– Making Money Can Be Fun! –
Adventures and side hustles have always been intertwined with me. My adventures cost money and I don’t have sponsors or people willing to pony up for my expeditions. I always had to earn the extra money I needed to finance my adventures.
And everyone needs adventure in their lives. The excitement and variety add to the quality of our lives. By expanding our portfolio of experience, we lead richer lives and become happier, more satisfied people. But sometimes saving the money we need for adventures is an obstacle. Too many times, I hear people say,
I Can’t Afford Adventure
This was true for me, especially when I was young. I worked hard to make the money I needed to pay bills and raise my family. It was a full-time job to make ends meet and I certainly didn’t have spare cash laying around for the kind of crazy adventures my imagination cooked up. And my wife wasn’t going to let me take from the family budget for some wild idea I had about mountain climbing or deep diving or God-knows-what new and unusual experience. If I wanted to work a little extra and make some money on the side, that would be all right. If I wanted the adventure that badly, she wouldn’t hold me back. And that’s how it started for me.
It turns out that side hustles are adventures on their own. They are – by definition – new and unusual ways to make money. If properly selected, they add a little excitement and satisfaction to our lives. The best side hustles are those that utilize skills and equipment you already have, or making money doing something that you actually love to do.
Not all of us have jobs we love; usually they’re just occupations. The things we love to do, like making music, or painting or carving or [insert your hobby here] are real passions for us, but not enough to pay the bills. By converting these passions into side hustles, we can accomplish two things at once. We can save money for bigger adventures (activities or trips) and we can have adventures with the side hustle. Here is one example:
Weekly Adventure with Wieslaw
My language teacher is a professor; that is his chosen profession. The story behind his decision to become a teacher is both fascinating and hilarious (the man is a great storyteller). But he does all the un-fun things teachers have to do to teach; prepare curriculums, meet students at scheduled classes, file paperwork for the university, blah, blah, blah. But one night a week, he meets me at my house and teaches me the Polish language.
I won’t tell you how much he charges, but I will tell you that it’s good pay for 1 ½ hours of work. And beyond the pay, there’s the excitement that he feels… the sheer fun of engaging in something he loves to do. We are always laughing, mostly excited, and genuinely enthused when it’s time on Tuesday nights for his ‘language lesson with Pat’. Beyond any doubt, he is happy with his side hustle.
In today’s world, you don’t need to have specific skills; something you like to do is of value to someone else. Maybe you like dogs; there are people who will pay you to walk their dogs because they’re too busy with their jobs. Maybe like landscaping; there are people who will pay you to mow their lawn or work in their garden. Maybe you like to cook; get a side hustle working at a local restaurant on weekends. The list of things that working people do not have time to do and will pay someone else to do for them is longer than this blog. If you provide a service that you love to provide, something that brings you joy, then your side hustle becomes an adventure.
Side Hustles Can Become Full-Time Gigs
Remember how I always say that one adventure leads to another? That’s certainly true of side hustles. They tend to grow and can expand to become more than just a simple side job. People sometimes leave their full-time job for a full-time hustle. Instead of working for someone else, we’re working for ourselves. We are doing something we like to do with our lives and that can add substantially to our feelings of satisfaction and happiness.
After working as an expatriate for twelve years, I came home to start a new career and raise my children in America. I got a full-time job and, in the evenings, I came home and played on my computer. This is back in the early 90s, when the Internet was brand-new and computers were a mystery for most people. My computer game seemed slow and I read about a RAM upgrade that could be purchased, so I bought the memory sticks, installed them, and upgraded my computer. And the performance of the game improved dramatically. The combination of technology and abstract thinking appealed to me. It became a hobby. I’d come home every night and work on my computer.
One Adventure Led to Another
There was no World Wide Web, really; we used a graphic interface called Gopher at the time. Shopping online at Amazon was still a couple years away. People used computers in their offices and played games at home, but it was not a technology with which most people were comfortable. As I learned more about them, I started working on them for my friends. For a few dollars, I’d install hardware upgrades or update operating systems. To make a long story short, within two years I was selling high-end data storage systems for a computer company in Dallas. A year after that, I talked a friend into starting Proactive Technologies with me and the rest is history.
I went from being an enthusiast to an entrepreneur in a matter of three years. It made me rich; not wealthy like Bill Gates or Steve Jobs, but I had enough money to take care of my family, pay for my adventures, and keep me busy with a job that I truly enjoyed. And this happens to lots of people. Side hustles are the seeds we plant to grow a better life. They are – in the truest sense of the word – adventures.
Adventure is about doing something unusual or exciting and, by doing it, improving the quality of our lives. It is not restricted to mountain climbing, scuba diving, African safaris, or deep-sea fishing. All those things are adventures, but adventure is not limited to those things. Unexpectedly, one of the best adventures of my life was discovered in a side hustle FOR adventure.
How to Find Your Side Hustle
- Make a list of things you love to do: hobbies, past-times, natural talents that come easy to you.
- Google them to research their viability as a revenue stream
- Imagine a way to incorporate that activity once or twice a week into your life.
- Build a simple business plan and execute it. With enthusiasm!
** If you like this topic & want more, let me know with a Comment (below) & I’ll write about the things that interest YOU.
The hardest thing is to decide to act, and the easiest to complain. Therefore, those who complain will always complain, look for more reasons to complain, and those who act will always act, look for more goals for action.