I saw a comment on a Facebook group I follow the other day. It was basically a guy complaining about how he’s tried everything to make extra money around his full-time job, all the online ‘get rich quick’ schemes, ‘make £10k this month’ etc… and had zero success and that he’s now just had enough of being scammed, has lost all hope and now stopped trying. He seemed quite upset, perhaps even as far as distraught. He was blaming everyone else for ‘selling him the dream’ and demanding everyone not to tell him what to do next, because ‘he’s had it’ and was ‘giving up’.
I imagine a lot of people feel and have felt like this in the past. Working on a new business is bloody hard! New businesses have a high rate of failure in the first year, it’s common knowledge. But at what point do you decide on failure? Running out of cash? Yes, this makes sense. But if we’re talking about a side hustle, around a full-time job, you can chip away at this in little bits, doing as much or as little as you can cope with. Obviously, if it’s just not profitable, then you move on. I can only speak from my experience in selling a service, as opposed to physical products, but here’s what I replied to him:
You’re absolutely right! These scams don’t work. If they did work, like the people peddling them advertise they do, they wouldn’t be giving their secrets away in the first place. They are trying to suck you in to get you on a marketing list or just make cash from you instantly. Selling you the dream, which you so badly want.
The truth is, hard work is what will make you extra cash. I admire anyone with the balls to quit their job and jump straight into a new business, he who dares and all that. I decided to take a little less risk than that. Assuming you work a 9-5, that’s 8 hours from your 24-hour day. Let’s say you sleep for 8 hours, which leaves you with 8 hours to work on your side hustle. If it were easy, everyone would be doing it. Role your sleeves up, stop bitching and just do it. Expect no help from anyone, then you won’t be disappointed. If you get some help, it’s an amazing bonus.
When I decided I wanted to go freelance, the way I planned it was that I would work on my side hustle around my full-time job and when I started to earn more on the side than I did in my full-time job, I would quit my job and double my time working freelance. It took me 5 years from deciding, but I did get there. You’ve got to keep working at it, even when you feel like giving up. On those crappiest of crappy days, just keep going. This is what will set you apart from all the others. Then one day, When you’ve paid your dues, it will happen. It just depends on how badly you want it.
