Today I’m writing this post to share YOUR success story. Yes, you heard it right. This is not my story. It’s yours.
Fifty-two weeks from now, you can change the way you work and bring more joy to your life. No matter how stuck you feel today.
You see, I’m a not-so-motivated person at the core – always looking to find solutions where I can minimize my working hours while increasing my productivity. I’m not good with analytics or tech either. I just know stuff that helps me survive.
I’m telling you this stuff because you need to know that people who are making it work effortlessly are not all naturally gifted. We take consistent action every single day to get to a point where some might even call us overnight success.
Because they don’t know the process.
Lesson one, every single thing has a process that needs to be broken down into a set of actions. Nothing is unlearnable. Even performing an intricate surgery or landing a rocket on the moon consists of specific actions that can be replicated.
But that is a debate for another day.
Today I’m going to give you some useful insights on how YOU can build a stress-free business from home in 2020. One that allows you to thrive. Because money won’t matter unless you value your time.
In fact, I read it somewhere, you don’t exchange money for things – you exchange money with time. The number of hours you worked on a project is your giveaway to the money that you received for that project.
It isn’t a gloomy concept at all. If you can use your time wisely, you can build a thriving business even from home. So let’s get to the good stuff and see how it’s done.
You Are Not a Lone Wolf
Here’s something I learned as an introvert – you might enjoy your solitude, but you do need your tribe.
If you hate being surrounded by people, it means you haven’t found the right ones yet. With social media, we have a huge benefit of connecting the people across the globe.
Running a business from home does make you your own boss, but a few years down the line, you will miss having co-workers. That is when you use the art of networking to your advantage.
Use Facebook and Instagram to connect with people from your niche. Engage in social communities. At first, it will look like you’re talking to a wall but give it some time. Make personal connections. Schedule calls and talk about your biz with other people.
So many times I’ve connected with other mommies running a biz and going through the same circumstances that I am. And believe me, going all bare with people from your tribe helps a lot. In fact, it’s one of the key components that helped me take my business to another level.
Consistency is Key, Obviously
This one is a given but consistency is key in everything you do. Something published by Joanna Weibe in her Copyhackers Copywriting Bootcamp helped me sort out a lot of my work-from-home dilemmas.
What she says roughly translates to this; as freelancers [or home-based business owners] our week does not consist of five working days and a weekend – instead we have a series of twenty-four hour days. What we choose to do with this set of hours determines our success.
This changed my perspective on consistency. I began writing more, scheduling more calls in a day, getting more projects done in a week because my timeline isn’t measured in terms of days or weeks.
It’s inconsistent, sometimes I work five hours a day and sometimes it’s only two – and within this inconsistency, we need to work out a consistent pattern so the ball keeps rolling.
Own Your Narrative
Drill this into your mind; most people will not have your back when you’re building a great business. Most people will still not have your back when you’ve built a successful business.
Don’t cut these people off from your life.
They’re not the ones with a dream – you are!
They’re not supposed to have your back, your success solely depends on your actions. Distance yourself from negativity and remember, you are responsible for the results you produce.
And this is when you’ll need your tribe. Because for every single person who told me I can’t do it, there were ten others who told me, I can.
Learn Time Management from Experts
Time blocking, deep work, using time trackers are all pretty amazing concepts that do give out results. When you don’t have a set time to go to work, you end up overdoing (under-doing, in my case).
Learn time management skills from experts. They’re literally giving away these secrets for free through TED talks, Facebook Groups, or blog posts.
Multi-Tasking Isn’t THAT Bad
Entrepreneur published this piece giving us so many reasons not to multitask, here I am endorsing that very thing. Listening to podcasts (a sure-shot way of improving your story-telling techniques) while commuting, parking the car away from the grocery store to get in a few extra steps, taking a friend along for shopping to get your socialization covered are all good ways of keeping up with life stuff.
Yeah, I call it life stuff because there are some things you can’t give up if you’d like to keep your mental and physical health intact.
Develop Your Unique Process
Over the years I’ve found so many freelancers/business owners having their own unique process. Some of us schedule all their calls once a week. Some work nine to five – but from home.
Some even take projects only in odd numbers (wait, what?)…
You should always learn and apply expert’s advice to your working schedule – the concept of theme days IS pretty amazing. Take a quick search on google and you’ll know what those are.
That being said, you must not ignore your intuition and work at your own pace. Do what works for you. If you feel like working at the middle of the night, do it. Don’t wait for the alarm to go off at 6 am to start your day
I’m not a fan of grinding or “hustling”. I don’t believe in order to be successful you need to compromise your health or mental peace. If it works for you, great. If it doesn’t no problem. Building a stress-free business that allows you to thrive is all about leading a life where you don’t compromise on relationships, health, and even money. Its about putting together a non-negotiable process that keeps you happy and fulfilled.
If you take charge of your life today, you will have a different story to tell in 2021.
Believe me, it’s not that far off.