The grounding before fastlane

[Mr Sprezzatura]

After experiencing some life setbacks and difficulties, and after regaining control of my life, I'm right back on track.
I've been working hard on building self discipline, momentum and to keep my focus on things that matter - things that make my future. I am a well organised person now. I use my time very well, I also gained tremendous amount of confidence and it's still getting better and better.

Now, I know that I want to be financially independent ($10m in a bank) by 3 Feb 2023. Yep, I'm giving myself almost 10 years to achieve that.

I also know that I want to earn $1000 of passive income per month by 30 April 2014. I have $0 passive income now and almost no presence in web.

Given that I live with parents and I still got at least 1 year of college ahead, I'm thinking of that $1000/month as a must, as a basis to fully focus on Fastlane AFTER I achieved that level of passive income. With a grand per month I can set myself somewhere in the world where I can live pretty comfortably on that income. There are plenty options as far as I know. China, Indonesia, Albania, probably 2 dozens more of them.

Then, far away from my parents bullshit and far away from those high school and university colleagues (which are like 100x less of a deal than parents), I will be able to work my a$$ off with a laser focus on a fastlane business in solitude.

Not only will I be far away from all of that old BS, but most importantly - I will be out there alone. Out of my comfort zone. Yes, I can discipline myself to get up every morning at 5:30 AM now and to work smart and hard, but it's still very difficult to fight that feeling of comfort. A comfort of being financially supported by parents and maintaining quality, decent lifestyle.

And all of these stories bring us to the question.

Should I:

a) Fully focus for a year on achieving $1000/moth of passive income while keeping fastlane in mind as a final destination?
b) Don't just keep fastlane in mind but actually start business/set of activities that are going to yield $1000 of not so necessarily passive income but that will turn fastlane later on after scaling it/them up?
c) Neglect the idea of that grand of passive income. After all, it is nowadays very unlikely to turn passive income that fast, especially with little ebusiness experience.

Things to consider:

1. The commandment of control. It also applies to a slowlane path of building a $1000 of passive income.
Building PI via your own website and brand seems like even more unlikely to yield that amount of income in a year.
There are several pages that can 'give you a ride', they have great recognition, SEO and business model optimized. E.g. Squidoo, Hubpages.
Would deriving PI on a few of this type of pages be a very bad idea? I'm worried about investing a year of hard work to other businesses.

2. Freelance writing. I'm striving to be a good writer. This above and freelance writing would really sky rocket my writing skills. I rarely practice now, but if I were to write few thousand words every single day to get paid, I'm sure I would experience an accelerated growth there. Freelance writing is rarely passive if ever, but after 1 year of heavy practice could pay the bills. It is a very competitive field though. Even if I finally made it to a grand per moth, I would still probably had to sacrifice much time which could be invested in fastlane business.
Maybe it would be worthy to do freelance writing while building PI. But then again, it would be even harder to break through competition with less focus, time and effort invested.

3. Chances are I could get accepted to a paid government scholarship in China starting this September. I would have accommodation and just enough money to eat provided. 1-2 years of learning Chinese alone (obligatory prior to actual course) and building a fastlane business meanwhile. Yum.
When will I know: end of July
Chances: no idea

4. Chances are I could get accepted to US as a permanent resident (Green Card). Then I would have 180 days to enter US or Green Card gone. Maybe a friend of my mother could offer me a stay in NY for beginning, but it's unsure. No other connections in US. It would be hard, it would be struggle with hustle. I would love it and US has always been my ultimate dream.
When will I know: April 2014
Chances: 50%


While I don't want to rely on these options because I have little or no control over them, I think they are worth to mention and to keep in mind.

So what do you think? I'm not expecting you to make a decision for me, but any suggestions, thoughts, criticism, feedback will be highly appreciated.

Am I just making excuses not to go fastlane right away? Or is it a proper way to plan those things - to make a distinction between achieving the basis ($1000 a month to make a living) and between becoming fully focused in becoming financially independent in the next 9 years. I could try and fail several times then, without worrying about paying the bills too much and without ending up in a 8h, 10h, 12h of shitty job per day.


I think this thread could serve many others in a future with similar dilemmas.

 

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