When I got out of high school, everyone seemed to know what next steps they were going to take in life, except for me.
Everyone had these grand plans for what schools they were going to, what career path they were taking, how they were going to achieve success in their lives.
I wasn’t so sure.
I had an idea that I would pursue medicine. Imagine being the first doctor in my family!
This seemed like a solid plan: I was pretty good at school, the prestige and money were definitely something that pushed me toward this decision, but something seemed off.
When thinking about the endless hours of studying and grinding to be successful, I didn’t get that burning drive in my gut that made me actually want to get it done.
I started to realize that while the money and status sounded nice, that was it. I didn’t have an actual passion for the field.
I was just going through the motions to achieve what, in my mind, constituted success. As a result I ended up with this sinking lost feeling, and a hazy view of my own future.
I began trying everything I could, dipping my toes in any and every job I could find.
Having already accumulated a significant amount of debt, and not really wanting to quit anything, I decided to stay in school pursuing my biochemistry degree.
But I still wasn’t scratching that itch.
I started trying a little bit of this and a little of that, anything that gave me a spark.
I became an EMT, studied fire science and finance, tried my hand at investing. I managed a local restaurant, worked for Nike, everything I could do to figure out what I wanted to do. Some good low acidity coffee was obviously a staple of my life at this point in my life.
The thing that stuck was finance.
I realized what I really wanted was to be able to teach people the things that I wish I had been taught from a young age; those tricks and secrets to success that I learned through hard trial and error.
This was an important point in my life.
I started refining the things I would delve into, looking for ways I could use the knowledge that I had achieved to help people. I needed to reach an audience.
I found blogging and everything changed.
It was like finding Excalaber and prizing it from the stone.
Here was a medium that allowed me to reach a vast audience and share everything that I had learned.
Not only that, but with just a little research I discovered that if done right, you can become crazy successful and make a comfortable living.
The fire was ignited. It was time to go all in.
I decided to take a break from college and leave my jobs behind. I needed to focus entirely on what I was doing now.
I had it together now. I would look for opportunities to work for other bloggers, learning the craft from established individuals while also earning money. I would then take that new knowledge and apply it to my own blog, where I would start making the big bucks.
But life has a funny way of surprising us.
After learning to create my own website, I did start bringing in pretty decent income, but aside from that, I was astonished at how much money I could make working as a freelancer for OTHER websites.
I watched my income skyrocket from $800, to $42000, to $5000 dollars a month!
As I honed my skills, my money reflected in direct proportion.
This was perfect! A win-win! I was able to learn new skills and make more money from them, apply them then to the blogs I was working on, only to turn right around and apply the same things to my own blog. A perfect circle.
While I think we all have an idea of what we want our lives to look like down the road, it often ends up different than we planned and that’s okay!
Don’t be afraid of the twists that life offers you. Roll with the changes that are thrown your way. When I began this blogging adventure, I thought that was it; this was how I was going to make it and this was where 100% of my money would come from.
If I had strictly followed that path and not incorporated freelancing into my plan, I wouldn’t be where I am today.
Don’t worry about what others are doing around you. I’ve found that comparing your journey to that of those around you is not only detrimental to your own success, but it’s also a joy killer.
Be flexible, embracing the twisting path that lays before you. Develop your own motivating mottos. Trust your gut and take chances.You’d be amazed how far it can take you. Heck, you’re talking to someone who didn’t have a home internet connection till I was 18. You just never know how things will turn out.