Stop Thinking of Ways To Get Rich, Try This Instead.
The harmful thought pattern that’s costing you millions.
To begin, I’d like for you to picture a scenario. You’re at home, bored, on a Friday night. You are thinking about going on that vacation you’ve dreamed of, or maybe you’re thinking about eventually buying a house. But you need money for these goals and lots of it! So you rack your brain for days and weeks, endlessly scrolling YouTube videos and articles in hopes that you’ll find anything potentially profitable. I’m going to stop the scenario here.
Does this already sound familiar?
If so, you’re not alone. Many of us who try making income on our own often fall prey to the fallacy of searching for ‘the holy grail’ hustle. It’s natural, but it’s also incredibly deleterious. This constant testing and hopping from hustle to hustle is the logical equivalent of going from theater to theater, watching 5 minutes of movies, then trying to determine which one has the best story. When you look at all of the people who’ve successfully garnered passive income streams, they typically are in the top 10% of their chosen hustle and are far above average. What does this make you conclude?
A conclusion to arrive at is that specialization is key. In this modern economy, so long are the days of the ‘all-in one’ Jack, we’ve transformed to revolve around the ‘great-at-one’ Jill. This also points to a concept in macroeconomics known as the ‘opportunity cost’. Without turning this into an econ lesson, an opportunity cost is essentially what you lose for doing another activity. So, if you produce 10 guitars in an hour, but you usually make 20 ukeleles in that hour, your opportunity cost is 20 ukeleles.
So, let’s drawback to how this relates. Instead of constantly searching for new side hustles, pick the 1 you already have and/or are interested in, and get really good at it. Devote the time spent searching for other hustles to it. As someone whose side hustles affords me to have 2 full salaries, the reality is that we only have 1–3 side hustles. To actually make real money with side hustles you need to be above average in your chosen hustle. But, this isn’t hard. The average person in many hustles usually does not make money and they abandon the hustle within a month. The general consensus amongst those who’ve found success in quitting their jobs for side hustles is that it took them at least a year to make it stable and paying enough to replace their job. That average time is getting faster.
There are still so many side hustles out there and you are reminded of them everywhere! It is absolutely possible that all of them are capable of producing meaningful income, but again, the one who does make said income is usually the one who’s only getting income from that stream. Concentration is the only universal truth when it comes to attaining wealth, look at the Forbes billionaire’s list, most on the list have their wealth concentrated in ONE company.
Humans are incredibly resilient and intelligent. No one is born with the inherent ability to succeed at any given task. It is through sheer grit and creativity that one succeeds. The key takeaway from this piece is that it is important to ignore the bombardment of side hustle opportunities, and instead allocate more resources to the one you already have. The end effect is that you will gain the kind of knowledge that only comes from experience and time.
If you’re looking for a side hustle to get your feet off the ground, I have previously mentioned a few. I hope that you walk away with the determination to focus your tunnel vision on that one hustle. Let me know how your adventure goes and how I might have helped, I love hearing the success stories emailed to me. Thank you for reading :)