30,000 Feet

CANVA PRO

I fumbled around with a few side hustles before I found the one that would become a 6-figure business and allow me to leave the 9–5.

Everything changed when I decided to look at things from 30,000 feet.

I remember the moment well. It was 2018, and Laura and I were out for dinner. After finishing our meal, we spent a couple of hours talking while getting refills on our coffee.

I distinctly remember asking her this question:
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“What do we want our life to look like in five years?”

Hardly eloquent, but Laura understood.

Here are some of the ideas we came up with while sitting in that restaurant.

In five years, we wanted:

• More time to spend together
• More freedom to travel — longer vacations, to visit family
• More day-to-day schedule flexibility
• To be available to support our kids as they moved into adulthood (whatever that would look like)
• I wanted to have my own business and do creative work (Laura didn’t express her own business goals but was interested in us working together)

In looking at the big picture, we drew the following conclusions:

• My 9–5 job was completely at…