How Much Has Doing What You Love Contributed To Your Success?
If you've been around long enough, you know that there are about 100 different ways you can go about making money online. I truly believe, however, that not every method is meant for every person. In the 2 years that I've been making money online, I've realized that there's a fine line between feeling like you're making money for your business and working for yourself yet still feeling like it's just another job.
Sometimes, where the money is at is not where you really want to be. Sounds confusing, huh? Well, think of it this way, I've known a lot of people who've gone to college for high paying professions only to find that when they graduate and start working they absolutely hate what they're doing. Accounting is a great example. Sometimes I think that the way we choose to make money online can end up the exact same way.
The first time I ever made a good amount of money online was with eBay. I eventually ended up quitting my job and working full time selling on eBay. For those familiar with profiting on eBay, it usually works in one of two ways: you either sell a few large ticket items or you sell a ton of small ticket items. Unable to break into a profitable niche based around large ticket items, I went with option number two. While I was making really good money, I was working my butt off, sitting in front of the computer for close to 16 hours a day packaging and shipping items. Needless to say, it wasn't too long before I started hating it. I got overwhelmed and felt like I couldn't catch a break. Then a medical tragedy struck and I had to use pretty much all of my money to cover it, which just about killed my business. At that point I came to the cross roads of whether or not I wanted to take the time and rebuild my eBay business. To be honest, the decision wasn't a hard one. I'm still a PowerSeller, but I no longer consider eBay to be my business.
Later on, I got into providing link building services for companies. Again, I did really well with this and made quite a bit of money, but there is a reason that people outsource this kind of work. It took a few months for me to burn out. I attribute a large part of the burn out due to my horrible time management skills. If I had orders, I would work until they were finished, no matter how many orders I had I would not give myself a day off until they were all complete. Even though I had a 3 day turn around for most services, I would deprive myself of sleep and free time to maintain a 24hr turn around time. Needless to say, my clients loved me, but I hated what I was putting myself through.
Before and since then I've done several other things online. I run a dating site, a forum, and own about 20 other websites. I've done bum marketing, list building, product creation, built review websites, Adsense farms, had a penny auction site, and an outsourcing website. I've made some money with most of the things that I've tried, and anything I've made money with, no matter how small of an amount, I don't consider a failure. As long as I'm learning, I'm not failing.
So, that was the last year and a half, all of the above minus eBay, which i started 6 months prior to everything else. The bad part is that I've wasted about a year and a half trying a bunch of different things. The good part is that I've learned my skill set and what I actually enjoy doing.
I used to think that I could be content with doing just about anything as long as I made a lot of money doing it. I know now that's a load of crap. And I've done enough online to realize that the only constant way for me to make money online and be happy at the same time is to follow what I love doing, even if the path to sustainable wealth is longer than some of the other methods I've tried and succeeded at. But it will be worth it because I know now what my goals are, what I want out of life, what I enjoy doing, what it will take to get there, and what I'm willing to do and not willing to do to make it happen.
Basically, I've created this thread to hear stories from Warriors who have turned their passions into their business. How much has doing what you love contributed to your success?
Sometimes, where the money is at is not where you really want to be. Sounds confusing, huh? Well, think of it this way, I've known a lot of people who've gone to college for high paying professions only to find that when they graduate and start working they absolutely hate what they're doing. Accounting is a great example. Sometimes I think that the way we choose to make money online can end up the exact same way.
The first time I ever made a good amount of money online was with eBay. I eventually ended up quitting my job and working full time selling on eBay. For those familiar with profiting on eBay, it usually works in one of two ways: you either sell a few large ticket items or you sell a ton of small ticket items. Unable to break into a profitable niche based around large ticket items, I went with option number two. While I was making really good money, I was working my butt off, sitting in front of the computer for close to 16 hours a day packaging and shipping items. Needless to say, it wasn't too long before I started hating it. I got overwhelmed and felt like I couldn't catch a break. Then a medical tragedy struck and I had to use pretty much all of my money to cover it, which just about killed my business. At that point I came to the cross roads of whether or not I wanted to take the time and rebuild my eBay business. To be honest, the decision wasn't a hard one. I'm still a PowerSeller, but I no longer consider eBay to be my business.
Later on, I got into providing link building services for companies. Again, I did really well with this and made quite a bit of money, but there is a reason that people outsource this kind of work. It took a few months for me to burn out. I attribute a large part of the burn out due to my horrible time management skills. If I had orders, I would work until they were finished, no matter how many orders I had I would not give myself a day off until they were all complete. Even though I had a 3 day turn around for most services, I would deprive myself of sleep and free time to maintain a 24hr turn around time. Needless to say, my clients loved me, but I hated what I was putting myself through.
Before and since then I've done several other things online. I run a dating site, a forum, and own about 20 other websites. I've done bum marketing, list building, product creation, built review websites, Adsense farms, had a penny auction site, and an outsourcing website. I've made some money with most of the things that I've tried, and anything I've made money with, no matter how small of an amount, I don't consider a failure. As long as I'm learning, I'm not failing.
So, that was the last year and a half, all of the above minus eBay, which i started 6 months prior to everything else. The bad part is that I've wasted about a year and a half trying a bunch of different things. The good part is that I've learned my skill set and what I actually enjoy doing.
I used to think that I could be content with doing just about anything as long as I made a lot of money doing it. I know now that's a load of crap. And I've done enough online to realize that the only constant way for me to make money online and be happy at the same time is to follow what I love doing, even if the path to sustainable wealth is longer than some of the other methods I've tried and succeeded at. But it will be worth it because I know now what my goals are, what I want out of life, what I enjoy doing, what it will take to get there, and what I'm willing to do and not willing to do to make it happen.
Basically, I've created this thread to hear stories from Warriors who have turned their passions into their business. How much has doing what you love contributed to your success?
