt free using the debt avalanche and debt snowball methods.

Let’s destroy that debt!

 

What is Debt?

First, what is debt?

Debt is money that you owe someone else. That someone could be a bank, another business, or a friend or individual.

For repayment, there are terms and conditions associated with certain kinds of debt.

For example, banks lend individuals hundreds of thousands of dollars for a house and allow those individuals to pay back the money over 360 months (30 years).

In addition, there is an interest rate associated with your debt. This interest is the “cost of the loan” to you – no one is going to give you money for free!

Each month, you will have a payment and this payment will be part principal pay down, and part interest.

A Debt Payment Example

Let’s say you have a $20,000 loan with a 6% interest rate and a 10 year term. Using an online calculator, your monthly payment will be $222.04.

Over 10 years (120 months), this will cost you $6,867.01 in interest. If you pay $100 extra a month, you can cut the time you are paying off your debt to 6.25 years (75 months) and you will pay $4,008.09 in interest. By paying an extra $100 a month, you will save yourself $2,858.92 and will be debt free 3.75 years ahead of schedule!

As shown above, by paying extra each month, you can save money and reduce the amount of time to debt freedom.

In addition, once the debt is gone you effectively give yourself a raise; you have more money falling to the bottom line each month for you to save, invest, donate, spend, etc.

Another thing to note: debt is legally binding. If you don’t pay back your debt, there are many negative consequences that can happen:

• Your credit score will tank and it will be more difficult to have a high credit score. Creditors report your delinquencies to the credit bureaus which are responsible for determining your credit score.
• You could be sued. Creditors gave you money for you to use and then pay back over time. If successful, the creditor and court can have your paychecks garnished until the debt is repaid – which means you take home less money each month.
• You might have to declare bankruptcy. Even though you will be able to get out of your debt, your credit will be ruined and your ability to get new credit will be destroyed.

Being responsible with your debt is very important because there are actually some benefits of having debt.

Is all debt bad? Is there such a thing as good debt?

In general, I believe debt is bad – and many other personal finance bloggers and experts believe debt is bad as well.

That being said, I do think there are cases in which debt can be a good thing. (Remember, personal finance is personal – some people hate debt and believe all debts are bad.)

There are two conditions to meet for my classification of “good debt”:

• First, look at the underlying asset you are buying or receiving.
  • If this underlying asset has the potential to appreciate, or increase in value, in the future, then it’s acceptable, “good debt.”
  • Some assets I’m referring to in this case would be a house (houses have potential to appreciate over time, and provide you shelter), education (you have to be careful here, but more education can result in higher pay), or a business (a start-up loan).
• Second, look at the interest rate.
  • There is an opportunity cost calculation to do.
  • Follow the financial theory: if your after-tax return on investments is greater than your after-tax cost of debt, then it’s acceptable to keep your debt.

Everything else is bad debt.

Credit card payments with an interest rate of 20%? Bad debt.

A home loan at 4%? Potentially good debt.

A student loan at 8%? I’m going to go with bad debt. There is, of course, the option to refinance student loans to get a more favorable interest rate.

A car loan at 2%? This one is tricky – cars are depreciating assets, but the interest rate is so low it’s probably fine.

Again, personal finance is personal and depends on your goals. If wealth is your goal, it’s okay to carry some debt. If freedom is your goal, crushing your debt should be your #1 priority.

Strive to be Debt Free and Free Yourself

The word mortgage is derived from a “Law French” term used by English lawyers in the Middle Ages meaning “death pledge“, and refers to the pledge ending when either the obligation is fulfilled or the property is taken through foreclosure.

Literally, mortgage = death pledge.

“A man in debt is so far a slave.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Debt is horrible: it is mentally draining, financially draining, and affects your entire life if you are weighed down by the large barbell of debt.

I want you to experience amazing freedom. Make getting out of debt a goal, and I’m certain you will feel like a weight has been lifted off of your shoulders once you reach that goal.

Think about it: with no debt, you wouldn’t be a slave to the bank, or to anyone. You’d have more money at the end of the month, and with more money, you’d have more options.

Unfortunately, today, I had to wake up and go to work because without my income, I couldn’t pay my mortgage. Until I sell my house, or pay off my mortgage, I have to continue working.

Two Strategies to Become Debt Free

There are two main strategies to become debt free fast. The two methods for becoming debt free are the debt avalanche method, and debt snowball method.

These methods are pretty straightforward. First, compile a list of your debts and their interest rates. After compiling this list, you will then pay a little extra towards a certain debt as determined by whichever method you pick.

By paying a little extra each month, you will be able to take advantage of some huge interest savings (as we will see a little bit later in this post).

 

The Debt Avalanche Method

Using the Debt Avalanche Method, you pay off your debts by paying extra toward your debt with the highest interest rate first.

Once you have paid off the highest interest rate debt, you put the entire paid off debt’s payment plus the same extra amount towards the next highest until all debt is paid off.

For example, let’s say you have two debts: one at 20% interest rate, with a minimum payment of $200, and balance of $2,000, and the other debt with a 10% interest rate, a minimum payment of $150, and balance of $1,000. You decide you can put an extra $50 towards your debt a month.

Using the Debt Avalanche Method, you would put $250 towards the first debt and $150 to the second debt.

Over time, the first debt will be paid off faster than it would if you just paid the minimum payment. If the first debt is paid off before the second, then you put all $250 towards the second debt, for a total of $400 a month, until the second debt is paid off.

The Debt Avalanche Method is the mathematically optimal debt pay down strategy.

The Debt Snowball Method

Using the Debt Snowball Method, you pay off your debts by paying extra toward your smallest balance debt first. Once you have paid off the smallest balance debt, you put that payment towards the next smallest until all debt is paid off.

Many people like the Debt Snowball Method because psychologically, you can generally see your debt accounts disappear faster. If you have a $1,000 loan and a $5,000 loan, it feels good to have the $1,000 loan gone.

Let’s go back to our example with two debts: one at 20% interest rate, with a minimum payment of $200, and balance of $2,000, and the other debt with a 10% interest rate, a minimum payment of $150, and balance of $1,000. Again, you will put an extra $50 towards your debt a month.

Using the Debt Snowball Method, you would put $200 towards the first debt and $200 to the second debt, because the second debt is smaller in balance.

The Debt Snowball Method is not mathematically optimal, but is still better than applying no strategy at all.

Your Savings by Paying Extra Each Month

I created an example where the user had 2 credit cards, a mortgage, an auto loan, and a student loan totaling $246,500.

• Credit card #1 has a balance $3,500 and an interest rate of 23.49%
• Credit card #2 has a balance $10,000 and an interest rate of 20.19%
• The mortgage has a balance $200,000 and an interest rate of 4.00%
• The auto loan has a balance $8,000 and an interest rate of 5.00%
• The student loan has a balance $25,000 and an interest rate of 7.00%

By paying an extra $25 a month and applying a debt pay down method, in this example, there is potential savings of at least $49,915!

By paying just a little bit more, debt can be eliminated quick, and our user became debt free with some solid cash savings.

In our example, the user started out with $246,500 in total debt. If no method was used, it would take 290 months (just over 24 years) and cost $371,109 to become debt free.

By paying $25 extra a month, the user is able to save nearly $50k, and chop off 140 months (nearly 12 years) off their payment plan! If the user could find an extra $100 in their budget, they could save an additional $12,000 and be debt free 158 months sooner!

With either choice of debt destruction method, you will save money, and be on your way to financial freedom!

Destroy that Debt! Become Debt Free

While the tone of this post was mostly to eliminate your debt, there are times when having debt makes sense.

Remember, personal finance is personal, and if it makes sense for you to take on debt for a certain period of time, then as long as it fits into your future goals and plans, then do it!

Right now, I have $12,000+ sitting at 0% for 3 years for some windows I got back in November. While yes, it’s a $12,000 expense, since it is 0% interest, I don’t pay an extra dime on interest, and when I pay it off in full in 28 months, I’ll be quite happy.

I ran the numbers and it made sense to me. Those windows have made this Winter in Minnesota much nicer, and they have also increased my home value.

Debt is something that can be used wisely and something you should be very careful with.

You now have a great resource for answering the questions: what is debt, is there a difference between good debt and bad debt, and how you can become debt free using the debt avalanche and debt snowball methods.

Readers: what is your opinion on debt? Are there good and bad debts, or is all debt bad? What debt elimination method do you like better?

 

Performing a 24 hour fast can be a scary thought, but with the right tips and plan, you can successfully make it through your fast. With this article, you will learn how you can make it to 24 hours without breaking your fast, and learn about the benefits of fasting.

Ever since graduating college, I’ve been looking to experiment and explore new ways to live my life to the fullest. Eating habits is one area I’ve focused on over the number of years, and in particular, experimenting with intermittent fasting has lead to some interesting results.

Typically, I’ve stuck to a pretty relaxed 16 hour fasting window and 8 hour feeding window since starting intermittent fasting, but every once in a while, I do a 24 hour fast (and once I did a 48 hour fast!)

If you have never fasted before, approaching a 24 hour fast might seem like a huge task to take on.

When I started, I barely could make it past 9 AM before I “needed” to eat. Now, after a few years of practice, I rarely eat before 9 AM.

Maybe you are curious about fasting and want to explore your relationship with food. It’s possible you are looking to lose weight and want to see if fasting is worth giving a shot.

Whatever your reason, I hope this post gives the information you want and need regarding fasting.

In this post, I will talk about the benefits of fasting, and also share with you a number of tips for you to apply if you are interested in a one day fast.

What are the Benefits of Fasting for 24 Hours?

First, a disclaimer: I’m not a doctor. Everyone’s body responds to things differently and just because I’ve had a good experience doesn’t mean you will. Please consult a real doctor if you have concerns or interest about this subject.

When you think about fasting, you probably think about people who are starving and are suffering on purpose for no reason.

With the ability to go and buy whatever you want at the supermarket or grocery store, why would you ever want or need to fast?

Believe it or not, fasting has a lot of great benefits.

Being in a fasted state can bring a lot of good, and by increasing the amount of time you spend in a fasted state, the benefits can bring some great results.

Two of the big benefits of fasting are that fasting could help you lose weight, and fasting can help with detoxification.

If you are always eating, your body does not have the ability to perform some of it’s natural functions – namely, cleaning itself and getting rid of the junk.

By fasting, you give your body space and time to heal itself.

Fasting for 24 hours is a way to tap into these benefits without having to do too much outside of your daily routine.

The benefits of fasting start happening after 12 hours, by getting 24 hours of no eating in, you can help reset your body.

Now, if you are interested in doing a 24 hour fast, the next section will go over some tips on completing your first 24 hour fast.

7 Steps and Tips for Completing Your First 24 Hour Fast

If you’ve decided to give a 24 hour fast a chance, there are a number of things to consider and think about when going through your first 24 hour fast.

Below, I’ve listed 7 tips for you to apply during your fast so you can successfully complete your fast.

1. Start with a 16 hour fast a week or two before the 24 hour fast
2. Eat a big meal around 4-5 PM before starting your 24 hour fast
3. Use sleep to your advantage
4. Drink plenty of liquids to keep you full over the two day span
5. Stay busy during your one day fast
6. Stay positive, listen to your body, and be strong
7. Make your first meal back simple and healthy

Let’s dive into each of these tips for completing your first 24 hour fast in more detail.

1. Start with a 16 Hour Fast to Prepare for Your 24 Hour Fast

First, if you’ve never done a longer fast before, you should start with a shorter 16 hour fast. This way, you can get an understanding of how your body might respond to fasting.

There are a number of interesting feelings I experienced when I fasted for the first time, and the first time I did it, it definitely was stressful and nerve wracking.

But after doing it a few times, I now know how to cope with those thoughts and feelings.

Starting slow with a 16 hour fast will allow you to experience some of the feelings involved with fasting and will help when you give the full 24 hours a go.

2. Eat a Bigger Meal at 4-5 PM Before Starting

Once you are confident you can do a 24 hour fast, then I’d recommend eating dinner a little bit earlier and if you are nervous about the fast, make it a big meal!

I suggest an earlier dinner because the second afternoon can be very difficult, and having a 5 PM cut off versus a 7 PM cutoff can make a world of difference mentally.

Imagine you finish work around 5 PM. Eating a big meal as soon as you get home not only follows your body’s natural rhythm but also ensures you’re well-fed and mentally ready for the fasting period ahead. On the other hand, delaying dinner until later in the evening, like 7 or 8 PM, might increase your anticipation and make it harder to start the fast.

So, to sum up, eating a bigger meal around 4-5 PM helps prepare your body and mind for a successful 24-hour fast.

By addressing both physical and mental aspects, this approach makes it more likely that you’ll complete the fast comfortably.

3. Use Sleep to Your Advantage

Something which is overlooked when fasting is it’s a lot easier to kill time if you are sleeping.

Sleep can be a helpful tool during a 24-hour fast. While you’re asleep, your body continues to work through various processes, and you’re less likely to feel hungry, making it easier to stick to the fast.

If you eat at 5 PM the night before, go to bed at 11 PM, and wake up at 7 AM, you only have 10 hours of fasting left before hitting the 24 hour mark.

If you can, adding in a 30 minute to 1 hour nap will cut another hour off the clock. This break gives your body a chance to rest and can help you feel more refreshed mentally.

Eating earlier and going to bed earlier can make this even easier – finishing dinner at 4 PM, and going to bed at 10 PM can lead to a short fast during the second day!

By using sleep patterns and meal timings strategically, you can navigate a 24-hour fast more comfortably. These tactics not only make fasting easier but also support your overall well-being throughout the process.

4. Drink Plenty of Liquids When Fasting

Next, make sure you are drinking a lot of water during your fast.

First, this will help with flushing your system, but also, by drinking a lot of water and other liquids, you can feel more full.

Drinking water is very important for general health, but even more important when you aren’t eating and trying to stay sane.

Other liquids you can have are black coffee and unsweetened tea.

Coffee contains proteins which suppress your appetite, and this can help with hunger pains. One thing to note though is coffee leads to elevated cortisol levels, which makes it harder to burn fat.

Green tea is another drink that you can utilize when fasting. Green tea has some caffeine, helps suppress your appetite, and in addition, drinking green tea does elevate cortisol levels.

In general, whatever you decide to drink, just make sure it doesn’t have any calories, and also that you are staying hydrated throughout the day. If you don’t drink enough water and get dehydrated, IV hydration in New Jersey offers a quick and efficient way to replenish your body’s fluids and electrolytes, ensuring you stay hydrated and healthy.

5. Stay Busy During Your One Day Fast

Have you ever heard the expression, “time flies when you are having fun?”

Time does fly when you are busy and occupied with work or play. If you decide to do a 24 hour fast, it will be a lot easier if you can stay busy and occupied throughout your day.

One of my worst fasts ever came when I had nothing going on during the afternoon at work.

From hours 18 to 23, I sat at my desk and, more or less, just thought about how hungry I was and calculated how much time I had left until it was time to eat.

On the other hand, you can go a long time with not thinking about food if you are busy and actively engaging your mind and body.

Also, a lot of times I’ll eat just because I’m bored or anxious. By staying busy, you won’t get bored and feel tempted to eat.

Staying busy will help you get through your fast much easier.

6. Listen to Your Body When Doing Your 24 Hour Fast

Finally, there will be moments when you want to eat and don’t want to push through.

Staying positive, drinking water, and resting could be best here – but also, if you become shaky or actually NEED food, then it is totally okay to end your fast.

If you are someone who is sensitive to not eating and have troubles with blood sugar levels, fasting might not be for you.

For people who check with their doctors and know the potential dangers of fasting, listening to your body will be very important for completing your fast successfully.

If you get a headache (which is very common and a sign your body is flushing out toxins), drinking more water will be critical for your success.

Being self-aware is incredibly important for success in this world, and being healthy rather than fainting or becoming sick because you tried to push through is a better scenario.

7. What to Eat After Breaking Your 24 Hour Fast

After completing a 24-hour fast, it’s essential to reintroduce food gradually to avoid overwhelming your digestive system and ensure a smooth transition back to regular eating.

Here’s a step-by-step approach to what you should eat after breaking your fast:

• Start Light: Begin by breaking your fast with easily digestible foods such as fruits or vegetables. These options are gentle on the stomach and provide essential vitamins, minerals, and hydration to replenish your body after the fasting period. Opt for fresh fruits like apples, berries, or watermelon, or choose raw or lightly steamed vegetables such as cucumbers, carrots, or bell peppers.
• Proceed with Caution: While you may be tempted to dive into a hearty meal immediately after fasting, it’s crucial to exercise restraint and pace yourself. Rushing into a large meal can overwhelm your digestive system, leading to discomfort, bloating, or even nausea. Instead, take your time to savor each bite and pay attention to your body’s hunger cues and satiety signals.
• Listen to Your Body: Pay close attention to how your body responds to food after the fast. If you experience any discomfort or digestive issues, consider scaling back on portion sizes or opting for lighter fare until your body adjusts. Remember, your digestive system may need some time to readjust to regular eating patterns after a prolonged period of fasting.
• Choose Nutrient-Dense Foods: Once you’ve eased back into eating, focus on consuming nutrient-dense foods that provide sustained energy and nourishment. Incorporate a balance of lean proteins, healthy fats, complex carbohydrates, and fiber-rich foods into your meals to support overall health and well-being. Examples include grilled chicken or fish, avocado, quinoa, leafy greens, and legumes.
• Stay Hydrated: In addition to food, prioritize hydration by drinking plenty of water throughout the day. Proper hydration is essential for supporting digestion, maintaining energy levels, and promoting overall health. Consider incorporating hydrating beverages like herbal tea, coconut water, or infused water with fresh fruits or herbs to replenish electrolytes and enhance hydration.

By following these guidelines and tuning into your body’s needs, you can effectively transition from a 24-hour fast back to regular eating without any adverse effects.

Remember to be mindful, patient, and gentle with yourself during this process, allowing your body the time it needs to adjust and thrive.

Best of Luck During Your 24 Hour Fast!

For the past 4-5 years, fasting has been a piece of my life and becoming a little bit healthier each and every year.

After fasting, I feel more focused and ready to tackle the next tasks in my life.

Sometimes it’s good to get out of your comfort zone and try something new.

Whether to experiment with fasting, learn more about your relationship with food, or to help you finally complete a 24 hour fast, hopefully this article has been valuable to you.

If you want to lose weight, fasting might be beneficial for you. Since fasting reduces the number of calories you take in for that day, you will be in a caloric deficit. However, there are other factors you need to consider before truly knowing if a 24 hour fast will help keep the weight off!

I hope you have a great 24 hour fast!

Making more money in your 20’s is very important when trying to build wealth and improve your financial situation for your financial future. Earning more and growing your salary is all about providing more value over time to your customers, clients and coworkers. In this post, you’ll learn how to make 6 figures before age 30 and receive many ideas to grow your income over time.

To improve your financial situation, you can either make more money, or save more money.

While cutting expenses is great, and will probably work for awhile, it will only get you so far. Saving money is not enough to build a financially secure life.  If you’re going to become financially stable, you need to find a way to increase your income.

Crushing your 20’s can lay an incredible foundation for future success. By earning more money in your 20’s, you can create an amazing financial base for your future goals.

Are you looking to make more money? I want to help you grow your income and become financially successful.

If you are an income minded millennial, and a young adult focused on making more money, you NEED to read these tips.

In this post, I will be sharing with you tips to making more money and becoming a high earner in your 20’s. I’m going to look to answer your money making questions and provide you answers on the following topics:

• Why Becoming More Valuable Will Lead to Increased Earnings
• How I Became a Six Figure Earner in My 20’s
• Skills Required to Increase Your Income
• The Importance of Creating Multiple Income Streams and Multiple Income Stream Ideas
• Side Hustle Ideas to Make More Money on the Side
• Examples of Money Making Side Hustles
• If Certifications and Advanced Degrees Matter for Growing Your Earnings
• The Importance of Cultivating a Growth Mindset When trying to Advance Your Income
• What’s the Best Kind of Company to Work for to Improve Income Potential
• Books for You to Read to Further Your Personal Growth Journey

Let’s get started with why focusing on value will help you increase your worth, and allow you to raise your level of pay.

Becoming More Valuable Will Lead to Increasing Your Income

“Try not to become a person of success, but rather try to become a person of value.” – Albert Einstein

Increasing your income, salary, hourly rate, and earnings comes down to a simple variable: value.

If you can create and provide tremendous value and results, you WILL grow your income.

What is value?

For getting paid to do work, value is the monetary and assessed worth of a service.

Becoming more valuable, and increasing the worth of your service go hand in hand. Creating value in yourself, for an employer, or for others is not too complicated, but it can be complex.

How can you create value for others, or an employer?

There are many people we interact with on a daily, weekly, monthly, etc. basis.

With each person we interact with, there is an opportunity to either add to that person’s life, subtract from that person’s life, or leave that person’s life be.

Think about this for a second: how would you feel if you could add to every single person’s life you came across. Wouldn’t that be wonderful? If everyone walked away from interactions with you saying, hmm, I really like that guy/gal.

It’s not going to be easy to always be providing value. However, through becoming a servant and giver, you can receive anything you want in the world.

Value in the business and money making world is a combination of skills, likability and experience.

Becoming a person of value and putting the best version of yourself into the world will lead to a higher wage.

How to Create Massive Value at Your Day Job

Increasing your income at a day job comes from 3 things in particular:

1. Providing Value to the Entire Department through creating Efficient Solutions
2. Securing a Job in a Highly Visible Department at a Reputable Company
3. Working on Communication and Leadership Skills

Let’s discuss more in depth each action to help you understand examples for growing your income.

1. Create Solutions which Benefit Everyone in the Team

“You can accomplish anything in life, provided that you do not mind who gets the credit.” – Harry Truman

Some work situations are difficult to navigate. Many people are trying to back stab you, and nickel and dime their way to the top.

Backstabbing is a not a sustainable strategy.

Instead, I look to GIVE, and provide solutions which make processes more efficient. This will help the company save more, allow others to work less on busy work, and more on important work.

In my first year in my current role, we needed numerous codes to run testing on our models. Many of my teammates had their own code for these models, but there was not a unifying set of codes which could be used across all models. In addition, we were interested in adding a few more tests which would require new code.

I was up for the task.

One thing I’m very good at is creating scripts which are usable for multiple situations. I ended up adding 4 different sets of code for the 10 team members over a 3 week period, and became a friend to everyone.

I ended up helping everyone and ended up saving potentially 10-20 hours per person.

Being a servant to your team and wanting to help others is definitely a recipe and strategy to follow to be more successful in your career. I look to serve others and add value in any way I can, and I hope you will as well.

Now, my managers have shown their appreciation for my work through raises and promotions.

Projects like these have definitely helped my case for a higher salary over the past few years.

2. Work at a Great Company in a Highly Visible Department

My current job is in a department which gets a lot of scrutiny from various regulators at the federal level. The department I work in builds statistical models (different varieties of regressions), and requires skilled programmers and statisticians to create robust models.

In the banking industry over the past 10 years, there has been an increased need for compliance in a variety of areas. Combining the high scrutiny with required programming skills, you get a very specific skill set with few people fitting the mold. This allows for a higher level of salary across the department.

In addition, the company I work for is a Fortune 500 financial institution.

All of these factors can contribute to a higher salary over time.

Working for a company which is not growing, or does not provide you opportunities for more responsibility, will, unfortunately, limit your earning potential over time.

3. Focus on Communication and the Soft Skills

A few years ago, there I was, age 24 and sitting in a room of 30 people presenting our models to regulators.

To my right, I had a few team members – some senior analysts and managers – who weren’t presenting.

I’m not bragging, I’m telling you the raw facts of the situation. I was chosen by the head of our department to present because of my communication skills. I’m able to translate technical concepts into every day speak, and help others understand more easily.

I’ve been working on my communication skills for a number of years – through everyday conversation, by creating this website, by podcasting, and by learning about interactions and conversation over time.

Communication is only possible if the other person understands what you are trying to tell them. Focusing on the other person is of utmost important in communication.

To conclude on this point, through increased responsibility and solid communication skills, I’ve been able to increase my value and increase my salary.

Now, I will share with you 8 important skills you can learn to help grow your value and increase your salary.

10 Important Skills to Learn to Grow Your Salary

To grow your income and increase your wage at a job, there are many skills, thoughts and abilities you can work on and improve upon.

However, through my experience and learning, there are 10 important skills which have lead to my success. Making more money at your job is possible, and some of these skills will be good to learn, while others might not be as important.

These 10 skills are broad, but can certainly be applied to other disciplines and fields of work:

1. Communication
2. Discipline
3. Teamwork
4. Big Picture Thinking
5. Leadership
6. Sales
7. Customer Service
8. Time Management
9. Problem Solving
10. Job Specific and Technical Skills

Why are each of these important? Below is a description of each skill necessary for increasing your income, and tips on how you can increase your abilities.

1. Communication

Communication is arguably the most important skill to have and focus on growing in a person’s life and career.

In every day life, we interact with many different people.  If you can’t communicate your thoughts and feelings in a coherent way, you will struggle.

Similarly for your career, written and verbal communication is so critical.

Being able to listen to instructions and ideas, and then go out and execute or instruct others effectively is part of almost every job out there.

As I discussed above in my income story, when I was 24, I found myself in a conference room full of people presenting because I knew the material, was confident in my understanding of the material, and could clearly express what was necessary.

Even though there were senior members in my department around the table who knew the material as well as I did, I was chosen because I was confident and clear in my verbal communication.

I’m a natural introvert, but I’ve improved my communication over time.

A few ways to improve your communication include:

• Writing in a journal or blog
• Recording yourself speaking on a topic, start a YouTube channel, or start a podcast
• Reading books on communication and practice with friends out in the world
• Joining a local Toastmasters club

Communication is so critical, and it’s essential for success in the world.

2. Discipline through Consistent Efforts

Success is the culmination of days, weeks, months, and years of work.

Being a servant at work for a month, and then taking a month off will not lead to increased pay. Working on yourself and taking a break won’t lead to self improvement.

Showing up day after day, week after week, and month after month, will lead to getting what you are looking for: more responsibility, more knowledge, and more pay.

Consistency and discipline are things we as humans know what to do, but sometimes lack.

Consistent daily efforts added up over time WILL lead to success.

Implementing a strong work ethic and mindset geared towards doing a little bit each day can get you on the path to increasing your skills and income.

3. Teamwork is Critical for Success in the Workplace

Being able to work on a team is another skill employers want.

Being an effective team player means being able to work with people from diverse backgrounds to best get the job done.

A good team player is reliable, genuinely committed to the task at hand, is respectful of others and is always ready to help.

A team player doesn’t care about getting credit, being right or “winning” – they only care about how to best get the job done.  Doesn’t that sound like an employee you’d want to hire?  😉

4. Big Picture Thinking

Big picture thinking is a rare skill. If you want to connect with your manager at a higher level, big picture thinking is a must.

Big picture thinking is the ability to take in many different pieces of information, understand how all of the pieces of information work together, and then provide a strategy to produce a favorable outcome.

Maybe, you have a strategic role that requires big picture thinking and you are fine in this area.

But, many people are still in the lower levels of an organization. It’s a difficult place to practice big picture thinking on a daily basis if your primary job functions are relatively static or routine.

However, through playing strategy games, learning about strategy, and taking a step back from the detailed processes can lead to improved big picture thinking.

Big thinking can bring big results!

5. Leadership

As with being a big picture thinker, leadership is a quality many want but few posses.

But leadership is an essential skill to have in business, because leaders:

1. Create an inspiring vision of the future
2. Motivate and inspire people to engage with that vision
3. Manage delivery of the vision
4. Coach and build the team so that it is more effective at achieving the vision.

A true leader is one that encourages us to do our best, helps us when we need it, is honest, trustworthy and confident.  A leader knows when to push and when to pull back.  They inspire us to do our best and their vision takes us where we want to go.

A good leader is indispensable to any organization.

6. Sales and Marketing

Even if you don’t work on the revenue side of a business, learning some sales and marketing strategies can benefit you in a few ways:

• Getting buy in on an idea or project from your managers and co-workers
• Raising awareness effectively of a new project or feature
• Selling your abilities and skills to get paid your worth

If you understand sales and marketing, you can apply sales concepts into your work and watch as other people start to buy into what you are saying.

Learning sales and marketing can be done through reading different books, watching videos, or trying to sell a product yourself!

As a friend once told me, without sales, you have no business! With sales, anything is possible!

7. Customer Service and Likability

At work, your customers could literally be the customers of the business, but they also could include your managers, regulators, auditors, other members of the organization, or anyone you come into contact with on a regular basis.

When you walk into a store, how do you like to be treated?

I’m guessing you’d like to be treated with respect, to have your questions answered in a clear and concise manner, and get on with your day stress-free.

Again, this isn’t rocket science, but if you don’t have much experience, start trying to become more friendly to people around you. Once you are on the job, you can continue these practices.

Likability is a huge component in raising your value as an employee or worker. Working on your customer service skills will lead to increased likability, and will help with increasing your pay.

8. Time Management and Planning

Meeting deadlines and expectations is a necessity in the world – but some people still don’t prioritize time management as much as they should.

Growing up, time management was stressed to me as important, but my parents seemed to dictate what I did and when around their schedule.

When you look to increase your income, all of a sudden your life becomes a balancing act between your day job, your side hustles, your personal development, your family, your friends, exercising, and relaxation time.

Being able to balance these things requires higher level thinking (something we just talked about), as well as the ability to prioritize and execute on your plans.

9. Creativity, Design and Problem Solving

A skill listed on many job listings is problem solving.

In jobs which are straightforward and grunt-ish, it’s very difficult to work on problem solving on the job.

However, for business owners and managers, thinking outside the box is a must. If someone can help solve a problem, they are instantly more valuable to you.

A few pieces of problem solving include creativity and designing a solution for the situation at hand.

Learning how to problem solve can come through playing games, doing puzzles, and studying strategies for problem solving.

Becoming more creative and working on your design skills can come from TRYING things. If you want to be UNIQUE and ORIGINAL, you need to triple your output.

It took Thomas Edison 1,000 attempts to make a light bulb. Do you think you’ll get it right on the first try? I know my first attempt at creativity was a fail…

Becoming a better problem solver will lead to increased value and over time, more pay.

10. Job Specific Knowledge and Technical Skills

The 9 skills I’ve listed above can help in many situations, but ultimately, the job you do will have some job specific knowledge and skills required.

The knowledge needed will depend on your job. This is obvious, but worth mentioning.

If you want to be a doctor, you’ll need to go to medical school. For a lawyer, law school.

For other roles, like becoming a electrician, carpenter, or plumber, a trade school, getting the appropriate certifications or becoming an apprentice can help you learn the necessary skills.

In many office roles, programming and the ability to make processes efficient is a great skill to add to your talent stack.

The Microsoft suite has the ability to automate processes with code (VBA) or with features (mail merge and Excel functions). You can learn how to use Microsoft Excel better with a site like Excel Easy, and learn pivot tables, VBA, or just basic functions to help make things more efficient.

Something I did this past quarter was automate reporting for a manager in our department. She was spending 10+ hours formatting charts and tables after manually copying and pasting in data (what a headache!). I added a few buttons to the Excel sheet, wrote some VBA code, and now, the process takes less than 5 minutes once the data is right.

If you don’t use Microsoft products, then learning how to code might make sense.

At my day job, I use SAS, Python and Javascript – these I either learned on the job, or at home by using sites such as Code Academy or learning from YouTube. R, Java, C, C++, Ruby, or C# might make sense to learn depending on your goals and wants.

Over time, adding new skills to your talent stack will lead to increased earnings. These skills can come from certifications, doing side projects, or getting more formal education.

Create Multiple Income Streams to Increase Your Earnings

Unfortunately, increasing your income at a day job can only happen so fast. There are budget restrictions, managerial approvals, and advancement structures which get in the way of growing your wage.

For example, in many jobs, there are strict time tables for advancement. After 2 years, you can become a senior analyst. With 5 years of experience, a manager. After 8 years, a senior manager.

Even if you have the ability to become a manager after 3 years, your pay and responsibility will be capped.

Fortunately, through side hustling and making money on the side, you can grow your earnings this month!

Side hustling is tough and not for everyone. However, if you are looking to grow your income fast, then side hustling is a must!

Below, I’ve created a list of side hustle ideas for your to possibly start to make more money this month.

Thousands of Side Hustle Ideas to Make More Money

There are thousands of ways to make money in this world.

Finding a side hustle which utilizes your existing knowledge is a great way to make money.

Below, I’ve listed a number of skills and interests which can be monetized. Maybe one of these will fall in line with your skills and you can start to work to monetize your life.

I hope that with the list below, you will have some ideas for earning some extra cash.

1. Tutor Students
2. Help with Yard Work
3. Edit Audio or Videos for Others
4. Build Furniture or Make Household Items
5. Referee Sporting Events
6. Start a Business
7. Help Others with their Businesses
   • Bookkeeping
   • Web Design
   • Social Media Marketing
   • Content Creation
   • Graphic Design
8. Rent Out Your Spare Things
9. Sell Your Stuff and Become a Merchant
10. Help Move People Out of their House
11. Edit Resumes
12. Invest in Income Producing Assets
13. Deliver Things in Your Car or Bike

Below is a description of each of these side hustle ideas. Maybe one of them will catch your interest and be the side hustle for you!

There are so many ways to make money in this world!

1. Tutor Students

If you have knowledge in math, writing, science, or history, you could become a tutor for high school or college students.

Many students need help with catching up to other students, or getting to the next level, and tutoring can help fill those gaps.

2. Help With Yard Work

Many people don’t like doing yard work – especially when it’s just snowed ten inches and they don’t want to go outside!

Getting outside and shoveling or mowing people’s lawns can earn you a decent amount of money for just a few hours of work.

When I was younger, I mowed 3 yards a week and was paid $20 for each lawn. For $60, I worked about 3 hours a week. Again, I was able to get some exercise and help out in the community. If you can handle some extreme conditions, mowing, raking leaves, or shoveling could be for you.

3. Edit Audio or Video

Video and audio quality is so important for businesses looking to attract views and listens online.

If you know how to do sound quality, video production, or sound mixing, you could secure a fun side gig helping others make amazing videos and sound clips!

Mastering the ability to edit videos can significantly enhance the overall quality and impact of your content, making it more appealing to audiences and potential clients.

4. Build Furniture, Do Repairs, or Make DIY Household Items

If you are handy, you could custom build things for others, or help friends with repair projects for pay.

Maybe you are someone who is DIY obsessed. If you love doing crafts, you could make custom crafts and sell these at local craft fairs or open an online store.

There are so many things people need help with around their house, and also, people love custom and handmade products.  You could fill a need with your skills and abilities.

5. Referee Sporting Events

When I was in high school, I refereed elementary school basketball each weekend during the Winter.

For an hour of work I got paid $15 a game, and got some exercise as well.

If you love sports, this could be an easy money maker for you – a few hours a week in exchange for some exercise and helping out your community.

6. Help Others with Their Businesses

Are you good with Excel or have a knack for social media? Business owners are paying top dollar for virtual assistants, marketers, and other helpers to grow their business.

Offering your skills for a certain hourly percentage could bring in some serious cash.

If you want to work online, I’d recommend looking at Fiverr, Upwork, or Freelancer. These platforms, freelancing websites and e-commerce marketplaces provide opportunities to monetize your skills and interests, reflecting current b2b ecommerce trends.

Below are 5 side hustle ideas for helping small businesses:

1. Web Design
2. Bookkeeping 
3. Social Media Marketing
4. Content Management
5. Graphic Design

A. Website Design

Every website that is created on the internet utilizes HTML, CSS, and Javascript to present data and content to the end-user. Learning how to use Javascript and other programming languages can be very lucrative for your career.

For many websites, the goal is to sell the user on some product (information, a physical or digital product, or a service).

There is a lot of technical information you need to know, but website design is a skill not many small business owners have. With that said, if you are a small business and you don’t have a website, good luck!

Small business owners are always looking for an edge over their competition. A nice looking and functional website can be the difference between a deal and a lost deal.

Web design could be a great side hustle for you if you enjoy programming, design or marketing, as these skills all lead to a great looking website!

B. Bookkeeping

When I was in college, I worked as a bookkeeper for a hotel management firm. It wasn’t sexy work, but it was extremely necessary for the business.

All small businesses need to have tax records, receipts, and documentation on their various financial activities, and many small businesses owners do NOT want to do this work.

It is tedious, it is a grind, but it is completely necessary and really only requires organization, data entry skills, and some finance and accounting knowledge.

Bookkeeping would be a great side hustle to get into for someone who is currently, or is looking to go towards, working in corporate finance or accounting in the future.

C. Social Media Management

Similar to websites, social media is another one of those must haves for small business owners. If you do not have a social presence, then the business brand will potentially look less desirable.

There are many different social platforms, each with a unique strategy and feel for connecting with potential customers and users.

The main social media platforms I will focus on discussing here are Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Managing the social media accounts for a business involves coming up with a strategy for engagement, scheduling out posts and content on the different platforms, interacting with followers and potential customers, messaging any potential partners, managing paid advertising campaigns, and executing on the engagement plan.

Many small business owners want to focus in on what they are good at, and social media might not be their expertise.

Roles that could come from this idea are Facebook ads managers, Google Adwords Manager, and Twitter and Instagram profile building.

Social media management could be a great opportunity for someone who is talented at marketing.

D. Small Business Content Management

Going back again to how important a strong website is, content is king when it comes to showing your brand is knowledgeable and worth trying.

Many small business owners are not experts in writing content, or determining which content is best for their audience.

A small business content manager is responsible for helping manage the existing content on the website (optimizing and cleaning up old posts), ensuring new web pages are strong, and communicating with all authors, editors and social media managers to make sure the message is consistent across platforms.

Some of the roles that come out of this idea could be website manager (webmaster), content site auditor, editor, and writer.

If you are good at writing, or enjoy some of the technical aspects of editing and formatting, content management could be a great side hustle for you.

E. Graphic Design

Every website needs a logo, every social media platform is image heavy, and how well printed and digital content is received is based on how visually appealing it is.

If you are good at graphic design (either in Canva, Photoshop, Illustrator, etc.), helping small businesses with their image creation could be a decent way to earn extra money on the side of your day job.

I’ve paid $20 for logos in the past, and now that I’ve also created a few logos myself, I could imagine myself being able to do 1-2 logos an hour.

If you can get involved with managing multiple pieces of the business and become responsible for a number of designs, this side hustle could easily scale up to a handful of hours per month.

There are so many ways to help small businesses out. Searching and finding what you will like to do most, and how you can be helpful can be done through communication and networking.

Now, back to the non-small business helping money makers.

7. Rent Out Your Spare Things

Over the past few years, I’ve made over $40,000 in rental income from house hacking. In July 2015, I bought a house with two spare bedrooms. Each of these rooms I rented out for $600+, and now, have made over $40,000 over time.

House hacking, the act of renting out your spare rooms to monthly renters, or to people using a service such as AirBnb, can be a great income generator. If you aren’t using those rooms, why can’t someone else use them and pay you for it, too?

There are also ways to rent out your car and other things, like appliances, storage, and parking.

These rental options are great since the incoming money is passive income once set up!

8. Become a Merchant and Sell Your Stuff

Over the years, people tend to accumulate stuff – I know I have. This stuff sometimes will end up sitting on a shelf in your basement or closet for years, never to be used.

Why do we hold on to these things?

Selling this stuff will free up space, and will put cash in your pocket.  It’s a no brainer.

Don’t have stuff to sell?  Buying underpriced things at garage and estate sales and flipping them on eBay has 8. proven quite profitable for many people.

Becoming a merchant sounds intimidating. However, it can certainly be done by going to thrift shops and finding underpriced items you can flip for a profit.

9. Start a Business

Coming up with something simple to sell isn’t that hard when you fully immerse yourself in the product development and brainstorming process. Satisfy the needs of others and you’ll be able to make money.

There is no guarantee of making money when starting a business, but it is a possibility if you have the right product, connection and skills.

10. Help Move People Out of their Homes

If you are physically up for it, moving people out of their homes is a great way to pick up some extra cash. It’s definitely hard work and not for the faint of heart.

It does pay quite well though – in college, I had a few gigs with my friends moving people, and we charged $15 an hour.  After the tip, it was closer to $25 an hour!

11. Invest in Income Producing Assets

Investing in income producing assets should help boost your income.  DIY minded people who are handy can buy real estate in a nice location, fix up whatever is necessary, and rent the property for a monthly income.

Real estate is just one of the many income producing assets a person can get involved in – and the hours associated with this side hustle is typically quite low.

12. Deliver Things in Your Car or Bike

Driving for Uber or Lyft, or making deliveries of food on the way home or on the way to your destination for Doordash or Postmates are all effective ways to multitask and earn some money.

There are so many ways to earn extra money through hustling on the side of your main occupation or job.

Do any of them seem interesting to you?  Start with one or two and see how it goes – you may find yourself earning enough income to one day quit your day job!

As I mentioned above, there are so many ways to increase your income and earnings through side hustling!

13. Edit Resumes

Helping people with their resumes and job searches by reviewing and editing their resumes could be a great side hustle.

If you have experience as a hiring manager or interviewer, this would be a great side hustle for you.

Now, let’s talk about some real world examples of side hustles which I’ve featured here on this blog.

Real World Examples of Side Hustlers and Side Jobs

On The Mastermind Within, I’ve had the pleasure and honor to feature some amazing side hustlers in my Side Hustle Spotlight series.

These side hustlers are making great money on the side of their day job. Here is a list of the side hustle interviews I’ve featured so far:

• Tutoring
• Consignment Store Flipping
• eBay and Online Marketplace Flipping
• Musician
• Food Tour Guide
• Sports Press Box Worker

Hopefully, these amazing interviews give you inspiration to start your own side hustle (and if you do, I’d love to hear about your side hustle!!)

Now, I have a few common income questions which I will answer before wrapping this post up.

Do Advanced Degrees or Certifications Matter for Growing Income?

Advanced degrees are quite valuable, for both personal development and career enrichment. By obtaining a graduate degree, you can expect the following:

• Personal growth
  • You should grow intellectually, but through your experiences you might also enhance your emotional capabilities.
• Wealth
  • On average – across employment fields and U.S. state lines – Graduate degree-holders earn about 30 percent more than workers with merely a bachelor’s degree. (I was able to increase my salary $20,000 through my graduates studies!)
• Connections
  • Professional networking opportunities abound in graduate programs, but social connections are also common. Many people meet their lifelong friends and loved ones in grad school.
• Recognition
  • Those with graduate degrees often enjoy higher social status than others. Master degrees and Ph.D.s are prestigious and earn praise and respect as a result.

At the same time, you don’t necessarily NEED an advanced degree for higher income. It really is dependent on your GOALS and your dream job.

Some of the most successful people I know didn’t go to college. Other successful people I know have multiple degrees.

Real world experience and knowledge are what will make you valuable at the end of the day. If you can provide enough value, you can do whatever you want, and make whatever wage you want.

If an advanced degree makes sense for you, go for it! At the same time, you could reach your goals without one.

How Important is a Growth Mindset for Making More Money?

Personally, I try to live my life with an abundance mindset. Living with a growth mindset can lead to amazing results.

Life is not zero sum: You can win, and I can win.

With an abundance mindset, I believe I can do anything in the world, become anything, and have anything.

With an abundance mindset, I know that you can improve our financial situation through increasing our income – there’s unlimited potential on the upside for income.

Provide value in places you haven’t provided value before and you will be compensated.

With a little more money each month, you’ll be on to bigger and better things.

There are billions and millions of dollars out there in the world today – do you think it’s possible we can skim a little bit off the top and make our financial lives a little better than the day before?

What Kind of Company Should I Work For to Increase My Income Potential?

Let’s be honest here: some situations have no ceiling and no chance for advancement. Part of emotional intelligence and being aware of your situation will allow you to realize this and get the heck out of there.

In my first role, I saw that it would take a while for me to gain the necessary skills to get to the next level. Even though they valued my work and I created some cool automation and Excel reporting, I didn’t fit in with the group’s vision.

I started looking after my first year, and found a job that had room for growth and the ability to advance in a shorter period of time.

During my second summer, I mentored an intern and this year, I’m leading a group of roughly 15 in learning Python and building multiple pieces of code to compare to our current production runs.

In my first job, I wouldn’t have gotten either of these opportunities. These opportunities have lead to more responsibility and higher pay.

If you value having a higher wage, then getting into a situation with opportunities for advancement, training and responsibility will be very beneficial for growth.

Next, I want to share with you a few books which have been beneficial for my income growth.

Resources to Further Your Personal Development for Income Growth

“Your level of success is rarely exceeded by your level of personal development, because success is something you attract by the person you become.”

Education doesn’t not stop after high school. Becoming a successful person and growing your earnings will require personal development.

Below are 7 books which have made a profound impact on my career growth, and have allowed me to increase my value and earn more money.

Skill with People, by Les Giblin

With these resources, you can learn and apply your amazing knowledge to reach your full potential, and earn more money.

Increase Your Income and Welcome Endless Possibilities

Over the past few years, there have certainly been many times where I was frustrated with my level of income, or lack of side income.

In 2013, my income was $20,000 – high for still being in school, but not where I wanted it to be.

In 2015, my income was $63,000 – high for 22 years old, but not where I wanted it to be.

I wanted more, and wanted it in those moments of frustration.

What I realized though is no matter how much I wanted something, unless I internalized those emotions and did something about it, nothing would happen.

I started focusing on what I could control: my thoughts and actions.

A few years later, I’ve improved my financial situation through improving myself, and have increased my income.

Reading books and blogs, watching videos, talking with successful people, learning, and then applying and trying things in the real world. All of these actions have been critical to my growth.

What did I learn about and then go out and apply? How to communicate more effectively, how to think a little bit bigger, and how to be consistent. I learned new programming languages, learned some marketing and web design, and joined different communities who needed help with different tasks.

Showing up is half the battle – I could have just as easily stayed at home, been content in my current role, and just met expectations. But, instead I made the choice to push the envelope and become better. But it wasn’t a one time choice; rather, a daily, weekly, and monthly choice.

Doing a little bit each and every day is so critical to working your way towards a higher income.

It will take time – patience will be required.

However, once you gain new skills, increase the level of your current skills, and provide value to the right people, the sky is the limit 🙂

I hope this post has been inspiring for you as an income minded millennial pursuing a higher salary.

Please let me know if you have any questions and how I can help you on your income growth journey!

Patience is a virtue and a skill which can unlock great benefits in your life. By working on patience and looking to become more patient, you will create many favorable situations for yourself.  In this post, you’ll learn about the benefits of being patient, the importance of patience, and ways you can be more patient in life.

Over the past few months, I’ve been meeting a lot of amazing women and going on a fair amount of dates. Something I’ve had to work on is being patient with some of the women I meet. I tend to get excited to hang out again, while they are slower to be open to seeing me again.

This push and pull is part of the dating game these days, and patience is very important for letting attraction build naturally.

I’ve been thinking a lot about patience recently with my focus on going out with new women, but I’ve also been thinking a lot about patience with regards to my level of physical fitness.

When looking to get into shape, there’s a lot of pain, sweat and suffering that goes into every workout.

4 sets of 10 of a certain exercise leads to no visible results the next time you look in the mirror. Doing it another day leads to more nothing after the next exercise.

Over time though, your body starts to change and you do see the results. With consistency, action, and patience, you can reach your fitness goals.

While you might not see the results in the first week or month, over time, you can get there.

Why is patience so important? What are the benefits of being patient? How can you be more patient and what are some ways to become more patient?

In this post, I will share with you why practicing patience is important for success, what are the benefits of being patient, and some tips for becoming more patient in life.

Why Practicing Patience is Important for Success

Patience is very important for success in life.

But first, what is patience?

Patience is defined as the the quality of being patient, as the bearing of provocation, annoyance, misfortune, or pain, without complaint, loss of temper, irritation, or the like.

Patience can be thought of of as being zen, and being unaffected by the crazy world around us.

When we are impatient, or not completely in control of our lives, we can get distraught, distracted and discouraged.

Think about a time when you were frustrated by the lack of your progress in a certain area.

Becoming frustrated didn’t lead to instant results, and may have even made the situation worse.

I know this has happened to me, especially in sports when trying to perfect a new swing and technique.

Recently, I’ve been rock climbing a lot, and as I’ve improved and gotten stronger, I have had to learn a ton about keeping a tight core and positioning my body in ways which will help me keep more balance.

It’s very frustrating when I fall off the wall because I’m slightly out of position. Instead of getting frustrated though, I need to stay calm, be patient, and keep working on the moves.

By being patient, we can stay calm, cool and collected, and keep on the path to achieving our goals and getting on to our dream life.

What are the Benefits of Being Patient?

There are many benefits of being patient in life.

Some of these benefits of practicing patience include:

• Helping you focus on longer term outcomes and goals, rather than short term pleasure
• Helping you with making good choices, rather than making impulsive decision
• Forcing you to show empathy and kindness towards others

By being patient, you will become a more peaceful, empathetic and kind human over time, and also, with a clearer mind, you can start to make better and rational decisions.

Being patient involves slowing down, understanding where others are coming from, and making a rational plan.

Becoming more patient doesn’t mean you are throwing emotions out the window – it just means that there are a time and place for certain emotions, and a time and place for being level-headed.

Now that we’ve discussed why being patient is important, let’s talk about some tips for becoming more patient, and also give some examples of the importance of being patient in different situations.

7 Ways to Be More Patient in Life

Below are 7 tips for becoming more patient in life.  The overarching thought of becoming more patient is slowing down in life and looking to live intentionally.

Whether you are trying to be more patient in the workplace, be more patient at home, or be more patient in general, these 7 ways to being more patient will help you with your goal.

The 7 ways to be more patient are as follows:

1. Slow Down
2. Breathe
3. Focus on What’s Important
4. Communicate Your Thoughts with Others and Yourself
5. Use Affirmations to Get in the Right Mindset
6. Understand Time Can Heal
7. Be Mindful of Your Progress and Current Situation

Let’s get into each of these tips for becoming more patient in more detail.

1. Becoming Patient Involves Slowing Down

Going one hundred miles an hour isn’t always the most optimal way to get to success.

Figuring out the right balance between when to push and when to pull back is tough, but is helpful for assessing the situation at hand.

Slowing down could mean taking a step back from the situation, pausing for a few seconds, pulling over on the side of the road, and once there, thinking to yourself, “What’s the best step I can take next?”

2. Breathing Will Help With Patience

Our bodies run on oxygen and getting this oxygen in times of need can be very helpful.

After slowing down, taking a few deep breaths can help with patience. There are many benefits of breathing, one of those benefits being that it quite literally is lowering your stress hormone cortisol!

By taking a few deep and slow breaths, you can reduce your level of stress, and work on making your next step a good one.

3. Focus on What’s Important

After slowing down and taking a few deep breaths, it’s important to figure out what is important and then act on this plan.

Another way to think about this step in becoming more patient is to completely ignore what you are stressed about and focusing on other tasks.

I know that if I’m stressed about a mistake, a misstep, or lack of progress, if I start doing something else, I can forget about what I’m stressed about and move on.

4. Communicate With Those Around You and Yourself

Frustration and anxiety can be internal, or external. In either case, asking the right questions of others or yourself can be helpful.

Asking, why am I stressed, or why am I not progressing, rather than getting frustrated and not doing anything about it, can be helpful.

Likewise, asking those around you about your situation can be helpful. Also, asking questions and looking to understand the other person’s position can help.

If you are frustrated with a child who keeps whining, trying to understand why they are whining can result in a better situation than complaining or yelling (though every situation is different – tough love could make sense too!)

The key here is to try and gain information you can use in a logical and rational way. There are times to be emotional in life, but when looking to become more patient, being calm is better.

5. Use Affirmations to Get in the Right Mindset

“I am a patient person.”

When you wake up tomorrow morning, say this 3 times.

“I am a patient person.”

“I am a patient person.”

“I am a patient person.”

Affirmations are incredibly powerful because you can quite literally reprogram your brain to think the way you want to think.

Getting in the right mindset is incredibly important for life in general, and is especially critical for becoming more patient.

6. Understand Time Can Heal

Unfortunately, time can sometimes be the best medicine for stress and anxiety. Giving yourself a break for a day, or week, can help your situation in times of impatience.

One example here is with training to get in shape.

Did you know your body actually grows when you are resting, rather than when you are in the gym?

Listening to your body and resting is sometimes the optimal way to proceed. If you are hurting, pushing to get one more workout in before the week ends might actually do the opposite of healing.

In a similar way, giving space to others when they aren’t living up to their responsibilities or doing what you want can work.

This is especially true in relationships, and is something I need myself as an introvert – space.

By giving space, you allow time to heal your frustrations, give the other person time to think, and after a while, you can revisit where you are going.

7. Gain Perspective on Where You’ve Came From and Your Current Situation

Looking back on where you have came from is a very powerful way to remain patient. This is something I experience when I look at my financial situation.

When I get stressed about money, and wish I had more, I look back on where I’ve came in the past 5 years and feel good about my progress.

I also think about those around me, and how many people would want to change places with me, and this also helps me gain a better perspective on my thoughts.

Seeing where you’ve came from, looking at those around you, and slowing down can help you with patience.

Now that we have talked about these tips for becoming more patient in life, let’s talk about the application of patience in a few different areas of life.

How to Find Patience in Different Areas of Life

You just learned about 7 tips you can take to apply in your life to become more patient, but now I’m going to share with you a number of situations where patience can help.

These situations are areas that I struggle with patience, and hopefully by sharing these situations with you, you can start looking at your life and make adjustments for the better.

The 4 situations I will share with you regarding patience are:

1. Patience with Other People
2. Patience with Exercise and Fitness
3. Patience in the Workplace and in Your Career
4. Patience with Money

Let’s dive into each of these four areas of life and talk about how being patient can help.

1. How to Be More Patient with Other People and in Relationships

As I discussed in the introduction of this post, I struggle with patience in my relationships from time to time (especially new relationships).

When meeting a new and attractive woman, I have to remind myself that I need to stay focused on my mission and purpose in life. When learning about someone else for the first time, there are a lot of things to get comfortable with, learn and do before attraction and comfort set in.

Having patience in my new relationships involves slowing down and having a longer term focus on my actions.

For existing relationships, friends, and co-workers, patience really boils down to understanding that other people have different goals and wants, and communication and empathy are very important.

Communicating with others when you have differences is the key to good relationships. If you can slow down, compose yourself, and understand where the other person is coming from, then you can navigate different social situations much easier than if you get upset.

2. How to Find Patience in Exercise and Fitness

Losing weight, “getting in shape”, improving in a sport, and gaining strength all require patience.

No one becomes an Olympic athlete overnight, even with so many diets and workout programs promising a quick fix.

Finding patience in exercise and fitness comes from an understanding that the body cannot change over night.

Weight is a simple “calories in minus calories out” equation, and while fasting can be beneficial, eating and getting the proper amount of nutrients is very important for general health.

Consistency and action are truly the most importance traits to cultivate when looking to get into shape, and by understanding this, you can develop patience towards your body.

3. How to Be More Patient in the Workplace

A very common question is how to be more patient in the workplace and how can I be more patient when I’m working.

One of the most frustrating things in my career is the lack of progression in responsibility and results, and how certain people at work can have no awareness of how they are working with others.

With working with annoying co-workers, if it’s really bad, then there are times when leaving your current role needs to be an option on the table.

If the situation is not that bad, then practicing empathy, breathing, and taking a long term view on why you are going to work is important here.

Sometimes, a crappy job in the short term is necessary to build skills, build savings, pay down debt, or provide for your family.

With waiting for a promotion, recognition, and results, understanding the goals and views of your organization are important for gaining perspective on the situation.

Again, some companies are not great companies and do not have a plan in place for you.

However, by communicating your goals and wants with your manager, and understanding the big picture, you can find clarity in the situation.

4. How to Find Patience with Money

Finally, if you are struggling with patience and your personal financial situation, there is hope.

I want to become rich at a young age. Becoming rich and financially free in my 20s or 30s would be an amazing accomplishment, but unfortunately to do so, I need to (a) make a lot of money, and (b) save a lot of money.

Becoming a millionaire, creating passive income, and becoming financially independent does not happen overnight.

Most months, my savings go up a few hundred dollars, and other months, a few thousand dollars.

$1,000, while a lot of money, isn’t enough to retire on, or enough to fall back on in the world today.

I sometimes get impatience at my lack of progress, but when I zoom out, I see some great results.

Falling back on this progress, and also understanding how time multiplies money via compounding, I find peace in my situation and keep going forward with my financial plans.

Start Working on Being More Patient Today

Practicing patience with yourself and with others will pay dividends for you in your life. Working on becoming more patient can result in great success, but it will take work.

Breathing, focusing on other tasks, communicating with others involved, becoming more self aware, and understanding sometimes time will cure things are great ways to become more patient.

Over time, through working on becoming more patient, you will become a more patient and positive person.

With this post, you now know a number of ways to be more patient, and how to become more patient in the workplace, become more patient at home, and become more patient in your daily life.

As we talked about, the importance of patience can’t be stressed any more, and with many benefits of being patience, you can’t not work on becoming more patient this year.

Slowing down and practicing patience can lead to less stress and more happiness. Will you give patience a shot?

Readers: how do you practice patience and how do you work on becoming more patient with those around you and yourself?

Thank you for reading!

The Richest Man in Babylon, by George S. Clason is a timeless classic. The Richest Man in Babylon teaches the value of saving, overcoming poor habits, such as procrastination and getting into a mindset to take advantage of opportunities.

I was drawn to read The Richest Man in Babylon because many people and bloggers recommended it as one of the top 10 personal finance books. I finally got around to it and I’m glad I read it! It was a quick and enjoyable read.

The rest of this post includes a summary of the book, my takeaways, and my recommendation for you. Enjoy!

Summary of The Richest Man in Babylon

The Richest Man in Babylon is a series of parables about personal finance. The parables take place in Ancient Babylon. The main story is about how an average man became the richest man in Babylon. He accumulated wealth by being disciplined with his spending, investing his savings, and working to increase his income.

Each story has a lesson and a moral. The lessons and principles in The Richest Man in Babylon are simple and easy to understand.

In addition to the many principles and lessons in The Richest Man in Babylon, The Five Laws of Gold are presented. The Five Laws of Gold form the foundation for your relationship and mindset with personal finance. Everyone should follow these laws:

The Five Laws of Gold

1. Gold cometh gladly and in increasing quantity to any man who will put by not less than one-tenth of his earnings to create an estate for his future and that of his family.
2. Gold laboreth diligently and contentedly for the wise owner who finds for it profitable employment, multiplying even as the flocks in the field.
3. Gold clingeth to the protection of the cautious owner who invests it under the advice of men wise in its handling.
4. Gold slippeth away from the man who invests it in businesses or purposes with which he is not familiar or which are not approved by those skilled in its keep.
5. Gold flees the man who would force it to impossible earnings or who followeth the alluring advice of tricksters and schemers or who trusts it to his own inexperience and romantic desires in investment.

These laws of gold are more important than gold itself. By following each of the laws, you will become wealthy. Translating into layman’s terms:

1. Save a minimum of 10% of your income
2. Your investments will grow and the returns will compound over time.
3. Always have insurance (FDIC insurance for a bank, for example) for your money
4. Don’t invest in things you don’t know about
5. Understand the balance between risk and reward. If you try for 50% returns, you won’t last long.

Takeaways from The Richest Man in Babylon

Personal finance is about being disciplined in your approach to your finances. If you want to have money, learn to discipline yourself now and not later. Most lottery winners are bankrupt within a few years and mostly because they lacked self discipline. Therefore, the problem is not the lack of money, but how it is managed.

Currently, I track my income, expenses, and net worth over time. I’m saving roughly 45% of my income – I’m doing well on the saving and investing front.

One area of improvement I could work on is being properly insured. I chatted with my insurance agent last week and she suggested I get an umbrella policy and more life insurance. While I understood what she was selling me on, but I didn’t feel it warranted the monthly expense. I will check into this some more.

Our Recommendation for The Richest Man in Babylon

Yes, please read The Richest Man in Babylon. If you like storybooks, books written in old time language, or personal finance books, The Richest Man in Babylon is the book for you.  The Richest Man in Babylon teaches the values of saving, overcoming poor habits, such as procrastination, and getting into a mindset to take advantage of opportunities! Give it a shot. The lessons in The Richest Man in Babylon will change your financial life!

Thanks for stopping by. I’m glad I could share my thoughts with you.

Do you like story books or instruction manuals? Are you saving at least 10% of your income? What are your thoughts on umbrella policies?

Amanda Palmer is not your average person by any means. Incredibly polarizing, some love her crazy theater girl ways. Others despise her and call her a sell-out, a poser, and a scammer.

The Art of Asking: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Let People Help is an expansion of the popular TED talk Amanda Palmer gave in 2013.

Asking for help can be one of the hardest things to do in today’s world.

I think I can accomplish anything I want in my life, and I’m guessing you might share the same mindset.

What we don’t realize is how it is perfectly okay to ask for help and rely on others if we can’t do everything by ourselves.

The Art of Asking is a fascinating read into the life of Amanda Palmer, and was very inspiring and motivating.

The rest of this post includes a summary of The Art of Asking, takeaways from The Art of Asking, and a reading recommendation for you.

Book Summary of The Art of Asking

The Art of Asking is the story of Amanda Palmer. The Art of Asking goes through her early days working as The Bride, her music career, her interactions with her fans, and her thoughts on help and asking.

Amanda Palmer as The Bride

After graduating college, Amanda Palmer didn’t want a real job. A 9-5 desk job would not be for her.

Instead of going to school, Amanda decided to dress up as a bride – she wore a wedding dress and give flowers to people on the street.

She would stand on the side of a street, up on top of a milk crate, and perform for the people on the street. Over time, she was making more money by being The Bride than she was at her various other gigs, so she kept doing it.

People loved her!

At this time, Amanda was thinking about the concept of being “seen” vs. being “looked at”. Being “seen” is having someone look into your eyes and trusting your gaze – trusting you are there with them.

Too many of us go through each day only “looking at” others. “Seeing” others involves a level of compassion and empathy.

Amanda Palmer with The Dresden Dolls

After a few years of Bride-ing, Amanda started a band, The Dresden Dolls, with her friend, Brian Viglione.

Amanda was seeking “salvation through volume” with their pounding, screaming Victorian punk rock style.

After each show, Amanda insisted on meeting fans after the show for drinks, autographs, and fun times. She increased her audience through her mailing list, parties, and social media. She would organize “ninja events” by sending out a tweet saying something like “I’m going to be in this city and at this bar at 9 PM – come see me play some music!”

By interacting with her fans on a daily basis through in-person events and social media, she built a fantastic community of fans.

When touring, The Dresden Dolls regularly asked for volunteers, food, couch space, and for local musicians to get up on stage and open for them. Amanda found that asking for help almost always resulted in success. She had created a vibrant artistic community of people who were joyously looking out for each other.

Unfortunately, relations with their record label went south – the label didn’t like the way Amanda was going about promoting her music. They wanted Palmer to stop talking to her current fans to go court new ones – this wasn’t her style.

“The whole point of being an artist, I thought, was to be connected to people, to make a family. A family you were with all the time, like it or not. That was the way we’d been doing it for years, whether or not we had an album or a tour to ‘promote’.”

After many years, she broke away from the label company and tried something completely new.

Crowdfunding a Kickstarter Album

“I think people have been obsessed with the wrong question, which is ‘How do we make people pay for music?’ What if we started asking, ‘How do we let people pay for music?’”

After Amanda Palmer’s falling out with the record label, she wanted to make a solo album.

Without too much money in the bank, she decided to do something unheard of: a Kickstarter for her album.

Amanda took asking to a whole new level with a Kickstarter campaign for her new album, “Theater of Evil”.

With this Kickstarter, she broke the site’s record at the time ($1.2 million in funding), and went on to launch the tour for the new album.

As she had for the past decade, she asked for local musicians to join her on tour and play. This time, the request was coming from someone who recently became famous for getting over 1 million dollars.

Unfortunately again, she was targeted by many haters for ripping off musicians.

Even when she posted a breakdown of her expenses to prove it wasn’t all profit, the damage was done and her reputation took a hit. That being said, she still had her loyal fans and many social media followers.

Other Interesting Stories Of The Art of Asking

It would be disrespectful of me not to mention some interesting perspectives and stories told about Amanda’s relationships with her husband, Neil Gaiman, and best friend, Anthony.

When Amanda was very young, she became friends with a man in the neighborhood named Anthony. Throughout her story, she references many stories Anthony told her as a young girl, a college student, and a young adult. When Amanda is touring, Anthony became sick with cancer.

In The Art of Asking, Amanda details her struggles with Anthony’s cancer and how much she loves him.

Amanda also discusses her relationship with her husband, Neil, throughout the book. Naturally a very independent woman, Amanda doesn’t like commitment. Being married isn’t natural to her and there are numerous passages discussing her struggles with marriage.

These stories about her relationships truly highlight how Amanda is human and normal. A perfect life doesn’t exist, there will always be improvements, struggles, and tweaks to make over time if you want success.

Great Quotes from The Art of Asking

Here are three quotes from The Art of Asking which resonated with me:

• “It isn’t what you say to people, it’s more important what you do with them. It’s less important what you do with them than the way you’re with them.” – Anthony (Amanda’s best friend)
• If you love people enough, they’ll give you everything.
• It’s hard enough to give fearlessly, and it’s even harder to receive fearlessly. But within that exchange lies the hardest thing of all: to ask. Without shame. And to accept the help that people offer. Not to force then. Just to let them.

Takeaways from The Art of Asking

With every book you read, it is a must to have takeaways and actionable items to implement in life.

The two main takeaways from The Art of Asking are the following:

• It’s important to SEE people, not just look at them.
• It’s okay to ask for help, people want to help you! 

Let’s dig a little deeper into these main takeaways of The Art of Asking.

Don’t Just Look at People, SEE People

The first main takeaway of The Art of Asking is people want to be seen, not just looked at.

When you walk on the streets, people generally will have darting eyes and don’t want to look at you. This situation would fall into being looked at; your presence was acknowledged, but the other person doesn’t care to keep you in their view.

To be “seen” is to truly be looked in the eye. To “see” someone is to realize that person is unique, that person has feelings, and that person is special. After reading this book, I look people in the eye with compassion.

Where I live, in Downtown Minneapolis, there are a number of homeless people. Most walkers just pass by and don’t try to interact. I don’t always give them money, but I do acknowledge them and say hi.

A smile goes a long way 🙂

People Want to Help, Just Ask!

The second main takeaway is to ask people for help when you need help.

Guess what? People want to help, why should we stress ourselves out and try to do it all?

It comes down to trust. I love the following passage I found in The Art of Asking:

When you accept somebody’s offer for help, whether it’s in the form of food, crash space, money, or love, you have to trust the help offered. You can’t accept things halfway and walk through the door with your guard up. When you openly, radically trust people, they not only take care of you, they become your allies, your family.

If you trust people, they will take care of you and be your friend. You can’t be isolated and try to trust others; it’s not possible.

You can be open to others help and trust they can get it done.

Our Recommendation for The Art of Asking

The Art of Asking was a fantastic read. The Art of Asking gave me insight into the intimate artist-fan relationship and the music industry, and also opened my eyes to being open to asking for help.

Growth as an individual comes through challenge and growing your perspective over time. Living in an echo chamber will not lead to success.

Reading and learning about other people’s success in different areas and careers can provide you a truly strong worldview and perspective.

You should definitely read The Art of Asking, by Amanda Palmer. For me, it was a completely difference perspective on the world, but it was completely worth the read.

Are you afraid to ask for things? What’s holding you back? Have you ever been a street performer?

The rules of traditional business and entrepreneurship have changed.

The American Dream is no longer confined to the corner office or a cubicle.

People are legitimately making good incomes using the internet to run a business completely online.

Not only that, but it’s allowing them to live the lifestyle they want, on their own terms.

Think about it, no more:

• long commutes in traffic
• getting up early just to try to make it to work on time
• getting dressed in clothes you hate, just so you can look presentable.

No, the new American Dream is a business that can be run from wherever you desire – and Click Millionaires wants to help you do just that.

Click Millionaires is an idea book and provides a broad overview of the different businesses you can pursue online.

Is Click Millionaires just another “get rich quick” scheme?  Absolutely not!  This is why Scott Fox encourages the reader to start slowly, part-time, and spend as little money as possible.  What’s great about this book is that he shows you how starting an online lifestyle business is easier and cheaper than ever!

In the rest of this post, I give you a summary of the book, my takeaways, and my recommendation for you.

“The trouble with the rat race is that, even if you win, you’re still a rat.” – Lily Tomlin

Book Summary of Click Millionaires

Click Millionaires about creating a lifestyle business online.

The whole point of creating something yourself is to be your own boss – that way you have complete control over your life, including what you do during the day, your compensation and benefits, etc.

A Click Millionaires lifestyle business adheres to the following principles:

• Helps People
  • People want help with their problems.  You will provide a solution.
• Possess Credibility
  • To provide solutions, you have to be knowledgeable in your niche.
• Automation
  • There are many tools available to automate the delivery and processes of a lifestyle business
• Outsourcing
  • Are there tasks you don’t like doing? Social media management? Website design? Contract it out!
• Audience Content Creation
  • Comments, forum posts, and guest posts are all forms of audience content creation.
• Scalability
  • Scalability is the ability of a technology or business system to adapt easily to increased volume and to maintain or improve profitability without requiring significant additional resources.
• Recurring Revenues
  • It’s fine to have one-time sales and clicks, but you want to have guaranteed revenue month in and month out. Ads or subscription products are great examples of recurring revenues.

What are some of the lifestyle business types which satisfy these principles when done correctly?

The Best Click Millionaire Lifestyle Businesses

As described in Click Millionaires, there are numerous examples of online lifestyle businesses you can pursue:

Digital Publishing

• “Noozles” (Email Newsletters)
  • Do you like writing but don’t really want to have a blog?  Consider a “noozle”.
• Blogging
  • Do you like writing? Consider starting a blog!
• Podcast
  • Do you like speaking?  Do people tell you they like hearing you talk, or like your voice?  Consider making a podcast!
• Video Broadcast/Online Television Show
  • Do you like making videos?  Make a YouTube Channel!
• Social network community
  • Building a vibrant forum is a great way to get a lot of people in one spot on the internet

All of these businesses are content related and have the potential to scale over time.

Digital Download and Product Sales

Selling your own digital product, whether that’s a book, a piece of software, a game, etc.

Affiliate Marketing

Marketing other people’s products through your website or marketing channel and collecting a fee on every sale which comes from your site.

Network Marketing

Also known as Multi Level Marketing – a way to sell other people’s products via your website.

Freelancing

Utilizing sites such as Upwork, Fiverr, or Elance, you can perform data entry, graphic design, virtual assisting and content creation for various small businesses over the web for a fee.

Copying Existing Products

Do you think you could improve upon an existing digital product? There is no need to reinvent the wheel!

The best part about Click Millionaires is these examples are talked about in depth. In addition, you are given multiple concrete examples on what and why someone would do pursue one versus another.

Find Your Niche for Online Business Success

The most important thing from Click Millionaires was to consider in creating your business is finding something you are passionate about.

If you aren’t passionate about a topic, you probably won’t be excited to work on your business each and every day.

An example from Click Millionaires was a person who lived in the United States, but wanted to learn French and travel to France. She started a french vocabulary blog to start learning French and over time, built a strong following and made friends in France!  What a story!

“There is only one success – to be able to spend your life in your own way.” – Christopher Morley

Takeaways from Click Millionaires

With every book I read, I’m always looking to implement actionable steps and provide takeaways. Reading Click Millionaires confirmed my belief that what I’m doing with my business and my blog is the right thing to do.

This website is certainly aligned for success and we have set up the business satisfies all of the principles above.

Going forward, maybe we will get into leveraging the internet through information products, digital products, and with different automation strategies.

Our Recommendation for Click Millionaires

Click Millionaires is a fantastic idea book with actionable advice. Scott Fox does a great job of bringing in concrete examples to help explain each of the business models he discusses.

While this isn’t a complete “how to” book, it does provide a broad overview of the different businesses you can pursue online.

If you are interested in entrepreneurship and looking for something with a low barrier of entry, I definitely recommend you check out Click Millionaires.

Do you have a side hustle? What’s stopping you from getting out there and working online for your income? Are you looking to leverage power of the internet?