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Turning my life around

A detailed account of a Fastlane process...

Falco

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Oct 22, 2014
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Good day to you,

I´ll spare you the whole story since I have written a rough overview of it in my introduction.
However, this is my current situation:

+ Just dropped out of technical college ( for too many reasons to list )
+ I am a heavy smoker
+ I am a regular ( binge ) drinker
+ No job or anything special worth mentioning in a resumee
+ Heavily depressed ( but having taken steps to make it better, and it already works )
+ Enough money saved to get by for about one year ( expenses about 600,-/month )
+ No debt

I am ready to change my life and build my business, I can see the path clearly.

I am starting this thread for two main reasons:
To document my personal and entrepreneurial journey to have something to look back on.
And to help people who suffer from depressive states, which is interfering with their
entrepreneurial aspirations to get better.


I am starting a content / subscription based online business. The niche I chose is quite huge with
a lot of competitors, and I am well aware of that. Good thing is, most of them are small to middle-sized, unprofessional and, what´s most important, targeting a completely different age- and livestyle-group. I know the market really well and see this as my big advantage.

My big business goal is to gain significant popularity and compete with the 3 biggest competitors
until June next year. It should be entirely possible, but I am going to do research on exact numbers to
make things more clear.

Today I researched and chose my webhost. It is affordable and ( most importantly ) makes later upgrades very easy. I will definitely need them. The service should be available in the evening.

Next steps:
+ Flip one product from ebay today ( already got a buyer )
+ Work the evening in catering ( one time job )
+ Mindstorm domain-names and register the best
+ Finish resumee and application for various 20h/w sh*t-jobs ( To pay bills and get out of the house )
+ Create first layout / site design
+ Get basic site online and register with search engines


Steps for getting rid of my depression and foggy mind:
+ Meditation ( started 5 days ago ), at least 10min in the morning
+ Go for a walk everyday ( 30min )
+ Do some short exercise daily ( 15min )
+ Free myself of smoking, starting tomorrow
+ Limit myself to two alcoholic bevereges / day ( started one week ago )
+ Start intermitted fasting ( basically only eating past 6pm )


I will regularly update on my business ventures and my mental state.
I have managed to get rid of my depression once using similar means. But I got lazy and it came back stronger than before.
This is when I realised that everyone is just the sum of what he/she does everyday.
And I will keep that in mind for my journey.

I´ll update again tomorrow.


Best regards,

Falco
 
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MoneyDoc

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Welcome to the forum buddy.

The first step to everything is CHANGE. I can see you have successfully completed that step. Depression is not a joke... So kudos to you for staying strong.

Remember, take a look at the gold threads on this forum - as their name suggests, they are GOLDEN. You'll learn a lot. Also, this community has some incredible people that you can learn a lot from.

By the way, what platform are you using for your subscription based site or are you coding it yourself?
 

Get Right

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Now that's a progress thread post. I like your approach.

Be honest with yourself and this thread. We don't mind hearing about the bumps in the road. Now go get em'!
 

Falco

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Oct 22, 2014
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@MoneyDoc
I will decide how to implement it when I get there, I am mainly focusing on the steps ahead.

Progress in business:
+ Managed to sell the item yesterday
+ Brainstormed domain names, am now down to 3 and will decide tomorrow morning
+ Wrote the code for my basic site layout
+ Wrote down a quick overview of my competitors ( layout, marketing, prices, themes, support, etc... )
+ Written resumee / application templates
+ Found 10 jobs that would generate enough money


Progress in my head:
+ Didn´t smoke
+ Didn´t drink
+ Didn´t eat until 6pm
+ Did my meditation/walking/exercise

Beeing depressed really sucks. But I can see myself getting better over time. The progress I made in about
a week by meditating daily are quite astonishing.
Smoking also REALLY sucks. It also increases mood swings due to varying dopamine levels, which is probably
not the best choice if one wants to escape depression.

Surprisingly, not eating all day really helped. Beeing hungry apperently helps taking
your mind off cigarettes. The Hungers seems to come up in waves, so it was not that hard to bear.
Also, since my body did not have to digest anything, I felt my energy levels beeing nearly constant throughout the day.

Next steps:
+ Register domain first thing in the morning
+ Upload basic layout page(es)
+ Chose color scheme for the website
+ Setup first database
+ Create first draft of the logo
+ Apply for the jobs I researched and look for 10 alternative ones
+ Put my speaker system on an online marketplace ( covers website hosting costs for one year )
+ Sell my IPod and use the money to buy an INSIDERS subscription


Thanks to MoneyDoc, Get Right and 16yearoldboy for the support.
I will keep you posted.

Best regards,

Falco
 

Falco

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Oct 22, 2014
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Update:

Had some problems getting out of bed yesterday. Anyway, I kept to most of my schedule:
+ Registered the domain
+ Finished parts of the layout
+ Put my Ipod on ebay
+ Sold my speaker system and
+ Bought an INSIDERS-subscription with the money

As written in the last post, the fasting really helps with quitting smoking. Today I am so hungry I don´t
even think about it. Must have something to do with primal survival priorities.

Yesterday I had a bad day. What really helps is anchoring my focus to the sensation of my body.
Sounds esotherical but actually isn´t. It´s part of common meditational practices basically means
returning to a calm meditational state throughout the day. Also helps me in social interactions.

If anyone has questions about it I am happy to help.

I did some more research on my competitors. It´s going to be tough building momentum ( aka traffic ), but
I will adress that problem when I have the site ready.

Next steps:
+ Wait for the domain to be available
+ Apply for the jobs ( failed to do that yesterday )
+ Further tweak the design / layout ( am not satisfied with it yet )
+ Read 5 INSIDERS articles that sound appealing before going to sleep


Take care and best regards,

Falco
 

Testament

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Hey man, it's great to see that you're able to face down your demons and come out productive.

Have you checked out any of Eckhart Tolle's audiobooks? Those made an absolutely massive difference for me in the way that I perceived the world. Also Tony Robbins has a great program called Personal Power 2 that really helped me a ton when I was at my lowest points.

Something else that has really helped me in the past has been setting up a morning success ritual. Just something you can do for 30-60 minutes right after you wake up that will set up a strong day for you.

My personal success ritual at the moment is waking up and immediately going and drinking a liter of water. Then I make a green vegetable shake (filled with generous amounts of kale, spinach, broccoli and dandelions leaves, with a bit of unpasteurized apple juice to kill the awful taste), and after that I lift weights and have a nutritious filling breakfast (usually steel cut oates mixed with a bit of ground flaxseed).

The idea behind it is that your day starts off so strong that mentally it will be really hard for you to deviate from it. Each of those specific actions is also designed to elevate your mood - the extremely healthy food, the water, and the weight lifting will make you feel fantastic after about a week of your ritual.

Anyway, those are just some quick things that I thought of. Hopefully it'll help a bit. Great thread so far! :)
 
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Falco

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Oct 22, 2014
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@Testament
Hey man, have never heard of him, but will check it out tomorrow.
Your advice with the morning ritual is spot on. I do my meditation sessions first thing
in the morning, followed by the most important task on my list. It really helps gaining momentum for the day.

Business progress:
Today was rather uneventful. I mostly worked on the design, but it was slow and I have not much to show for.
For the time beeing I decided to keep it basic and focus on getting content and store online.
Tomorrow will be better.
I also finished kind of a market-summary-spreadsheet to keep things in perspective as I add content to the site.
Still no job-replies ( thank god, in the end I might have to take one ).

Personal progress:
+ Didn´t smoke
+ Managed to drink one beer today without having the urge to get completely smashed afterwards ( now THAT I call progress )
+ Did my walking / meditation / exercise

The mindset that really helps me at the moment is seeing EVERYTHING I do as a form of training.

+ Training to think clearly: meditation.
+ Training to have energy throughout the day: exercise.
+ Training to not procrastinate: Get something important done first thing in the morning.
+ Training to be confident: Walk and talk confident.

Like in sports, I am going to get better if I just practice daily.
Success is nothing but practice, with all its ups and downs.

Wow, pretty deep.
Anyway ...

... next steps:
+ Finish basic layout
+ Create basic content ( this could take a couple of days, we´ll see how fast I am )
+ Create my product ( at least two weeks, but I will build traffic in the meantime )


Don´t know if it´s because it´s just my second business attempt or because I had too much coffee.
But I am really excited. Something I missed during all those years in school and college.

I am going to update soon.
Take care and best regards,

Falco
 

GravyBoat

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You need to start drinking a shit load of water. Especially if you're drinking alcohol. Add 1 gallon of water to your daily schedule for change. It will change you.

EDIT: More on this. You need to stay fully hydrated at all times. It's like running a car without oil or gears without lubricant if you aren't fully hydrated.
 
Last edited:

Falco

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Oct 22, 2014
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@GravyBoat
Sounds right, I am going to try it out.

I started creating content / articles to generate traffic. I made a plan in my head how I will go about writing the articles.
However, progress seems slow ( probably because of my inexperience in writing ).


Today I have:
+ written down A LOT of subjects I am going to write about
+ started writing on a couple of articles

One of the things that differentiate my service is marketing. My competitors market in a pretty straightforward way, and none of them
tells a story that goes along with their products and services. Also their branding is minimal.

That means I have to figure out how to create my own "brand-universe", a story and vocabulary that connects the people who us my service.
What I mean by that ? I can take this forum as an example.
This forum operates in its own universe. People can feel connected because of phrases like "fastlane, slowlane, rich-in-a-wheelchair, etc".
And it works, there are countless examples ( crossfit, freelethics, twitter, ... ).


However, I am still a bit in the dark about how I exactly I will pull it off. But I will figure it out.

Next steps:
+ Finish at least 5 articles
+ Polish the design ( I think it´s going to be a lot of polishing )
+ Make the site more dynamic ( in order to show content without having to change the site everytime )

As I said earlier, any tips from regular bloggers about writing good articles would be greatly appreciated.


Thanks in advance and best regards,

Falco
 
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