The Wealthy Worker

In this blog, I’ve been trying to show you how you can gain freedom. Freedom to choose your own path, to work when and where you want and so on. I can’t think of anything more satisfying than to be able to work at home, in any city, with global clients. This removes many of the usual worries (no jobs in my city, recession in my country) by providing diversification (as you would do with your investments). As I mentioned I’ve been working remotely for many months, but I’ve recently come across some exciting news for those of you that have some sort of expertise to share with the world (and almost everyone does).

At Teaching Sells (of which I’m a member), they show you how to teach online and get paid for it. From figuring out your content and how to structure it, to marketing and building the site. The idea is to set up a paid monthly subscription site, but instead of a regular website you create an ‘Interactive Learning Environment’ using all sorts of multimedia. This creates a community of learners around your topic and provides a constant revenue stream for you.

I’m setting one of these sites up for another of my passions, teaching guitar. What can you teach to others while gaining the freedom you want?

Well, my first month of being on-call is over and it went very well. As I mentioned previously, I had a minimum 20 hour per month clause in the contract and the rate was about 50% higher than normal due to being on-call. They didn’t call me that much and so it was a good idea to have the 20 hours in there! Things were pretty stable after I left and any major development is on hold so there wasn’t that much happening. I was on vacation for 2 weeks so it was nice not to have to answer too many calls. But I was prepared to do what I had to - once or twice I was swimming or lying in the sun when they called, but answering questions on the phone isn’t that taxing!

I’ve decided to only work remotely and there’s a possibility I can get some remote work in a couple months or so when the same client will start ramping up. So for the next couple months I am going to work on another business idea I recently started (online interactive guitar lessons). Not only that but I’m planning to move to the east coast where I have another house which we recenlty bought. I plan to get it set up with furniture and services and do my work from there.

The key point for you to take out of this is to know what you want and figure out a way to get there. It takes some thought to gain clarity on what it is you really want. Do you really want a large business with lots of employees and travelling around the country, or would you like to work from your country home or a tropical resort on a one-man internet business? Would you like to work with one client for months or would you like to have multiple clients for short-term jobs? Do you want/need to work full-time or would you prefer to work part-time on multiple interests? I realized that there are certain things I don’t like about the IT work, but I kept doing the same things expecting a different result (the definition of insanity). So I’m committed to living the dream. I hope you are too.

My wife forwarded me an email from the wildlife rehabilitation society (where she volunteers), telling me someone had a found a baby robin outside their home. There was a hole in the nest and it had fallen out. 2 other babies had died. So since I was working from home, I offered to pick up the robin and take it to the rehab society. They get lots of calls during this spring season since there are lots of babies being born!

When I arrived at the woman’s home, she let me in to see the robin she had found. It was really small and in a box. She had been feeding it baby food and it seemed okay. She was sad to see it go, but I took it to the rehab society where it could get proper care. As soon as I peeked my head into the box, it stuck its neck out and mouth open wanting food. It gave me a glimpse of how stressful a mother robin’s job is!

I just checked up on the robin and it’s doing well! Another benefit of working from home, and doing something really meaningful to me.