I frustrate my mother, as I’m sure all of us do for a million different reasons. My particular reason is because I do too much. Always trying another projector side hustle. Always biting off more than I can chew. Well, we all have our flaws, and that is one (among many) of mine.
So if you are worried because you just don’t know what side hustle will work for you, I’m here to tell you that you don’t have to choose just one. Different side hustles are right not only for different people, but also for the same person at different times in their life.
My first side hustle (after the age of 10) was a multi-level marketing company. If you have found or are hoping to find success in MLM, I wish you all the luck. With that said, it wasn’t for me. I did all the things one was supposed to do, but some companies just aren’t quality companies, and I finally cut my losses.
However, my MLM experience probably taught me the #1 most important lesson for success in money AND in life: feed your mind and control your mind. As most MLM companies, mine offered extensive ‘professional development’ in the form of conferences, CDs, books, and seminars. Eager to succeed, I dived right in. I read and listened to some of the top names in personal development: Earl Nightingale, Zig Ziglar, Dale Carnegie. They led me to other motivational thinkers like Marie Forleo, Tony Robbins, Jack Canfield.
I don’t pretend to have things 100% figured out. I get in funks like everyone else. But most of the big things that I have accomplished in life have been possible because I kept going. And how did I keep going? By feeding my mind a constant diet of encouragement and focus.
Almost 15 years ago, I broke off an engagement and gave up on the idea of getting married. But I knew with 100% clarity that I wanted to be a mom. With an adopted sister who has taught me more things than I can tell, adoption was an easy choice for me.
What wasn’t easy was the adoption process. I spent 19 months assembling documents, reading about adoption, assembling the necessary funds on a teacher’s salary, and a hundred other things. Oh, and doing them all as a single woman.
Through all the headaches and heartbreaks, I had tremendous support from family and friends. But I also made a conscious choice to keep my mind right. I listened to leftover tapes and CDs from the MLM. I continued to read books.
Ten years later, my husband (so much for giving up on marriage) and I decided to move to Norway. Again, it took focus over time. Over two years after starting the process, we finally settled in Stavanger, Norway. (For more info on life in Norway, you can check out my lifestyle blog here.)
This time, keeping my mind right was a little different. It involved looking daily at housing, checking facts, reading the posts in Facebook groups, and changing my password to NORWAY2018, so I would remember several times a day where I was headed.
Even though I didn’t make millions (or even hundreds) in the MLM, in a very real way, that first side hustle made it possible for me to follow my dream all the way to motherhood and Norway. Life isn’t perfect, but I am loving my life in so many ways. And I don’t really think I would be here if I hadn’t had that lesson from my MLM experience.
If you have big dreams, especially big dreams that are going to take a long time to realize, get your mind right. Find a podcast or two that wlll continually point you where you want to go. Watch Youtube videos, read books. Whatever works for you. But you need to find a way to keep that dream front and center.
Why? Because you’ve got to find a hundred different ways to remember what I am always telling you: You’ve got this.
I’ve spent the morning planning for the next 6 months and now I’m waiting for my kids’ dental appointments to be over, hoping my computer charge will let me get a little more written.
And I have to admit, I’m kind of terrified. For the past 6 weeks or so, I’ve been working to create my first online course: Fun French 101. It’s a free 4 week course that will allow me to get used to the tech I need to use, start a mailing list, and figure out what people do and don’t like about the current design of the course.
So here is the lowdown on my struggles and my successes.
Struggles
Struggle #1:
Just doing the work. When you have three kids, it’s hard to carve out the time to get much done, especially when you have to record videos that require a relatively quiet house.
Struggle #2:
Video quality. The quality of my videos kind of stinks – a lot. Because this is a free beta course and I know it won’t bring in any money for a while, I have spent my money only on the necessary software, and NONE on lighting or stuff like that. I do have a $20 microphone that I purchased earlier, but that’s it. So I’m really disappointed with how plain (and unflattering) they look. But do you know what? It’s not going to stop me. And 5 years from now, when I am able to produce some really nice videos, the old ones (from now) will make a great “You can do it!” story.
Struggle #3:
Tech. OH. MY. GOD. I am SO not a tech person. I’ve had to learn video recording and editing, as well as a WordPress plugin that is not always as intuitive as I think it should be. But I’ve kind of come to peace with tech. I’ve always told myself that I’m not good with tech. However, I don’t think that’s true. I think tech is like math. No one is inherently “good” or “bad” with math OR tech. It’s just that some people have spent more time doing it than others. And when you spend more time doing it, you get better at it. I’m already so very, very proud that I found a work-around that fixed a glitch on my course page. I was inserting a picture, and for some reason, no matter what I tried it showed up twice. I could NOT get the second one to disappear. So I inserted the image as a “cover” instead and low and behold, only one image. Win for me! So let me rephrase that first sentence. I am SO not a tech person – YET! But I will be.
Successes
Success #1:
Doing it scared. I feel so very out of my league. But I’m not going to stop. Because everyone has to start somewhere. And I firmly believe that anything worth doing is worth doing badly – until you can do it well. I’m not going to be good at this for a while. But it is definitely worth doing. So I’m going to do it the best I can, even if that’s not super great.
Success #2:
I am totally rocking the WordPress plugin. (Well, relatively speaking. Compared to when I started.) See Challenge #3 above for my awesome “I found a work-around that worked!” story.
Success #3:
Right now, I am on track to launch my beta right on schedule. And if I stick to my plan, I will have evey single lesson completely uploaded one day before the course opens. Wish me luck and NO sick kids!
Other: Expenses
Here is the current breakdown of what I have spent this month:
Well, I wasn’t actually expecting to write this blog about launching an online startup business. When I sold/transferred my preschool teaching business about a year ago, I thought I was done for a while. But that’s not the way it seems to be turning out.
Saying goodbye to Startup #1
So why did I sell it? A couple of reasons. First, I was once again teaching full time, and in a totally new subject area. I had never taught English Language Learners and although I had a strong base in understanding language acquisition, I was pretty much starting from scratch as far as materials and such and didn’t have any spare time.
Second, I had realized that my Spanish preschool startup business wasn’t going to serve the needs of my family long term. My husband and I had been talking about spending some time living overseas, and a preschool language business just wasn’t going to fit into that plan.
A New Startup
So I started exploring online options. I tried giving French classes online, and I loved it. But it was a pretty big stress on my family for me to be online and totally uninterrupted at a specific time each week. We’re a hot mess around here, and that just wasn’t working for us. Plus, a lot of my students had the same trouble. Their schedules changed from week to week, so they missed a lot of classes.
I kept thinking if I could only pre-record classes and set it up so they could do it on their own schedule, that would be ideal. I just didn’t know how to do it without making it deadly dull. I mean, it’s my sparkling personality that brings my classes to life, right? OK, well, maybe that’s an overstatement. But things just aren’t as interesting when the instructor can’t react to the student in real time. What to do?
Finally, I figured out a way to use video clips with my voice narrating them. Because a lot of the videos I use in my classroom have a twist or a surprise at the end, I felt like that would compensate for not having the personal interaction. But there was the issue of copyright infringement. I couldn’t use a lot of the videos without permission from the creator. I pondered that for a week or two, and finally found a solution (or a couple of work-arounds, actually) that will allow me to start on the class until I can get it 100% figured out.
So now, I’m working my way through a course I bought about 2 years ago. Here’s a shout out to Amy Porterfield, who is absolutely my hero in creating the course. So far, it’s been a breeze thanks to her amazing step-by-step system. Check out her page here. She’s also got a kick butt podcast, which I’ve mentioned before. It’s taking me step-by-step through the process of building my own course from the ground up.
The Startup Plan
At this point, my plan is to offer a free four-week class. This will allow people to see whether the format works for them, and also help me to see what folks like and what they don’t. The free class will remain available as a lead magnet. In other words, in order to get the free class, you have to submit your e-mail address. This serves two purposes, as I’m sure you know. First, it allows me to get subscribers the course information. Second, it allow me to start building my e-mail list.
Once we’ve gone through the free class, I’ll have another class ready for people who want to continue. Pricing and a lot of things are still in the air, but I’m unbelievably excited about this. I miss teaching French SO MUCH! And as I was sitting around planning the free course this morning, and working on content, I was just so incredibly psyched about how much my students are going to get out of this course. Even if they never pay me a cent, I want this course to be a huge value in their lives and allow them to learn things they wouldn’t otherwise.
Why I’m sharing it
So here’s why I’m sharing. When I read blogs, it really inspires me to see people who have shared their journey from the beginning – the good, the bad, and the ugly. One of my favorite blogs was The Simple Dollar,a blog in which the author shared his story of going from drowning in debt to being 100% debt-free. It really inspired me by showing how small, consistent steps can totally change a person’s situation. Plus, I just like seeing people succeed, so reading it always made me feel uplifted.
My plan is to let you all take this journey with me if you want. Every two months I’ll publish an income statement with real numbers to let you see what kind of progress (if any!?!) I’m making. If you know me at all, you know I’m pretty transparent. I’m not overly afraid to share my failures as well as my triumphs. So this is my chance to start at the beginning and allow any of you who want, to come along for the ride.
