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[Daily Update] Watch me go from Freelancer To Entrepreneur

A detailed account of a Fastlane process...

MaxKhalus

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Plot twist!

The product actually sucks (costs twice as much as expected) so I gave up the deal this week.
All my writing clients also went on vacation and just got back yesterday, hence the 12h of work to compensate.

To add more irony to the situation, I must have earned far more money trading crypto so far than with Amazon. Those alts are really hot right before Septembers 1st.

Also, I've updated my plan and divided my schedule in one task per quarter (like long time ago):
- All the morning: Write and finish with workout (at least 750 words). If there's no work, send 3 Upwork proposals and daily posts on alternative sites.
- From noon to lunch: Research for Amazon products. (according to my mentor, there are far better products and should waste time with this one. I'm already on the green, so it's okay to lose the Christmas sales rush.)
- From lunch to 6pm: Code my productivity app
- From 6pm to 9pm: Practice day-trading and have dinner.

Night routine: Research next day's articles and write the outlines. Also, write all todo lists and update metrics.

P.S. I day trade and code just because it's fun. I wish I could spend over 4-5h just writing or researching, but I need tight deadlines to keep the intensity. If I wrote 12hrs a day, efficiency would lower and my boredom would increase.

So far, I love the routine. Ready to start the new quarter.
 

MaxKhalus

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Numbers in red? Is that why you don't post?

Nah, here's what I've been doing this whole time:
Remember the four-block routine? Writing, business, coding, trading? It's awesome. I could work all day long and feel happy about life. The problem is, you can only progress 25% at a time, if not less.

It doesn't take much research to find why all entrepreneurs recommend doing one thing at a time. I believe that, although you should do one thing at a time, you can learn as broadly as you want, hence the coding and trading stuff.

But even with that routine, one part was failing: the business. Weeks ago, I went from being about to close a deal to give up on the product (for the second time) because it broke down on negotiation. Just like happened last October.

In case you don't know, I started FBA in late 2018, bought 300 moon lamps in October, and was expecting to make 5K per month at early 2019. Here we are guys, almost 2021!!!

With this obvious expectation gap, I had to decide. I want to do these four things, but I can only do one thing at a time:
1. Find awesome product.
2. Fund awesome product.
3. Find more awesome products.
4. Repeat until you're 300k/month profit
5. Start software company (and code)


So these red numbers are good news, because it means I've spent most of my days on product research. For what my mentor has said, I've got far better at research in the last week (six products, and most of them are viable). Now, we've validating product improvement and seasonality. As I wait for his feedback, I assume the product research part completed, 80% chance.

That means we can finally go to step 2. Grow the numbers.

I'll admit I've been postponing Upwork for no good reason (except that I have nowhere to keep my money online). So whenever I ran out of work, It will be searching for clients.

Now, this research part has been much harder because of the focus part. I could hardly do one thing at once, and if I did, I got no enjoyment out of it. That's why I think the 16h hustle workday model doesn't work (unless you alternate among projects which are closely related). I felt most of the times at risk of falling back to bad habits (like gaming), which didn't happen with the 4-block routine. It's been a risky experiment.

With research almost complete, I'm starting to raise these numbers tomorrow (writing this in the evening).

But I still want to focus on a single thing for now. And I can't do it if I need to cover my daily minimum of $15. That's why I'll plan to do the whole week's work in one day, then do whatever I need to focus on.

And yes, daily postings are back.
 

MaxKhalus

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Ok guys, the morning routine is over and I just covered all my losses. Let's see how the rest of the day goes.
 
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MaxKhalus

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PayPal froze the account with half of the money. The other half is still a +$1000 pending payment from my client. After rent, I'm left with $165. Yep, my progress for the whole year.

(It's not that I lost it. But I can't verify my identity without an ID. I'd better accept the loss than spend months on resolution centers.)
But wait, there's more:
- I paid $281 without buyer protection for an order about my previous product, which I gave up on later. Lost.
- Even before, I earned $400 in some writing platform. Due to verification, the amount got lost too.

What's the point of making money when you can't save or use it? I don't remember ever spending a dollar in myself.

So, it's two-three years now I'm in the same spot.

Either I beat the odds or I'll stay here forever. Excuse me while I stop the writing and try to get control of this matter first.

Learning the commandment of control the hard way.
 

MaxKhalus

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Gladly, rent can wait until the account unblocks, which makes my remaining balance technically usable. Let's undo that 1200 for now.
I'll use someone else's verified account to keep the funds in the mean time.

As for the growth, the days I was on red numbers were spent on perfecting a system.

Because my perfect amazon product has these numbers:
34912
That's more than $100 a day. There's no way I can achieve that unless I change myself, which is what I've been doing these days.

See it here :
34913
I invite you to do something similar, you'll see amazing results. Here's what I did:
- I went back to every single source of information I considered useful in the past: Youtube channels, books, articles, and personal thoughts. I wrote down all of them.
- I combined some of them and removed the unnecessary ones.
- I grouped them on categories, each of them with subcategories for every purpose.
- The most important step. I added triggers to use this information in practice: checklists and reminders.

It took lots of work. You know how it feels like after an in-depth cleaning of your house? This was the same, but with brain's thoughts. I feel much more clear and calmer now.

Am I now ready for the $100+/per day? Let's see it in the next episode.
 

MaxKhalus

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This exercise has changed everything. You may haven't read this point I added (there's so much content)...:34982

From now on, I'm posting three times a day here on the forum. The day counter will no longer show the real day, but three days for every actual day (time goes on 3x faster).
 
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MaxKhalus

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Morning tasks are over and also covered the minimum words to break even. Starting day 2.
 

MaxKhalus

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Today isn't my day, but I'm glad to see things keep moving.
Day three is mostly about maintenance tasks, but will focus on getting more writing done before bed.
 

MaxKhalus

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Things turned out to go better than expected. Ready to sleep and restart the morning routine, expecting massive action after I go through it.
 
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MaxKhalus

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You're right. The goal is to have at least 4hours per day, or over 10 in total.
Day 1 is 7-8 hours (until lunch)
Day 2 is 6 hours (until 8pm)
Day 3 is 2-3 hours (until bed time)

Short story: I spent some time these days doing paperwork to update the IDs. Hopefully, Paypal will enable the account now.
 

MaxKhalus

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This shows I need more focus. When I made the numbers yesterday, my potential allows to make $100-$200 per day easily, and a maximum of $690 with the time I have.

I want to get it right.
 
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MaxKhalus

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k, I kinda like where this is going. Feeling confused as well!?
The longest day corresponds to the lowest profit (day 1, aka 275)
The shortest day (from 8 to 10pm) made me $24.
It's not much. But it's ironical how the my productivity spiked when having less time available.

Getting ready for tomorrow. Closing day 3.
 

MaxKhalus

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Happy Thursday guys,

That's how day one ended.
Luckily, I have enough content to keep me busy for today. If he doesn't reply with a new order by tomorrow, good news: time to start looking for more client relationships on Upwork and related. I know it won't be as easy as posting a few times, and it may cost me money. But I feel very confident and ready to get it done. Chances are, I'll later be wondering why I haven't done it sooner.

With two articles remaining for this batch, I estimate todays potential earnings to be an extra $99 at most.

It seems the three day method is affecting me psychologically in a good way. I got it from here If you wanna know.

Let's ace day 2.
 

MaxKhalus

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Both me and the client are quite happy with the amount of work that's getting done. He replied, but I'll need to follow up to receive the next titles.
Fortunately, I underestimated how much work these two last articles take. I haven't finished the first one, and it's already worth $77. So the potential has increased.

Whether I'll do Upwork or not, I don't know. I'll take a break for dinner, walking outside, and what not, but I'm not feeling like stopping.

Time for day 3.
 
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MaxKhalus

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So I closed day 3 for less than usual due to inconveniences. As for the actual 24h day, that makes an impressive $125, or $140 if you include the rent payment. I still need to reach the $200 per day goal and hope this day preserves some momentum for tomorrow.

Closing day 3. Going to sleep.
 

MaxKhalus

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closed day 1 negative without giving it a proper work session. After getting rid of everything else for the day, I'm now ready for content with more potential.
 

MaxKhalus

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The day I made the most money was the same I underestimated rest. So I worked when I wasn't supposed to (Day 3), got poor sleep, and lost the momentum yesterday. I'm now rebuilding the thing.

At least I now Know how things work. I just need to take rest more seriously to avoid losing speed.
 
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MaxKhalus

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Hi guys,
Got solution. But first, here's some failure analysis:
- The momentum led to a bad ending. I had everything I needed to work but considered it not that urgent (ehem, procrastination!). Because I did $140 the other day, I felt confident that I could take a break and finish the work in less time. Later.

Here we are.

Whenever I have a bad day, I usually skip it and start preparing much more in the night to prevent it the next time. That still didn't work today because I was overly positive about how much time I had.

Let's jump to the solution I found: A new challenge.
It works by levels, and the way to move forward is by adding hours and (in my case as a writer) words.
- You work intentionally for a specific time, always aiming to give your best.
In my case, I want to write the most words in that frame. working by hours means I have multiple shots throughout the day, not just one.

Let's say I've optimized my 1h record, and it gets really hard to beat it later. That's the best moment to step up to level 2: 2hs at a time. Level 7, for example, would be 7hours straight.

After beating level 7, I can go back to Level 1 (1h) and probably beat the record again.

By the time I make it till the end, It will have made enough money to order the Amazon product.

Rules:
- Before moving to the next level, I must spend at least 7 sessions on that level.
- Each hour of the day is a validation:
* Are you ready to beat the record this hour? If so, start right now. (it doesn't matter if I'm not ready. If you can beat the record, do it)
* If I'm no ready, then I prepare better: workouts, cold showers, food, power naps, cleaning the environment... If I'm not ready after one hour, I'm doing the preparation wrong.

I think this control should work well. It counters my objections and catches me were I'dnormally make excuses.

Not working makes me think of things like these. I'd better go get ready for tomorrow.
 

MaxKhalus

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Did all my research, which in terms of words would be worth ($22). The day has felt both boring and fun at the same time, it's strange.

As for this day 3, I'm aiming for an another hour session and get ready for tomorrow. The current record is 1000 per hour.
One mistake I made is caring about quality too early. I have another rule where I can't reach the next level until I repeat the current one seven times at least (for 1h, it's making 7 1h sessions or more).

My only concern should be getting more sessions before worrying about personal records. That's what I'll do from now on.


Day 3 starting now.
 
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MaxKhalus

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Yesterday, I decided to take the day off today (I only worked to cover the daily expense).

Main reason? I spent almost all my morning doing paperwork to update my documents. I alsosent everything to Paypal to see if they unfreeze those $1300.

By the way, my savings might reduce since the dollar is growing lately. I keep all in euros.
We're ready to hit hard tomorrow morning. The hourly validation strategy works!
 

MaxKhalus

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2000 quality words in one hour?

Duh, coffee is so overpowered when taken only twice a week. It may also be the sense of urgency: me wanting to get as much shit done as possible before the effects run out. It really feels like a placebo.
 

MaxKhalus

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Because of the productivity streak, I finished work early and started and "side project" on Quora. I just answered a few questions: let's see how many visitors we can drive to the site!

As for day 3, I'll spend one hour applying on Upwork.
 
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MaxKhalus

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I've spent this time promoting at more freelance pages rather than keep working with the same client. Now that I've sent some proposals, it's time to focus on the topics at hand.
 
Last edited:

MaxKhalus

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The whole day is going to be about research and writing about finance.

As soon as I get the results, I'll update you (5-6 hours from now).
 

MaxKhalus

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Suprisingly, the topics I've got this time are more extensive than usual (so I'm still at zero dollars). Good news is, they have more value than the others.

I hate saying it, but today's work won't have a visible effect until tomorrow.

On the flip side, I''m managing to borrow around $1K to speed things up with FBA. So by next week, I'm paying the first 30%. Let's grab those holiday deals!
 
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MaxKhalus

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Good and bad news. Because of the "loan," my goal is now $1000 lower.
Bad news: Paypal has another€1000 frozen and I got a debt of €80 this week.

Here's what I've reflected:

Problem: I found myself unable to do what I want to do despite having all the systems in place. I made the dumbest mistakes and my distraction level was maximum.

Diagnosis: It's all right with me. I've just been using my tools the wrong way.



How does my brain work?
  • LOGIC serves to communicate and reinforce beliefs. Its extremes are Focused and Distracted. The less you think (unless you directly chose so), the more focused you are.
  • EMOTIONs recognize values and are the default decision-makers. Its extremes are happy and unhappy. The less dopamine you expose yourself to, the happier you are.
  • CONSCIOUSNESS takes decisions and manages both tools, which are part of the subconscious system.


OBSERVATIONS:
  • Logic is bad at making decisions, because it only intensifies the ones you've already made.
  • One you take a decision, there's no logical point in reinforcing the belief. Unless you're communicating with a detail-oriented person.
  • Emotions react to the environment and take (wrong) decisions when consciousness isn't active.
  • Emotions will always gravitate to the path of least resistance. A limiting emotion is a sign I failed to block the limitation. You increase your dopamine threshold by removing everything lower, and I do mean literally. Logic can't beat emotions.
  • Consciousness is active the moment you no longer trust yourself, or you expose/recognize you've been trapped in these methods.
  • Consciousness requires energy to work. Since you can only make so many decisions in a day, preventing most of them the day before improves self-control quality.
  • To make the task easier, you can use the subconscious when your conscious indicates you're moving in the right direction. So you're doing dopamine hits as a reward (generally rests) and let yourself reinforce the belief logically. If you make this habit, you can delegate your logic and emotion this behavior, which then becomes automatic. However, it may be hard to change later.
 

MaxKhalus

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This has been the most intense day (morning) of my life. 10/10
 

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