The realities of earning $10,000 + a month online or in business in general

[GT777733]

This thread is very high-quality, I am happy I started from the start with it early on. Thank you to the OP and others who are contributing to the quality of the discussion.

You are welcome

 

[doc holliday]

Man oh man if I could like the original post a million times I would. I have a traditional brick and mortar business and I'm in my 20th year of operation. It has been one hell of a roller coaster ride without a doubt and I can relate to every single post on this thread. It is without a doubt a daily physical and emotional grind. One day you'll think you're king of the world and the next day you'll think that you're going to lose it all. You have to grind for new business, do all the paperwork, file and pay all of your taxes, pay your vendors, service your debt, make sure that you have the necessary insurance for you business, make sure money is being collected and your cash is flowing to take care of all of the aforementioned things. Oh and on top of all of that you have to then perform the service that makes you the money to take care of all of that other bs and hopefully once you've paid out all of that, you have enough money to live on.

As I enter my 5th decade of life, I really wonder how much longer I want to keep going with my business. I still have some obligations to take care of for a few more years but once those are done, I really have some serious decisions to make. 20+ years is a long time to keep a small business going and it doesn't ever seem to get easier. The amount of sacrifices I made to this business while at the same time raising a family is astounding when I think back on it. I'm often amazed I lasted this long and managed to do everything I've done. That's not even mentioning surviving a divorce too, somehow managing to hold on to my business. The amount of personal sacrifice it takes to be successful in business can never be understated. Even now I should be working harder than I do and I work a lot to run this business. This is a thread every young aspiring entrepreneur should read.

 

[GT777733]

Man oh man if I could like the original post a million times I would. I have a traditional brick and mortar business and I'm in my 20th year of operation. It has been one hell of a roller coaster ride without a doubt and I can relate to every single post on this thread. It is without a doubt a daily physical and emotional grind. One day you'll think you're king of the world and the next day you'll think that you're going to lose it all. You have to grind for new business, do all the paperwork, file and pay all of your taxes, pay your vendors, service your debt, make sure that you have the necessary insurance for you business, make sure money is being collected and your cash is flowing to take care of all of the aforementioned things. Oh and on top of all of that you have to then perform the service that makes you the money to take care of all of that other bs and hopefully once you've paid out all of that, you have enough money to live on.

As I enter my 5th decade of life, I really wonder how much longer I want to keep going with my business. I still have some obligations to take care of for a few more years but once those are done, I really have some serious decisions to make. 20+ years is a long time to keep a small business going and it doesn't ever seem to get easier. The amount of sacrifices I made to this business while at the same time raising a family is astounding when I think back on it. I'm often amazed I lasted this long and managed to do everything I've done. That's not even mentioning surviving a divorce too, somehow managing to hold on to my business. The amount of personal sacrifice it takes to be successful in business can never be understated. Even now I should be working harder than I do and I work a lot to run this business. This is a thread every young aspiring entrepreneur should read.

You're a champion in my eyes.

I freely admit to people that if I didn't have the internet in my generation, I'd probably have given up on life in some way, shape or form - or, at the very least I'd never have evolved as a person to the extent I've done now.

I seriously doubt I'd have had the balls to open up a brick and mortar business off the bat like you.

If you're not doing so already, and it's something you're interested in (and you actually have some time at some stage), you might look into finding some avenues to do some mentoring and/or paid teaching/courses at some stage and pass on what you've learnt to these future generations.

I'm sure there's heaps of invaluable lessons and things you've learnt over the years.

Get on YouTube and create your own channel, or piggyback with someone else with a platform who has a business course.

Thanks for sharing your experience!

 

[doc holliday]

Man oh man if I could like the original post a million times I would. I have a traditional brick and mortar business and I'm in my 20th year of operation. It has been one hell of a roller coaster ride without a doubt and I can relate to every single post on this thread. It is without a doubt a daily physical and emotional grind. One day you'll think you're king of the world and the next day you'll think that you're going to lose it all. You have to grind for new business, do all the paperwork, file and pay all of your taxes, pay your vendors, service your debt, make sure that you have the necessary insurance for you business, make sure money is being collected and your cash is flowing to take care of all of the aforementioned things. Oh and on top of all of that you have to then perform the service that makes you the money to take care of all of that other bs and hopefully once you've paid out all of that, you have enough money to live on.

As I enter my 5th decade of life, I really wonder how much longer I want to keep going with my business. I still have some obligations to take care of for a few more years but once those are done, I really have some serious decisions to make. 20+ years is a long time to keep a small business going and it doesn't ever seem to get easier. The amount of sacrifices I made to this business while at the same time raising a family is astounding when I think back on it. I'm often amazed I lasted this long and managed to do everything I've done. That's not even mentioning surviving a divorce too, somehow managing to hold on to my business. The amount of personal sacrifice it takes to be successful in business can never be understated. Even now I should be working harder than I do and I work a lot to run this business. This is a thread every young aspiring entrepreneur should read.

You're a champion in my eyes.

I freely admit to people that if I didn't have the internet in my generation, I'd probably have given up on life in some way, shape or form - or, at the very least I'd never have evolved as a person to the extent I've done now.

I seriously doubt I'd have had the balls to open up a brick and mortar business off the bat like you.

If you're not doing so already, and it's something you're interested in (and you actually have some time at some stage), you might look into finding some avenues to do some mentoring and/or paid teaching/courses at some stage and pass on what you've learnt to these future generations.

I'm sure there's heaps of invaluable lessons and things you've learnt over the years.

Get on YouTube and create your own channel, or piggyback with someone else with a platform who has a business course.

Thanks for sharing your experience!

I think you guys who make money online are the smart ones. Traditional bricks and mortar businesses are so hard to run these days with the amount of overhead, liability, employees, taxes and other headaches. I have very much thought about teaching once I get my last kid's college taken care of. The You Tube idea is a good one but I'd more likely piggyback with someone who knows the ins and outs of that business. Thanks for starting this thread GT.

 

[GT777733]

The challenge I see, however, is that becoming an expert in a niche is a time-intensive process as is becoming skilled in AM. Theoretically a person can do both, but that might not be practical if you have less than 10 years to play with.

Personally, becoming knowledgeable in a niche has been a full-time endeavor for me for many years and that pursuit was largely incompatible with doing something as demanding as building a AM skillset. Becoming an expert in a niche typically involves working a (boring or routine) day job for many years to understand what the needs and missing solutions are.

You can always hire someone to do your marketing for you, but can you hire someone to invent a product from scratch for you?

I'd like to challenge you on that.

Working a day job is a completely different scenario, and I wholeheartedly disagree that that is the typical way to become an expert. If somebody else is setting your pace and you are taking little if any initiative to grow outside of that, you've got some big internal changes to make in order to have a shot.

With a careful approach, it is possible to rapidly gain moderate to high level proficiency on a subject. I've done it. An argument could be made that I learn quicker than average, but what's more important is that I'm not afraid to take matters into my own hands, fail a bunch, and go deep.

Reading the books by ONLY the top people in that area, calling/driving/flying to meet and network with the most knowledgable people, searching for mentorship. In 6 months or less of daily intensive study and application, you have more knowledge than 95% of people and can talk your way in and out without stumbling. Emphasis on daily and intensive. You just made some bank as an affiliate, you now are in a position to essentially learn something full time because you are under absolutely no monetary pressure.

As an example let's say a family member has had severe gut issues for their whole life, and no doctor could figure it out/just threw drugs at them, but you took matters into your own hands and learned everything there is to know about GAPS protocol, FODMAPs, affects of gluten and wheat on inflammation, alkalinity, antioxidants, probiotics. You've tested everything, and you have a thorough understanding of the processes behind the body's reactions. As a result, within 3-6 months your family member makes a rapid improvement in health, cognitive function, mood.

What you just went through is an extremely valuable learning process (and you can now sleep well knowing you helped your family), where you acquired knowledge that MILLIONS of people would love to have, but don't have the time, desire and/or intelligence to figure out for themselves. All of a sudden you have massive value to provide to the world... but there are also a lot of others to compete with. Luckily for you, 95% of them know very little about how to position themselves correctly. But you've already honed your skills for the past 2-4 years as an affiliate, broken down countless funnels, and you've done some prior research and surveying so that you understand how your market works and what they respond to.

Now let's say that your knowledge isn't 95th+ percentile, and instead it's only 80th percentile. You will likely come across a few customers here and there who will want to be refunded, but so what? They are not the majority! Never underestimate just how clueless the average joe is. Time and time again I get reminded of this and every time I am absolutely astounded.

In order to offer a product or service you do not have to be the best at what you do, but you do have to be more knowledgable than your average customer and you do have to know how to sell. Most people who can pull this off are obsessive by nature, and will have gone deep on SOMETHING at least once. Whether it was potato guns, nutrition, fitness/workouts, skiing, mountain biking, golfing, or Runescape. Maybe not Runescape. The only caveat is that it should be a market who are capable of spending - so avoid anything where teens are the primary audience.

Another approach I've seen work is combining moderate personal knowledge + partnering with an expert. You negotiate an upfront fee or revshare with them (you did learn to negotiate as an affiliate, didn't you?) in return for their knowledge - be it creating content, refining content, interviews, consulting. You know enough about the topic that you know what you don't know, so can ask the right questions to bring the provided value to the next level.

This way you can also piggyback off of their name and their reputation, so you have added social proof (huge) and the potential of an email list blast (huge) straight off the bat.

You are correct that the average person could have trouble... but frankly I think that for anybody smart enough to find and contribute value on this forum, it can be pulled off in under 5 years from scratch provided the correct path is laid out; but you do need to commit 120%. The more you are committed and the less time you waste, the more likely it is that you can learn/earn in marketing within 2-3 years. Then all of a sudden it's 2-3 years AM + niche research + 6 months learning + testing and creating the product. Yes it's true that affiliate marketing you are building somebody else's business and not an asset. But you also make BANK while learning an invaluable skillset.

That does however mean putting pickup on the back burner, purely because it is a timesuck and destroys your focus. I've been in LTRs for about half of my business journey so far (with a bit of hedonistic travelling here and there), but I'm fine with paying that "price" to get myself set up for life.

Compare a multiple 7 figure upside likely within 3-5 years, to working a desk job... or living in Chiang Mai writing blogs and selling dropshipped crap.

For most there are many psychological barriers at play here - fear of failure, imposter syndrome, deeply ingrained limiting beliefs; even if you've conquered these in game, it doesn't necessarily carry through to business. All perfectly normal. Push through and get hustling brothers.

"Never underestimate just how clueless the average joe is. Time and time again I get reminded of this and every time I am absolutely astounded."

If I was starting life and in particular my 20's all over again and I knew just how true this is, I would have looked at my future with an unbelievable amount of confidence and I would have taken way more perceived risks way earlier than I did.

Seriously (and I'm not trying to be a dick...I like people, but this is just the truth) - the amount of people that can hold themselves accountable, have a work ethic, have self awareness, focus on one thing, and improve at that thing - it's like one in every few thousand or even rarer.

The bar to succeed at most things in life is way lower than what you think.

Once you get over that bar and you look back at everyone, you will kick yourself for ever doubting yourself so much.

The blind leading the blind is a real thing.

 

[GT777733]

Man oh man if I could like the original post a million times I would. I have a traditional brick and mortar business and I'm in my 20th year of operation. It has been one hell of a roller coaster ride without a doubt and I can relate to every single post on this thread. It is without a doubt a daily physical and emotional grind. One day you'll think you're king of the world and the next day you'll think that you're going to lose it all. You have to grind for new business, do all the paperwork, file and pay all of your taxes, pay your vendors, service your debt, make sure that you have the necessary insurance for you business, make sure money is being collected and your cash is flowing to take care of all of the aforementioned things. Oh and on top of all of that you have to then perform the service that makes you the money to take care of all of that other bs and hopefully once you've paid out all of that, you have enough money to live on.

As I enter my 5th decade of life, I really wonder how much longer I want to keep going with my business. I still have some obligations to take care of for a few more years but once those are done, I really have some serious decisions to make. 20+ years is a long time to keep a small business going and it doesn't ever seem to get easier. The amount of sacrifices I made to this business while at the same time raising a family is astounding when I think back on it. I'm often amazed I lasted this long and managed to do everything I've done. That's not even mentioning surviving a divorce too, somehow managing to hold on to my business. The amount of personal sacrifice it takes to be successful in business can never be understated. Even now I should be working harder than I do and I work a lot to run this business. This is a thread every young aspiring entrepreneur should read.

You're a champion in my eyes.

I freely admit to people that if I didn't have the internet in my generation, I'd probably have given up on life in some way, shape or form - or, at the very least I'd never have evolved as a person to the extent I've done now.

I seriously doubt I'd have had the balls to open up a brick and mortar business off the bat like you.

If you're not doing so already, and it's something you're interested in (and you actually have some time at some stage), you might look into finding some avenues to do some mentoring and/or paid teaching/courses at some stage and pass on what you've learnt to these future generations.

I'm sure there's heaps of invaluable lessons and things you've learnt over the years.

Get on YouTube and create your own channel, or piggyback with someone else with a platform who has a business course.

Thanks for sharing your experience!

I think you guys who make money online are the smart ones. Traditional bricks and mortar businesses are so hard to run these days with the amount of overhead, liability, employees, taxes and other headaches. I have very much thought about teaching once I get my last kid's college taken care of. The You Tube idea is a good one but I'd more likely piggyback with someone who knows the ins and outs of that business. Thanks for starting this thread GT.

You're very welcome.

I should mention that starting a YouTube channel is so incredibly easy.

Literally just get on YouTube, start your channel, and you can record videos on your iPhone and upload them if you really want.

But, cameras that do video with a super clear video these days are only about $400.

The beauty about a guy like you is you have all that experience. There's very few people who can give out the information you can or that have lived the life you have.

What I would do if I was you is write down all your video content ideas in a list (or just start with say the basics of brick and mortar businesses and do like 5-10 videos), and shoot them one by one (just talk into the camera - you don't even need to edit it).

You will start building up an audience of people who are interested in what you are talking about.

Once you build up enough of an audience, you might find there are people who want you to teach them further.

You can either really easily do Skype calls with people where you can help them with specific business questions they have, or, if you have heaps of demand, you can really easily create an online course on a platform like Thinkrific.

I understand you may just not want to do any of that regardless - in which case, yes, teaming up with someone with an established platform would be the way to go. You may even get on a website like Clarity.fm where you can use their site and traffic and just have a profile set up with who you are, what you've done and what advice you can give.

But, you can link up with other YouTubers from your own channel too.

Don't think this online stuff is beyond you. It's pretty easy to get the basics going once you get the initial hang of it.

 

[doc holliday]

A year ago, I was actually working on some content to put into videos, very similar to what you are describing here but I put it on hold because I just had too much going on and I couldn't muster up the time and energy to get the project off the ground. I'll probably revisit it again in a few years time once I decide what I'm going to do with my life (damn I sound like a teenager now).

 

[asdfk]

Thanks for the advice.

I think it’s important to stick with it for now and at the same time think about a business that I can actually stand behind.

 

[Veloce]

Great thread. It's always been a fantasy of mine to start an online business and this thread makes me glad I didn't.

There's a case to be made for being a midlevel or upper level manager in a corporation. My job is more of a 9-7 at this point...but that's only if people above or below me know where I am. I have regular meetings where, if I went missing for 3 hours to eat a giant porterhouse steak with a couple martinis and polish off a rail off a strippers ass, nobody would be the wiser. I just have to make it to the meeting and sound smarter than the people around me, something that's not very difficult. This month I net well over 10k. I have zero stress about the company I work for or my job security, and I'm on a pretty good path to eject from my life as I know it by the time I'm 40 or 41 if I choose to do so and never turn back, or I can stay on and make ridiculously more cash. In the meantime it's a good cushy life with paid vacation and not really anyone above me to answer to, if anything I answer more to the 60 employees below me and the thousands of customers that fuel a $15 mil operation. By no means am I bragging, there's a lot of people out there and on this forum making far more than me, but I've gotten things to where it's *almost* easy money. The points above about delegating workload and training your underlings are absolute gold.

In Vegas, there's tons of people like me. Chefs, managers, casino managers, bean counters, financial controllers, VPs, beverage managers, etc...people of middling intelligence that just know how to play the game that are making upwards of $250k/year plus bonus plus partnership plus plus plus. I can only believe that the same thing exists in other major cities. There are a LOT of people that bullshit their way into these positions, and while Vegas is famous for hustlers like that, I know it exists everywhere.

Anyway, just making a case for the 9-5. In any 9-5 there might be an opportunity to work the system, it's just all about learning to recognize opportunity and capitalizing on flaws or cracks. And you get the benefit of learning how to exploit these things while someone else takes the business risk.

 

[GT777733]

Great thread. It's always been a fantasy of mine to start an online business and this thread makes me glad I didn't.

There's a case to be made for being a midlevel or upper level manager in a corporation. My job is more of a 9-7 at this point...but that's only if people above or below me know where I am. I have regular meetings where, if I went missing for 3 hours to eat a giant porterhouse steak with a couple martinis and polish off a rail off a strippers ass, nobody would be the wiser. I just have to make it to the meeting and sound smarter than the people around me, something that's not very difficult. This month I net well over 10k. I have zero stress about the company I work for or my job security, and I'm on a pretty good path to eject from my life as I know it by the time I'm 40 or 41 if I choose to do so and never turn back, or I can stay on and make ridiculously more cash. In the meantime it's a good cushy life with paid vacation and not really anyone above me to answer to, if anything I answer more to the 60 employees below me and the thousands of customers that fuel a $15 mil operation. By no means am I bragging, there's a lot of people out there and on this forum making far more than me, but I've gotten things to where it's *almost* easy money. The points above about delegating workload and training your underlings are absolute gold.

In Vegas, there's tons of people like me. Chefs, managers, casino managers, bean counters, financial controllers, VPs, beverage managers, etc...people of middling intelligence that just know how to play the game that are making upwards of $250k/year plus bonus plus partnership plus plus plus. I can only believe that the same thing exists in other major cities. There are a LOT of people that bullshit their way into these positions, and while Vegas is famous for hustlers like that, I know it exists everywhere.

Anyway, just making a case for the 9-5. In any 9-5 there might be an opportunity to work the system, it's just all about learning to recognize opportunity and capitalizing on flaws or cracks. And you get the benefit of learning how to exploit these things while someone else takes the business risk.

Thank you for sharing your honest feedback - I appreciate it.

What you described is what I realised at about 22/23, and it was probably the first red pill I ever had to swallow about the world.

The company and corporate game when it comes to rewards is significantly more about company/office politics, appearing to look and sound competent, how much your boss likes you and how good/quick you are at getting into managerial positions where you can delegate work and responsibility than it is about actual competence, performance, or sacrificing for the company.

I just couldn't end up taking part in a game like that for my entire life (it's almost necessary while you are young to build some finances and a monetary safety blanket). But, I can see why people do and I don't hold it against them - it is the game we are all pushed into from school or university after all. For some people (and probably most to be fair), they just can't see a way out of it or don't believe they can get out of it. That, or you get to a point in your 30's where you're in a senior position and the reward to ride it out until your mid 40's and even beyond is just too great to pass up compared to throwing that all a way and taking a risk on doing your own thing (like you expressed). It's human nature.

There is some level of acceptance I have for this when the company actually performs a practical service or offers a practical product, and the company is at a smaller size so that there is some level of accountability among all workers and employees.

But, holy cow - I've seen some things that go on with some mid size and large size companies, and in dodgy companies and industries (or the dodgy parts of some industries like finance and law for example), where the bad s*it that is being done to game the system is magnified (because of the size of the company and their resources), and what you end up with is a big money making machine that spreads very little wealth and/or offers very little value back. There's also usually a gross amount of negligence from middle and upper management at these companies.

Companies are what humans allow them to be at the end of the day - we create, work in and buy from companies and the economy - it's not the other way around.

 

[Built to Fade]

^^^ Post #49

Your post reminded me of a couple of threads that discussed the politics of the corporate environment. They're from a few years ago, so I'll post the links here:
The Gervais Principle Thread (First posted on March 3, 2013)
Four major languages spoken in organizations among Sociopaths, Losers and the Clueless (First posted on March 8, 2014)

Direct Links From Ribbonfarm:
The Gervais Principle Home Page

1. The Gervais Principle, Or The Office According to “The Office”
2. The Gervais Principle II: Posturetalk, Powertalk, Babytalk and Gametalk
3. The Gervais Principle III: The Curse of Development
4. The Gervais Principle IV: Wonderful Human Beings
5. The Gervais Principle V: Heads I Win, Tails You Lose
6. The Gervais Principle VI: Children of an Absent God

 

[nomadbrah]

I think the best position to be in is to be smart and work a trade.

There's a lot of dumbasses in trade, let's be honest, cause everyone in my generation were pushed into academic education.

I was thinking this the other day. If society collapses, what use is online marketing or coding? Not much.

Nope, I'd like to have learned a trade. Then market it using video, social media, websites, SEO.

It's maybe 1 in a 1000 tradies who get the very basics of marketing, branding, customer identification etc. You can really clean up if you know how to market as a tradie.

 

[roberto]

I think the best position to be in is to be smart and work a trade.

There's a lot of dumbasses in trade, let's be honest, cause everyone in my generation were pushed into academic education.

I was thinking this the other day. If society collapses, what use is online marketing or coding? Not much.

Nope, I'd like to have learned a trade. Then market it using video, social media, websites, SEO.

It's maybe 1 in a 1000 tradies who get the very basics of marketing, branding, customer identification etc. You can really clean up if you know how to market as a tradie.

Yes, but then you become a businessman, not a tradie. I spent far less time on the tools than I did when I started. Not neccesarily a bad thing, but something to be aware of.

I'm at a kind of 'sweet spot' now whereby I have a lot of tools, and can go out with a guy or two most days and make £300-500 after wages depending upon whether I have a second man and machine or team out. The question now is whether to scale or specialise. I'm leaning towards scale, but it comes with a whole other set of issues and a short to medium term drop in profits as you hire the right people.

 

[Shimmy]

Great post, for those of you who didn't read or comprehend it just work your ass off on something and put 110% into it instead of searching for that next magical idea that will make you rich without actually taking any action.

 

[Chase]

Turns out putting in all those hours with uncertainty of success does not bode well with my neurotic personality. I fear I’m wasting my time and my youthful vigor on a project that I do not like that much and is just a way to build an asset that churns out dollar bills.

Many thanks, everyone, for this outstanding thread. Isolation and doubt are also my biggest challenges since running my own business. They suck energy and can make you unahappy. Not being able to share successes and failures is another thing.

How are you all handling and counteracting this?

An office/coworking space to be in the company of people (even if you don't work with them) helps me.
Regular phone calls/exchange with other business owners, some of them good friends, are super useful.
And, of course, all the basics like gym, good eating and regular sleep at a reasonable time are crucial to keep yourself energized, productive and in a good mental state.

 

[2 Cool 4 U]

It's not just about making money, you need to learn how to save too. Just incase if you make little profit or you feel like you need to get away and take a break

 

[2 Cool 4 U]

The years of isolation is the tough part that grinds you. Most people think persistence is like 6 months but when you're 3.5 years into a business with little to show for it, it's very difficult to keep trying. You need an extreme desire to be self employed to put up with the pain of that, watching yourself age 4 years chasing a dream.

If you have a traditional job, it takes a huge amount of effort and commitment to wake up every morning to go to work, put up with a boss, and deal with a toxic work environment. It takes a huge amount of desire to put up with that

 

[GT777733]

It's not just about making money, you need to learn how to save too. Just incase if you make little profit or you feel like you need to get away and take a break

100% agree.

I've been putting most of my profits away in my savings account to invest down the road.

The one exception to this is if you know your business model really well (the risks and the upside) and you can make way more money re-investing back into the business than you can by taking it out.

I also admit I haven't experienced a recession yet in business. Will be an interesting experience when it comes.

 

[GT777733]

The years of isolation is the tough part that grinds you. Most people think persistence is like 6 months but when you're 3.5 years into a business with little to show for it, it's very difficult to keep trying. You need an extreme desire to be self employed to put up with the pain of that, watching yourself age 4 years chasing a dream.

If you have a traditional job, it takes a huge amount of effort and commitment to wake up every morning to go to work, put up with a boss, and deal with a toxic work environment. It takes a huge amount of desire to put up with that

Hmmm. I definitely understand where you are coming from.

I've experienced all 3 - success in business, struggle in business and working a traditional job.

As bad as a traditional job can be in terms of the monotony and feeling trapped and dealing with the politics - the one thing you know at the end of the day (unless you are in a performance based job and you aren't performing), is that you will definitely get paid for the work you put in.

Whatever happens - you can bank that cash and use it in the future. You can even go find another job.

It's not your business so you don't have to deal with all the behind the scenes stuff - you can take the money and run.

You also turn up to work everyday and there are people around and you have a boss and management that keep you on track.

It's close to impossible to explain what it feels like in business when you first start and you don't know what you're doing and things aren't working, or when you are a year or several years in and you haven't succeeded yet.

You aren't getting paid, you're isolated, you feel dumb and you start crucifying yourself, your mind starts wondering and thinking about what you could have done with your life instead of putting all this time into this pursuit that hasn't worked out.

The bills keep coming, you keep working harder, you keep getting more depressed and unhealthy (mentally and physically) - it's so easy to get on a downward spiral very fast if you don't have a plan, keep checking in with yourself and keep yourself moving forward.

In short - everything is on you. If you don't get paid or something goes wrong, whether it's your fault or not - you are the only one you can blame at the end of the day.

As an example, I had 20k that I was owed the other month which essentially got voided (for reasons I can't go into here) between my payer and my bank. It got super messy and I spent a week staying up stupidly late working it out (got no sleep and productivity nosedived). I'm told it's sorted out now - but it still hasn't hit my bank account - so I'm just working and essentially waiting for it to come through.

I've also heard horror stories of guys being denied up to 50-100k of earnings from some clients and affiliate programs that was never eventually given to them.

This stuff all eats into your social/personal life and your sanity.

The uncertainty sometimes can make you feel like you're just floating in life not knowing where you are going sometimes - which makes it hard to plan things or communicate things with people and potential dating partners (I've lost at least a couple of girls because they didn't want to take on how unconventional and unpredictable my life was at the time I met them, and I don't blame them).

I'd be lying if I didn't say I didn't have regular depression at certain stages, and even thoughts of why am I living this life anymore if this business stuff isn't working out/it's so hard and stressful, and I can't go back to employment because it makes me sick with anxiety.

That's the part people never talk about on Instagram and YouTube because you can't sell that, and most people want to distance themselves from all the ugly and depressive times and experiences - it's heavy energy to deal with that brings people down.

Having said all that, I'd still re-hash:
1) Business is certainly great once you stick at it and work it out - it's like anything - you can learn over time to improve massively and callous your brain to all the seemingly high pressure stuff
2) Everyone is going to find success at different things. A traditional job might be way better for some people. It depends on who you are and your circumstances - and also what you want out of life in the short and long term

 

[Luther]

Like Roberto said, You can bank on $500 a day as a skilled tradesman. Time is your limiting factor, not marketing. If you’re good then you’ll have all the business you have time for, through word of mouth.
And scaling requires massive overhead with employees salaries, fleets of vehicles, a shop, tools to outfit several crews...
If you scale hard you may get caught when construction dips with the national and local economy.
By all means, learn a skilled trade, but it has limitations. I would do things as I’ve done... I work alone. I can make high five figures a year working on my own terms, taking whatever days off I want, and when I take off my tool pouch the day and it’s worries are over.