Introduction
I don't have a business yet, so, at first glance, this is an odd thread for me to be creating. This thread seems lonely in this forum, surrounded by action-takers and business owners, making solid progress and improving their businesses. Honestly, I hesitated posting this thread here - I don't have a business idea, I'm not making money, from the outside it seems like I'm doing nothing.
However, I realized something today. Sure, I may not have a business mapped out yet. But that is OK. Because I have been learning and progressing. I've been educating myself, through forums, websites, and books. Though I may not be at the same stage as a lot of the other people here, yet, I've been gaining the knowledge I need to be able to join you on this path, sooner rather than later.
I'm starting this thread as a way to keep me accountable, keep me moving forward. Here, I'll write about my path towards financial freedom, the steps I take and the knowledge I gain along the way. Not only will I write my goals, dreams, and tasks out, I hope that I will be, in a way, teaching what I learn to those readers who are along the same path as me. Maybe I can help some others, maybe not. But, either way, I'll have a record of what I'm learning. All in one spot, easy to review and easy to take action on. And, soon, I will have a business, and I'll be able to write about that too.
But first, my current situation:
What is my WHY?
From reading the book and looking around the forums, I realize that this is a very important part of being successful in the Fastlane. Like MJ writes in The Millionaire Fastlane , "Passion for an end goal, a why, drives Fastlane action." (pg 214) Without having a reason for doing something, you aren't going to get far. So what is my WHY? I have several that I believe really affect me, and make me passionate about this path.
Overall, I want to be in control, to have freedom, and to be the driver in my life, not the hitchhiker.
My goals [UPDATED 30SEPT2011]
Goals are an extremely important part of achieving anything. Without specific goals set up, you may very well never arrive at your WHY, as it is very easy to stray off of your path and get distracted with other opportunities. I find these goals are best split into five parts - Overall, Long-term, short-term, near-term and daily. Each part feeds off of the part that comes before it. Near-term goals will help you work towards your long-term or overall goals. This way, you know that things you are working on right now will get you to where you want to be. The wonderful thing about goals is that you can always change them, so these are just my (business-related/financial) goals as I see them now - in time, I'm sure some will change.
My education
As I've stated earlier in this post, I've been educating myself on a lot of business- and life-related topics. I'll keep an updated list on what I want to learn here, so that I can always look here when I don't know what my next step is. In future posts, I plan to share what I've learned so that other people can take advantage of this as well. =)
"You have a LOT of hidden knowledge in past posts on these forums. So much so that if you used the search function well, you could spend the next 5 weeks reading, non stop, and learn enough to get started." -Russ H (I've definitely found this to be true!)
My current resources
I have two main resources currently available to me. The first is a blog that I started about two years ago (Baby-Steps to Fluency), and the second is my position at Beachbody as an Independent Coach.
I am planning on using both as learning opportunities while I work at creating my Fastlane business.
My blog will let me improve my writing skills (English is not my native language, so I can use all the help I can get!), work on my programming/coding knowledge, and let me play with different techniques to really improve a website (split testing, sales pages, etc). It'd be nice to make some side income through this website, but in the end I will use it as a learning platform for myself, while still being able to provide value to the people that read the blog.
Though I know that being in a MLM isn't nearly as good as owning it, it is a great opportunity to learn and see what works and doesn't work with sales and marketing. I've never had much experience trying to sell things to people, and this company (with products that I really believe in, a la P90X and Insanity) will give me some knowledge I can really use in the future. I have a wonderful upline coach who has been really successful (he's in the top 10 worldwide), and talking to him has been extremely educational so far. Through this, I also feel I could learn a lot about networking, finding opportunities, and improving my creativity. I'll also be able to put any income I make from this directly into my business fund.
So...
I think this post is more than long enough, and my brain is getting fried thinking all this stuff through. Hopefully this thread will be at least a little bit useful to people here, and if nothing else I've got my thinking somewhat organized so I can take the next step. =)
I don't have a business yet, so, at first glance, this is an odd thread for me to be creating. This thread seems lonely in this forum, surrounded by action-takers and business owners, making solid progress and improving their businesses. Honestly, I hesitated posting this thread here - I don't have a business idea, I'm not making money, from the outside it seems like I'm doing nothing.
However, I realized something today. Sure, I may not have a business mapped out yet. But that is OK. Because I have been learning and progressing. I've been educating myself, through forums, websites, and books. Though I may not be at the same stage as a lot of the other people here, yet, I've been gaining the knowledge I need to be able to join you on this path, sooner rather than later.
I'm starting this thread as a way to keep me accountable, keep me moving forward. Here, I'll write about my path towards financial freedom, the steps I take and the knowledge I gain along the way. Not only will I write my goals, dreams, and tasks out, I hope that I will be, in a way, teaching what I learn to those readers who are along the same path as me. Maybe I can help some others, maybe not. But, either way, I'll have a record of what I'm learning. All in one spot, easy to review and easy to take action on. And, soon, I will have a business, and I'll be able to write about that too.
But first, my current situation:
- My introduction thread - for those of you that'd like a bit more general information.
- College student (senior), full-time
- Army cadet
- Expecting a son, due any day now!
- Debt free, but low on cash - have about $50/month I can put towards a business at the moment without extra work
- Experience with blogging (Wordpress), website design, and programming (some CSS/HTML, little PHP and Javascript)
- Interests include health, finance, and languages
What is my WHY?
From reading the book and looking around the forums, I realize that this is a very important part of being successful in the Fastlane. Like MJ writes in The Millionaire Fastlane , "Passion for an end goal, a why, drives Fastlane action." (pg 214) Without having a reason for doing something, you aren't going to get far. So what is my WHY? I have several that I believe really affect me, and make me passionate about this path.
- I want to be able to support my family while being able to spend time with them, without being shackled to a J-O-B.
- I want to be able to repay my parents for all they've done for me throughout the years, and give them opportunities and experiences they could not have otherwise.
- I want to be able to travel and explore the world, without having to worry about if I'll have a job when I come home.
- I want to live life according to my, and my family's, schedules, not my job's.
- I want to make a difference in the world. I want to make someone's day just a little bit better, someone's smile just a little brighter.
Overall, I want to be in control, to have freedom, and to be the driver in my life, not the hitchhiker.
My goals [UPDATED 30SEPT2011]
Goals are an extremely important part of achieving anything. Without specific goals set up, you may very well never arrive at your WHY, as it is very easy to stray off of your path and get distracted with other opportunities. I find these goals are best split into five parts - Overall, Long-term, short-term, near-term and daily. Each part feeds off of the part that comes before it. Near-term goals will help you work towards your long-term or overall goals. This way, you know that things you are working on right now will get you to where you want to be. The wonderful thing about goals is that you can always change them, so these are just my (business-related/financial) goals as I see them now - in time, I'm sure some will change.
- Overall - These goals are the goals that keep you going, how you will be able to achieve your WHYs, and what you ultimately want to accomplish with your life.
- Create a business that truly brings value into this world, effecting millions of people world-wide in a positive, helpful way.
- Have a passive or semi-passive income of at least 10k/month.
- Organize and balance my personal/work life so that I have plenty of time to spend with my family, whenever I want to.
- Constantly grow, learn, and achieve new things - bucket list.
- Long-term - Long-term goals are those that are a couple years out still, but ones that will impact your overall goals and get you closer to being able to live your dreams (or your WHYs).
- See Daily goals
- Short-term - These are probably goals that you want to achieve by twelve months from when you set them. It's a refinement of the long-term goals.
- See Daily goals
- Near-term - Near-term goals are the specific actions required to achieve your short-term goals. They cover about 4 weeks in advance, and are always changing. I take my daily task list from these goals.
- See Daily goals
- Daily - These are the nitty gritty, daily (or even weekly) tasks. Just doing a few of these a day will allow you to make significant progress towards your goals.
- Create a long-, short-, and near-term plan to achieve my overall goals.
- Analyze 30 Day Challenge business idea.
- Practice 'seeing opportunities'.
- Practice sales skills through Beachbody.
- Study business structure.
My education
As I've stated earlier in this post, I've been educating myself on a lot of business- and life-related topics. I'll keep an updated list on what I want to learn here, so that I can always look here when I don't know what my next step is. In future posts, I plan to share what I've learned so that other people can take advantage of this as well. =)
"You have a LOT of hidden knowledge in past posts on these forums. So much so that if you used the search function well, you could spend the next 5 weeks reading, non stop, and learn enough to get started." -Russ H (I've definitely found this to be true!)
- Seeing opportunities.
- Sales skills.
- Improving creativity.
- Positive outlook.
- Learn the vocabulary.
- Collect 'tools of the trade'.
- How to read/understand financial statements.
- Basic accounting knowledge.
- Basic tax knowledge.
- Legal knowledge.
- Financial modeling skills, be able to test scenarios.
- Budgeting.
- Networking.
- Negotiating.
- Raising money.
- Understanding markets.
- Communication skills.
- Leading people.
- Managing Time.
My current resources
I have two main resources currently available to me. The first is a blog that I started about two years ago (Baby-Steps to Fluency), and the second is my position at Beachbody as an Independent Coach.
I am planning on using both as learning opportunities while I work at creating my Fastlane business.
My blog will let me improve my writing skills (English is not my native language, so I can use all the help I can get!), work on my programming/coding knowledge, and let me play with different techniques to really improve a website (split testing, sales pages, etc). It'd be nice to make some side income through this website, but in the end I will use it as a learning platform for myself, while still being able to provide value to the people that read the blog.
Though I know that being in a MLM isn't nearly as good as owning it, it is a great opportunity to learn and see what works and doesn't work with sales and marketing. I've never had much experience trying to sell things to people, and this company (with products that I really believe in, a la P90X and Insanity) will give me some knowledge I can really use in the future. I have a wonderful upline coach who has been really successful (he's in the top 10 worldwide), and talking to him has been extremely educational so far. Through this, I also feel I could learn a lot about networking, finding opportunities, and improving my creativity. I'll also be able to put any income I make from this directly into my business fund.
So...
I think this post is more than long enough, and my brain is getting fried thinking all this stuff through. Hopefully this thread will be at least a little bit useful to people here, and if nothing else I've got my thinking somewhat organized so I can take the next step. =)
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