A lot of people wake up to a life they neither envisioned for themselves, nor do they want. They find themselves asking, “How did I get here? And most importantly, what do I have to do to get back there?”
Since the first post of this series, I’ve been receiving calls from people telling me, “So I don’t like the direction the company is going and I’m thinking of resigning and starting my own thing.”
I usually have only two follow-up questions; “Do you know what you’re going to start?” and “What do you do after work and over the weekend?”
The answers are usually; “No.” and “Either at home Netflixing or out partying.”
More than the first question, the second is usually more indicative of why such a person should not quit their job.
Why?
The average person is used to having some form of structure in their lives…whether it is in the form of following a syllabus at school or hitting KPI’s at work. So it’s easy to wake up one day with no school/job to go to and spend the entire day on Youtube.
“Build Your Equity After Hours”
There’s this clip (funny enough, on youtube) by entrepreneur Garyvee where someone asks him, “How do I make money doing something I love?”
I loved his response because it was very practical, “You don’t. I lost a ****load of money when I started doing what I loved. What you do is you position yourself to succeed. If you’re doing something else and you want to do this thing you love, you do it after hours. You work 9 to 6. You get home. You kiss the dog, and you go to town. You start building your equity and your brand after hours. Everybody has time. Stop watching ***ing Lost.”
If you’re frustrated in a life you didn’t want for yourself, then don’t expect the clouds to just open, and the light to just shine through. The reality is you’ve got to do something about it.
The least you can do are as follows:
– Up-skill
– Working on a side hustle or passion project
– Engage with interesting people
The benefits of just one hour after work compounds over time.
Instead, some people would rather spend all of their evenings at Jay’s.
Especially on Thursdays.
“Your unwillingness to work on your own ideas during your free time is the reason why you have to work for someone else…” – Joe Duncan
Up-skill
This is important to emphasize because the world is rapidly changing, with new technologies continuously disrupting the scene. So up-skilling is necessary to stay relevant as you can’t solely rely on whatever knowledge and skills you attained at a formal educational institution.
The good thing about today’s world is how everything you want to learn is only one google search away. The bad thing is – again – you’ll have to apply your knowledge and skills in actual projects that add value to the world, which is why the next step is important.
Work on a Side Hustle or Passion Project
The way I distinguish between the two is whether you make money from it (the former) or not (the latter). Working on projects is a great way to apply your knowledge and demonstrate you actually have skills especially in an area that is totally different from what your current job looks like.
In his blog, Tom Wahlin documents his undertaking of a 100 Days of Making Challenge, adopting the idea from Elle Luna who summarizes it as, “It’s a celebration of process that encourages everyone to participate in 100 days of making. The great surrender is the process; showing up day after day is the goal. For the 100-Day Project, it’s not about fetishizing finished products — it’s about the process.”
Work with Interesting People
In a recent post published by Brave Venture Labs, Ibanga writes about how education needs to be changed, not just for continuous skills-building but also for continuous collaborative innovation.
“[The world] opens the door to global collaboration to solve profound human problems. It’s not just creating and managing knowledge that matters. Those who connect knowledge create the most value. Where some race to micro-skill, others innovate.”
The beginning of that is to work with interesting people who are bringing ideas to life.
The caveat here is it is actually difficult to find people like that.
Last but not least, remember that every hour you spend at Jay’s is an hour spent not exploring the following:
What sparks you?
What are you curious about?
What value do you want to add to the world?
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