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Finally launched! But can't stand my current environment

Anything related to matters of the mind

Fpm9

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Hey everyone,

I hope I posted in the right section.

I am in a though situation and I wanted to ask fastlaners for advice. Sorry for the long post and the broken english !

Like many people here I work a dayjob I don't really enjoy and I also work on my own business ( for me, I sell a physical product ).

The good news are : I launched my product and my website last week! This is a very exciting time for me, especially after I received my inventory. Now all my efforts are directed towards making that first sale, and I have many ideas on how to promote my product. I can't wait to take my first hit of entreprenarial heroin.

Now here's the bad news. My dayjob recently got way worse : tasks were not the most interesting, now it got so boring it became almost insulting. And I got relocated. My new comutee is 2 hours each way, I spend $15 on gas everyday to go to work and come back exhausted in the evening. It means spending less time working on growing my business, and less money to invest in it.

Also, kinda like MJ talked about why he left Illinois for Arizona, for many reasons I feel the need to go live somewhere else. I can't stand the city I live in, and I can't see myself staying here for more than a year. I don't like the weather, I barely meet new people, traffic is so bad it takes hours to drive a few dozen miles...

There's a place I've lived twice in my life, and I had an amazing time. I met tons of good friends there, and did many cool things on weekends. Even when doing meaningless things like going to the gym, grocery shopping, or going to a local coffee shop, I was much happier. I can see myself living there for a year or two. The problem is : this place is in another country. I started my business in my own country and I sell physical products. I am not sure how I can manage this kind of business from a remote location ( especially now since I have zero sales ).

The other problem is with my current job. Basically, based on the laws in my country, if I quit by the end of the month, I only have to wait 48 hours before I am officially gone. If I wait until April to give my resignation notice, I will have to wait 3 full months before leaving. So it would be better if I could make a choice now.

And finally, if I ever decide to leave my current city and move to another country, I will need to find a job there to get my Visa ( and pay for the bills ) . In my field, it can take 3 to 6 months to get a job and do multiples roudns of interviews.This is not really a problem, in the meantime I could always get a temporary job as a bartender or something.. but it is a bit annoying.

I know that was a long rant, but if some of you have advice regarding my situation, especially if it is realistic to manage a ecommerce business from overseas, and how, that would be great.

Thanks a lot!
 
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Bon Appetit

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Hi Fpm9,

How long have you been working with your dayjob? I am from Paris also, I believe that you can get "chomage" for 2 years, which will allow you not to worries about finding another job and give you enough time to grow your actual business.

Another thing, are you single? do you have any kind of attachment to Paris? If you have a wife and kids, or if you are bind to any contract in Paris, it might be more difficult than being single and got no attachement.

Which country are you planing to go? If you want to expatriate yourself, it will be better to go in a country where you have more purchasing power.

"Chomage" will give you the financial back up to start your journey. Let me know if you are able to get this government support.
 

fvcorp

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It sure seems like you're full of confusion at the moment. I got a little angsty from just reading your post.

I'm going to give you some advice that I wish I had earlier in life. It's going to set you free from this indecision in just a few minutes.

I've moved 4000 miles for school. I've done business in several countries. And this realization didn't hit me until I met a great mentor at a time where I was in the midst of a small nervous breakdown where I was about to give up on my dreams.

First let me start by saying there are only six situations that can be controlled in life.

  1. Where you live
  2. How you make a living
  3. Who you spend your time with
  4. The shape of your body and what you eat
  5. The car that you own
  6. The hobby that you have at night
All problems are built around these six points. All businesses are therefore built around these six points too. Each one is often tied to a great deal of emotion.

This forum mostly relates to #2 and #6. And your post made me a bit angsty because it talked about #1, #2, #3, #6.

The fact is: it's not really possible to make 4 life choices at once. This is the same thing I was doing to myself throughout University. I was telling myself, life would be better if only I had these FOUR major changes. Basically what I was saying was that I was unhappy with at least 4/6ths of my life, and you're doing the same here.

Isn't that stressful? Isn't it depressing? Is it possible you're trying to do too much at once?

My way out was to make my focus as narrow as possible and accept the rest for now.

Identify What You Truly Want

What is your goal in life right now? To make your ecommerce business become "how you make your living"?

Identify What's in Your Way

To accomplish that, you're going to need more time? To get more time you're going to need less of a commute?

Let your Focus be Ruthless

Does it really F*cking matter if you have friends right now? Since your business is already going, does it matter if you live elsewhere that makes you feel good?

Your answers will be different, I'm sure, but you must choose one change at a time. You will drive yourself crazy thinking of four major life choices at once. Not to mention you may fail your business because you have too much other stuff on your mind.

It's time for a reset, brother. Be focused (keep your vision narrow) on one choice at a time and you will be the most decisive person on the planet.
 
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Fpm9

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Thanks a lot

Hi Fpm9,

How long have you been working with your dayjob? I am from Paris also, I believe that you can get "chomage" for 2 years, which will allow you not to worries about finding another job and give you enough time to grow your actual business.

Another thing, are you single? do you have any kind of attachment to Paris? If you have a wife and kids, or if you are bind to any contract in Paris, it might be more difficult than being single and got no attachement.

Which country are you planing to go? If you want to expatriate yourself, it will be better to go in a country where you have more purchasing power.

"Chomage" will give you the financial back up to start your journey. Let me know if you are able to get this government support.

Hi! I have been working for this company for about 6 months. I am in "Periode d'essai" and if I quit I won't get "Chomage". I don't think they will fire me either so my chances of getting Chomage are close to 0%.

I am single and I have no kids. I have some kind of attachment to Paris but it is not that important.

The place I'd like to go has the same cost of living as France, a bit lower than Paris city.

How many months cash runway would you have?

I can only survive 4 to 5 months with no income ( if nothing bad happens ) :(
 

Fpm9

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Jul 27, 2017
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It sure seems like you're full of confusion at the moment. I got a little angsty from just reading your post.

I'm going to give you some advice that I wish I had earlier in life. It's going to set you free from this indecision in just a few minutes.

I've moved 4000 miles for school. I've done business in several countries. And this realization didn't hit me until I met a great mentor at a time where I was in the midst of a small nervous breakdown where I was about to give up on my dreams.

First let me start by saying there are only six situations that can be controlled in life.

  1. Where you live
  2. How you make a living
  3. Who you spend your time with
  4. The shape of your body and what you eat
  5. The car that you own
  6. The hobby that you have at night
All problems are built around these six points. All businesses are therefore built around these six points too. Each one is often tied to a great deal of emotion.

This forum mostly relates to #2 and #6. And your post made me a bit angsty because it talked about #1, #2, #3, #6.

The fact is: it's not really possible to make 4 life choices at once. This is the same thing I was doing to myself throughout University. I was telling myself, life would be better if only I had these FOUR major changes. Basically what I was saying was that I was unhappy with at least 4/6ths of my life, and you're doing the same here.

Isn't that stressful? Isn't it depressing? Is it possible you're trying to do too much at once?

My way out was to make my focus as narrow as possible and accept the rest for now.

Identify What You Truly Want

What is your goal in life right now? To make your ecommerce business become "how you make your living"?

Identify What's in Your Way

To accomplish that, you're going to need more time? To get more time you're going to need less of a commute?

Let your Focus be Ruthless

Does it really f*cking matter if you have friends right now? Since your business is already going, does it matter if you live elsewhere that makes you feel good?

Your answers will be different, I'm sure, but you must choose one change at a time. You will drive yourself crazy thinking of four major life choices at once. Not to mention you may fail your business because you have too much other stuff on your mind.

It's time for a reset, brother. Be focused (keep your vision narrow) on one choice at a time and you will be the most decisive person on the planet.

Wow, great post! Thank you. It made me think of a book I recently finished : "The One thing"

Yes my goal right know is to be able to have a profitable business and provide some value to the world. I have been working hard those last few weeks.. and I was happy with the progress I made on my business.

On the other hand, I am miserable in every other area of life. I know I can't fix everything quickly but I am not sure I can wait until I am sucessful with my business. Even my health started to suffer. And I am trying to take action before I get depressed and I can not work on my #1 goal anymore
 

amp0193

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$15 for gas.

Don't forget to factor in the huge hidden costs of car maintenance that come with driving 4 hours a day.

Or the amount of money you're not making because you don't have time or energy to work on your new business.

IMO, it'd be worth taking a paycut to find anything else closer to home, even if it's just temporary.

Get your time back.
 
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Fpm9

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$15 for gas.

Don't forget to factor in the huge hidden costs of car maintenance that come with driving 4 hours a day.

Or the amount of money you're not making because you don't have time or energy to work on your new business.

IMO, it'd be worth taking a paycut to find anything else closer to home, even if it's just temporary.

Get your time back.

Yeah gas is expensive here.. And I know it cost me way more in maintainance.

You're right. Thats exactly why I don't want to work that far from home, I can't afford wasting 25% of my time ( if I sleep 8 hours a day ) driving to and from my job. But if I get another job, I was thinking of moving to a place I actually like instead of staying in the same area.
 

Fpm9

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Also a good option.

And thats why I wondered if it was realistic to move to another country now that I launched my product. I guess it is possible to manage and grow an ecommerce business from abroad but I don't know how hard it would be.
 
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Ethan_Scott

New Contributor
Mar 1, 2018
16
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41
India
Hey everyone,

I hope I posted in the right section.

I am in a though situation and I wanted to ask fastlaners for advice. Sorry for the long post and the broken english !

Like many people here I work a dayjob I don't really enjoy and I also work on my own business ( for me, I sell a physical product ).

The good news are : I launched my product and my website last week! This is a very exciting time for me, especially after I received my inventory. Now all my efforts are directed towards making that first sale, and I have many ideas on how to promote my product. I can't wait to take my first hit of entreprenarial heroin.

Now here's the bad news. My dayjob recently got way worse : tasks were not the most interesting, now it got so boring it became almost insulting. And I got relocated. My new comutee is 2 hours each way, I spend $15 on gas everyday to go to work and come back exhausted in the evening. It means spending less time working on growing my business, and less money to invest in it.

Also, kinda like MJ talked about why he left Illinois for Arizona, for many reasons I feel the need to go live somewhere else. I can't stand the city I live in, and I can't see myself staying here for more than a year. I don't like the weather, I barely meet new people, traffic is so bad it takes hours to drive a few dozen miles...

There's a place I've lived twice in my life, and I had an amazing time. I met tons of good friends there, and did many cool things on weekends. Even when doing meaningless things like going to the gym, grocery shopping, or going to a local coffee shop, I was much happier. I can see myself living there for a year or two. The problem is : this place is in another country. I started my business in my own country and I sell physical products. I am not sure how I can manage this kind of business from a remote location ( especially now since I have zero sales ).

The other problem is with my current job. Basically, based on the laws in my country, if I quit by the end of the month, I only have to wait 48 hours before I am officially gone. If I wait until April to give my resignation notice, I will have to wait 3 full months before leaving. So it would be better if I could make a choice now.

And finally, if I ever decide to leave my current city and move to another country, I will need to find a job there to get my Visa ( and pay for the bills ) . In my field, it can take 3 to 6 months to get a job and do multiples roudns of interviews.This is not really a problem, in the meantime I could always get a temporary job as a bartender or something.. but it is a bit annoying.

I know that was a long rant, but if some of you have advice regarding my situation, especially if it is realistic to manage a ecommerce business from overseas, and how, that would be great.

Thanks a lot!
Since you are talking about a product, I am guessing you need to increase the sales and generate more revenue. For any business to take off, I think it is necessary to advertise to the right audience. Because there is a lot of data on the internet about all of these things, I think you could have two options. Before I discuss those two options, I would like to say that even if you do go abroad, I don't think managing your e commerce business is a problem. If your products generates revenue, I'm sure you wont be alone who will be managing the business and I think you can easily live a happy life.
So the 2 options are basically either you hire someone to do the advertising part. Since you have a product that needs to be sold, advertising is key. The other option is you do a digital marketing course yourself and implement those things to your business and dedicate your entire time towards developing your business.
Either way, your business will succeed since all major companies are using data analytics to improve their sales.
The other thing is, if you want to get your product up and running, you can't do it while working on 2 things at once. Dedication is necessary for this and I think concentrating on one job can help you do better
I wish you all the best!
 

amp0193

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I guess it is possible to manage and grow an ecommerce business from abroad but I don't know how hard it would be.

It's not hard. You just have to put some systems in place.

Someone needs to receive your product, prepare it for shipping, and be able to ship it out for you. There are "3PL" or 3rd-party logistics companies that do this.

The simpler your product, the easier this will be.
 

Fpm9

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It's not hard. You just have to put some systems in place.

Someone needs to receive your product, prepare it for shipping, and be able to ship it out for you. There are "3PL" or 3rd-party logistics companies that do this.

The simpler your product, the easier this will be.
Thanks!

I thought about outsourcing logistics, and I thought that it was not something for very small businesses.. but after I did some research I found out that you don't need to be a big fish to do it.

I will email some companies to try to get quotes. My product is small and light, so storage should not be a problem.
 
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JohnBuffet

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$15 for gas.

Don't forget to factor in the huge hidden costs of car maintenance that come with driving 4 hours a day.

Or the amount of money you're not making because you don't have time or energy to work on your new business.

IMO, it'd be worth taking a paycut to find anything else closer to home, even if it's just temporary.

Get your time back.

I agree. I read in this book called "The Happiness Hypothesis" that certain things cause humans to be stressed no matter what, and unless you change your environment it's going to bother you. One of these things was noise, and the other was long commutes...
 

tiagosoares17.22

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If you have cash to live 4-5 months in a city like Paris, why don't you move to a city where the cost of living it's at least half, and where you don't need VISA?

If you go to places like Prague, Budapest, Krakow, you can EASILY, find a job and live 10 months with the money you have to live 4-5 months in Paris.

Moving to a very expensive city without money, job and a business is not a good idea, unless you are willing to accept to work for the "first" thing that shows up.

Some people here mentioned about finding out what you actually want, what you value and those things. And that is exactly what you have to do before taking the decision of going somewhere else.

Now, when it comes to spending 4hours per day commuting to work? Well, that is a LOT of wasted time.
 

Fpm9

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If you have cash to live 4-5 months in a city like Paris, why don't you move to a city where the cost of living it's at least half, and where you don't need VISA?

If you go to places like Prague, Budapest, Krakow, you can EASILY, find a job and live 10 months with the money you have to live 4-5 months in Paris.

Moving to a very expensive city without money, job and a business is not a good idea, unless you are willing to accept to work for the "first" thing that shows up.

Some people here mentioned about finding out what you actually want, what you value and those things. And that is exactly what you have to do before taking the decision of going somewhere else.

Now, when it comes to spending 4hours per day commuting to work? Well, that is a LOT of wasted time.

I think I'd rather go to any city I want and find a job there, but yeah I thought about eastern Europe. I can also find a job before moving to that place, and doing job interviews on skype.

At least when I'm stuck in traffic, I have time to think about what to do in the next few months. And I have time to listed to podcast people here recomanded.
 
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