Hi all,
I'll try to keep this concise as possible. After coming on fastlane, my brain is like on crack - wheels constantly spinning
I was wondering if I could get some advice? My initial goal was to make extra dough to pay off my student loans.
I am 31 and work in IT for 4 years. My passion is music, playing guitar since 12. I came up these goals past weekend (some are personal not sure I should include them here):
1. pay off 26k student loan debt asap.
2. record an album, work on my guitar playing
3. get two more IT certifications by August.
4. Errr ill leave that out for now.
5. Try to free myself from 9-5, long term, fund my music goals and have financial freedom and success.
#1 is most important. #2, #3 is related to #1 - if i spend too much time on #1 there is no time for #2 which is important. #3 is a nice to have, although it could increase my earning potential (maybe, by 5-10k tops in a new job), it would still be slowlane.
Which brings me to some ideas I have and Im not sure where to put my focus. I keep zipping back and forth mentally every time i read these success stories. I feel unclear. Some ideas i have:
Short term money generating ideas (i need to generate an extra 1200$ per month, or $36/day till september 2019 and my debt would be cleared, i am paying 1k currently a month):
- uber, but would have to swap my 07 golf for something newer than due to uber restrictions. Its possible if i swap for a cheaper but newer car of different make.
- arbitrage - ive tried this but i find time cost very high for low reward, inconsistent
- amazon fba PL, merch by amazon (not as quick as above)
Longer term money ideas:
- shopify e-commerce, amazon fba - i have a few ideas for products but would need to do more research
- fox web design company idea - amazing, but not sure if i want to spend more time doing code
- real estate investment - not at that level right now.
- product development, i have an idea for a product that i have not seen marketed exactly, its simple but i feel highly useful. A few friends think its a good idea. I have done some minimum research.
Any suggestions? I feel i am stretching myself too thin. Thanks.
Hi,
It is pretty interesting goal setting. If you asked for suggestions, if I were you...:
(This is what I am actually doing) I would pick only one of all those objectives for a simple reason: there's almost always a clear hierarchy, which means if you perform in an excellent way the most important of the objectives, it will be guarranteed that you achieve the other ones more easily. If you think about it, it resembles a lot with the 80/20% Rule.
Of course, if time and patience is not your problem, you can spare them in your free time, so you feel more productive. I like speed more than anything else, and doing the one right thing is the perfect way to do it. For me, that thing was money. Achieving that, I could 'upgrade my life' as much as I want, which includes reducing time that is needed to complete the other objectives. (Productivity boost)
Long story short, I disabled all my interests and focused in only that thing.
Regarding to sources of income, I have started an FBA bussiness (started, made no money yet, inventory has just arrived a few days ago)....
IF you have at least 1000USD,
I recomend you starting it too. Regarding to my recent experience, it is something very quick to learn (and easy if you know how to learn effectively) and, of course, about 90% passive. 1000$ and Less than 20hours of work are needed to begin, and the process to succeed is also a simple to-do list: Find products -> Contact Manufacturer -> Create a Listing -> Selling (PPC Ads, Reviews Exchange, Giveaways...)
If you haven't, you can earn them with arbitrage as I did. It's not to hard, the more products you advertise, the more frecuently they will buy.
Everything I learned was from Youtube and Tanner J. Fox and 7 Figure Machines Course. (If you do not want to buy it, you can simply consume less than 30% of content and request a refund).
Oh, for Long Term income streams, building trust and a personal brand with social media is strongly recommended.
Also, when tlaking about long term goals, you may become an outlier as a student so one day you can make a bussiness from your carrier. Specially if you are been taugh technical info or something simmilar, the entry barrier will be high enough to have no competition problems.
Ok, you have caught me inspired today . I will give you further information.
Having Money issues covered, let's dive on goal setting (because I know you can improve a lot by following this steps). Let me introduce you the OKR sistem, Objetive Key Result.
You can learn more about it if you google it. Also the is a profesional app/website designed for that and, surprisingly, it's Free: Weekdone Weekly Planning + Quarterly Objectives and Key Results (OKR)
OKR system is commonly used by Google and the leading large companies. But there's more: elite athletes and musicians also use this technique to become unstopable. Let's begin the mini-tutorial .
What I am about to explain you is the step by step strategy:
How to set up an OBJETIVE? It's very important that...:
-The Objetive is achievable in this time interval [1month-3months]
-The Objetive has NO numbers in its title.
As an objetive is synonym to a destiny, no numbers should appear on it. Examples: Lifting more weight, getting the best grades, make as much money as you can, ...
Imagine you want to travel somewhere by car. The objetive is the destiny while the signs that appear in the road are the KeyResults.
You have to right KeyResults right below your objetives.
How do you set up Key Results? (This means, How do you know you are on the right path?)
-Include a number in it
-Include a % in it
-Include a Yes/No Question
You can use a mix of them or just using one of them. What matters is that those keyresults are Needed for that goal. Always have 3-5 KeyResults.
Example: How do I know that I will get the best grades?
KR1: Getting at least 7/10 in each exam
KR2: Doing the 100% of all paperwork and Research Tasks
KR3: Showing up in class everyday
And this is how you guide yourself everyday to make sure you are making progress. Ah, under each KeyResult, you can write down the speciffic action that will lead you to get that KeyResult (Ex:Studying 2h).
Doing this everyday wll help you, if not guarrantee you a high chance to succeed in the Objetives. Of course, nothing matters unless you know exactly your reasons to put your effort in each of those objetives, those are, your priorities. I think I've helped you enough so far.
This information is taken from a Spanish researcher that has the most recent data from New York University, and I learn from him in Youtube (Vic Blaz). Use this!!