As I noted in my last “journal” entry, I’m quitting my job in a few weeks. November 8th.
I show up to work and have thoughts. “What am I doing here?”.
I’ve had some mixed emotions about this change. It’s all great, and definitely what I want to be doing, but I’m slightly nervous about the day-to-day implementation of working on my business full-time.
Like, what do I do with all of that time? I’ve been able to grow it to where it is now without any more than an hour or two every day.
This is the first time I have ever had complete control over every second of my day. I can do exactly what I want. There’s not a single person I have to oblige (other than my wife if I want to stay happily married).
Do I have what it takes to make the business grow substantially with more time? Should I even be focusing on that? What about building multiple streams of income?
There’s a lot of questions floating around in my head. All of that, and I still want to have an awesome marriage + I want to be an awesome parent to my two kids.
There’s a lot going on, and it’s slightly overwhelming. Only slightly, though, it’s not really that bad. It’s a lot of good problems. Problems that mean I/we are growing and increasing.
One thing that I know is true (always has been and always will be) is that I need to have strict disciplined routines and maintenance in place to keep progressing in the right direction.
This is in every area of life. Business. Marriage. Parenting. Friendship. Learning. Reading. Health + Fitness. Spirituality + Faith. It’s all important, and if something gets neglected or left behind, it all suffers.
Each area of life needs a daily routine that allows it to sustain itself on autopilot. Something I can consciously do everyday to make sure I am on the right track. It requires elimination of distractions, and ruthless focus.
Developing daily routines isn’t hard, but it takes time and consistency. You have to start small, make it obvious, and make it possible. I won’t be able to address all of the different areas of life at the same time. I will have to build the habits one at a time.
Something I’m doing on the spirituality + faith front, is a website I made about a year ago called https://1189days.com. It’s a journey through the Bible one chapter at a time, and there’s 1189 chapters in the Bible.
I started it out, but I didn’t have enough time to do the required writing and studying every day. It took upwards of an hour.
Now, I have plenty of time to implement that into my day, and I have a chance to take it a step further. I plan on doing YouTube, Podcast, Writing, and an email sequence for the whole thing.
I’m not sure how I would monetize it, but building an audience in the space would be fun. At first I will just put out content, and I will see who is attracted to it. Then I’ll build a product for them (course, book, app, etc.).
I don’t want to build an audience around every area of my life. Some things I have no interest in producing content about.
But, I might do something with my wife that allows us to help teach other parents to be more productive and create businesses while raising successful children.
Lots of things going on. That’s the danger. I can’t do it all at once. I have to do it one at a time. I have to at least maintain the business until a more long-term income stream comes along.
Some things have to wait. Some things I have to say no to. That’s okay. I just have to be okay with it.
I know for sure that writing is critical to my success. It’s the one thing that I love to do that I can do everyday. So a daily writing routine is a must.
I can easily see myself being an author in the future, and even an author as a career. But that’s now right now. Right now I am an app developer that likes to write. In the future I will be a writer that happens to make apps.
So, my goal at first is to get back into the habit of getting up early every day to write. I write best in the mornings, and that’s the most productive use of my time.
By getting up early every morning, that means I need to get to bed early as well. I also need to make sure my house is picked up and clean every evening, so I can get up and write without distractions.
Writing is the least friction thing I can do in the mornings. If I had to get up early to workout every morning, I probably wouldn’t do it (I’ve never had the motivation to do it). Writing is fun. Writing helps me think. Writing helps my mental health. Writing generates revenue and profit. It’s my number one thing.
It might end up that I do the 1189days task first thing in the morning. I might batch that work. I’m not sure. I might just end up journaling in the mornings. It might just depend on what I need and how I feel.
After a stint of writing, there will be some code, some customer service, some exercising, some maintenance, etc.
Each one of those things will require a system. Something that I can work towards that compounds my time and energy. Something that’s documented and simple to implement.