Not focused enough

[zion]

Hey guys,

There are many things i am interested in:

Music: had some releases on music labels
Programming: Rich Internet Clients (Angular/Flex) as my current profession as an employee (project leader and developer).
Poker: Wanted to do it on a professional level, but decided to be an employee LOL
Anyway i played the World Series in Vegas last year, which was my dream since i started playing

So in everything i am interested in i am "ok" and have some success because i am a quick learner, but it's far far away from making a living driving the fastlane.

My problem is: It's hard for me to focus on one thing and keep track...ok it's even harder to find a business idea...

So, how do you know what you are doing is THE THING (if something like that exists), when you never made a fastlane-living from that?
How do you stay focused?

I have saved $10k while my friends bought cars, playstations and rent bigger appartments, but they just seem more happy, healthier and have the good looking girls.

I can't lie to myself, my live sucks, because there always was this big need to make something beautiful with my live and stay away from the average bs and social brainwashing, but i seriously can't get started.

Ok, now whining is over...

My first goal is to find something that pays better than my normal job (since online poker is dead this would'nt be an option), so i can quit and have more time to focus on the fastlane.

I know, these are not the "best" questions, but maybe there is something to learn.

I am looking forward for any advice or if you have a business idea, looking for a partner who has frontend skills...


Thanks, Alex (from Germany)

 

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[MarkNNelson]

Zion,

I want to use the subject of investing as an analogy. There's a style of trading called "Trend Following". In very simplistic terms, you pick an investment vehicle (stock, ETF, currency, whatever) that's currently going up, and you buy it. When it starts going down, you sell it. After the fact, you can calculate whether this was a "win" or a "loss". But the key is that one doesn't predict what will be, one only reacts to what is.

So now to your question. You will not predict "THE THING" ahead of time! We probably all started out thinking that way, waiting for the light bulb to go off over our heads, and a voice to boom out from the heavens. But it just will not happen.

You need to find something to try, and try it. Find something to sell, be it a product, or your services as a consultant, or a SaaS app. Pick something that seems like it might sorta follow CENTS guidelines, and just work on it a while. As you work on it, you'll learn more, and you may veer off on a productive tangent. You start a SaaS app project, you pitch to potential customers (very early please, like wireframe stage), you hear from them that your x won't help them, but if you built a y, they'd be all in. You adjust, and go from there. This is all within the "it's going up" stage of the investment analogy.

What happens next? I think there's three general sorts of possibilities.

• Maybe it turns out to be a successful fastlane business. Congratulations. Home run on your first at-bat. To the hammock with you. Your margarita is waiting.
  
• Maybe you strike out, find out that the market doesn't need what you're working on. If so, good. You found out early, and hopefully didn't spend too much money finding that out. Time to try something different.
  
• Or maybe it's a single. The project is a success, but it turns out to not be as fastlane as you thought. That's cool. Maybe you sell it, maybe you run it on the side if it's not too time intensive.

The key takeaways to scenarios 2 & 3 are:

1. You did something. You didn't consider something, or think of something. You did something concrete. This helps you to start building momentum mentally.
2. You learned something. Maybe you struck out, maybe you hit a single. Either way, you're a better player than you were before you came up to bat.

Either way, you're not predicting what will work..."THE THING". Instead, you're getting up to bat, trying something, and adjusting course as you go. Keep getting up to bat, and you'll eventually hit the home run.

And as far as the normal job thing, I know others may disagree, but until you have some traction with a fastlane candidate project that's actually making money, until you can no longer physically do both your day job and your fastlane project, do not even consider quitting the job.

Good Luck!

 

[zion]

1. You did something. You didn't consider something, or think of something. You did something concrete. This helps you to start building momentum mentally.
2. You learned something. Maybe you struck out, maybe you hit a single. Either way, you're a better player than you were before you came up to bat.

This is really cool, never thought about it that way.
Thank you for your time !

 

[AndrewNC]

"So, how do you know what you are doing is THE THING"

You don't know. There is always a leap of faith in the direction you are going.pick your path based on your market research and move fast.

Learn as you go. If you fail- why did ou fail? Learn from it and move forward.

 

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