Destiny Dawn Marie

More and more people are looking for ways to earn extra income today; as living expenses rise and budgets are stretched thin.  Many choose self-employment and home business ventures as alternatives to the corporate grind. Some enjoy newfound freedoms and control that a successful home-based business delivers while others try and fail.  A worse fate still is the many great small business ideas that are dreamed of yet never explored.

Several years ago, I realized I was in financial trouble and going downhill quickly.  I was over my head in debt and unable to afford moving out of the severely depressed economic area where I lived.  As a young, single mother, I soon realized it was costing me around $12 a day, after travel expenses and babysitting fees, to work the minimum wage jobs in the local area.  I was headed deeper in debt doing what everyone had always told me was the “right” thing to do: get a job and work hard every day for someone else!

I sat at my kitchen table with my weekly paycheck, calculator and notebook and saw the numbers before me in black and white. The “right” thing wasn’t working; slaving at the local burger joint waiting for a better job to open up was not going to fix the problem.  I decided to learn more about self-employment.  It was a turning point that brought me down the path to where I am today.

I gave you a little about my background to demonstrate I know where many of you are coming from. Many others are experiencing the same financial dilemma of dead-end jobs and growing debt today that I experienced then.

Today, I’m a marketing consultant for a new online home-based business operating on a shoestring budget. I researched many online businesses before settling in on this one.

With all of that said, I encourage you to allow yourself to explore your home-based business dreams. I would, however, offer you some key elements to consider that I learned the hard way.

1. Don’t try to learn everything you need to know before you decide to begin.  While research and knowledge are important to success, too much will overwhelm you and paralyze you with information overload.

2. Don’t think there is a magic program for sale out there that produces overnight wealth without putting in some serious effort.

3. Don’t think that you can figure it all out and manage it all on your own! BIG no no. A mentor and team are necessary for your learning process and long term business survival.

Number three is key.  Had I understood that one and found a mentor early on, it would have saved me from learning the first two lessons the hard way.  The hard way is almost always painful and expensive!

Finding a good mentor and a support team you trust is very challenging and time-consuming.  Many with the “work at home” bug avoid dependence of a support system and struggle blindly through the dark days of their small business startups.  This is an ego problem that must be overcome.  It is okay to need a little help learning the ropes.

Another lesson I learned that doesn’t conform to what we are taught is that the best mentors are not friends and family, no matter how successful they may be.  Nor will great mentors be free.  A good mentor is not there to make you feel good about yourself, be your buddy or do the job for you.  A true mentor assumes a great responsibility of delivering honesty and guidance through their own expertise.  Friends, family and free mentoring are often misguided by emotion and personal motives.

When considering self-employment, factor in the costs of a good coach who will take a personal approach to understanding your resources and business development goals. This is the secret weapon of the most highly successful home-based business entrepreneurs. Follow this advice and you are one step closer to your own success.

About the Author: Dawn Wentworth AKA DestinyDawn  has been actively engaged in the internet marketing community since 1996 and is currently helping internet marketing business owners establish teams and mentors at http://www.BigWealthBuilder.com

I see many people stating how they would love to be self employed and decided to tell it like I see it. I have been self employed since 1996 and this is what I have learned.

Self employment / working at home is HARD.

1. There is no “off” time, you are always on duty.
2. You will get no respect from ANYONE unless you earn more then they do.
3. You will get the “eyebrow” every time you fill out income statements.
4. You will not be able to get credit as easily as a W2 earner.
5. You will get taxed heavier then anyone else in your income bracket.
6. You won’t have all the extra time you thought you would have - I promise.
7. You will do 10 times more paperwork then you ever imagined.
8. Your friends and family will not think of your work .. as work.
9. Your friends and family will innocently expect you to give them free services.
10. Everyone will assume your schedule is flexible and expect you to bend to theirs.
11. Everyone will expect you to do all domestic chores because your home all day.
12. You will soon realize clients are much more demanding then your ex boss was.
13. You will pass out when you see how hard it is to keep up with employees and insurances and the paperwork involved with both.
14. Your potential to run into legal problems will quadruple overnight.
15. You will live with your work and take it to bed with you nightly.
16. You home life and work life become entangled, balance becomes a battle.
17. You begin eating at your desk and get outside less and less.
18. You put on weight from being on your computer more.
19. You begin to loose energy from the weight gained.
20. You must become a little bit of everything to manage all aspects of your business.
21. You live with constant stress of trying to calculate the “next” payday.
22. Clients don’t always pay on time.
23. Progress is often slow, setbacks are often major.
24. Your family feels neglected, your friends get board and your left with more work.
25. and my biggest gripe about being self employed - YOU CAN’T FIRE YOURSELF!

I’m sure I am forgetting many of my gripes. Can it be rewarding .. yes it can. But it is NOT easy, you end up working twice as hard for half the pay and twice the taxes. Sure you can work in your underwear, sure you can sleep until noon, sure you can tell your boss to shove it … but when you weigh both sides of the equation you better have a business plan, and a backup plan and a backup plan for the backup plan.

Can you do it? I did. If I can - anyone can!
Should you do it? Depends on you, your lifestyle and your expectations.

Be sure to look for small business classes in your local community and do your homework. Put one foot in front of the other and you will make it if that is your chosen path. Don’t take my gripe list as a reason not to try .. but as a warning on what to watch for so that it doesn’t slow you down.

What do I recommend? Affiliate marketing. No product, no inventory, no shipping, no office, no customer service, no employees … it’s all good. It is a great opportunity to earn some side income while you step inside the realm of self employment.

How did I learn? AffiliateClassroom. I invite you to come check it out for $1.