The formula for freedom goes something like this:
- Build marketable skills
- Earn more than you spend
- Don't depend on a single source of income
- Stop trading time for money
- Align your work with your curiosity
- Work when and where you want
- Develop a network of trusted relationships
None of which happen overnight.
There are many unintuitive things about working on the internet:
The first being, the narrower your focus, the bigger your opportunity.
The great irony in identifying your focus is (in my experience) only achieved by widening it first.
For me it went something like this:
- Study graphic design
- Do 3 unpaid graphic design internships
- Get an agency job
- Quit agency job
- Get 7 more agency jobs
- Start my own advertising agency
- Pivot agency business
- Pivot agency business again
- Build Visualize Value
The last bullet is a combination of everything I learned and experienced in the 8 bullets before, packaged into "a brand" — something that takes a long time to take hold in the minds of everyone that isn't you.
I talk about this idea in more detail in this video:
There a many awful, cringe inducing definitions of "personal branding" — none of which I'm endorsing here.
Doing business on the internet is about convincing people you don't know that you have something they need or want. Think of a brand as the bridge between the two.
This is a segment from the 10-part Leveraged Creator series.
Sign up here to get it all: leveragedcreator.com
