When I meet someone new, one of the first things they usually ask me is what I do for a living. That’s a pretty standard, boring question here in North America, and I always struggle to answer it. What do I do exactly?
Sometimes I tell people I’m a writer, other times that I co-founded a men’s lifestyle and entertainment website – which people often think is something far more… adult. Often times, though, I just make something up completely.
But every so often I’ll meet someone that’s especially curious, and they’ll press for answers. When they realize that I work from home as a “blogger,” they’ll say something like… blogging seems super easy. How can I start a blog like Unfinished Man so I can sit around in my underwear making billions of dollars?
The Four Hour Work Week?
It’s a nice thought, don’t you think? Working from home, doing about an hour of real, actual work per day… making millions of dollars a year. This business rarely actually works like that, but a person can dream. The reality is that it’s a lot of work. It takes time, effort, and dedication, and though you can certainly make money, don’t expect millions to roll in overnight.
I can’t speak for “bloggers” everywhere, but I can speak from my own experience helping run this site for the past 5 years. The reason we’re here is that we decided to take action and actually start the site. That may not sound very romantic, but it’s the truth. Most people are too lazy to pick a niche, research and sign on with a decent web hosting service, and actually, you know… start writing and promoting one’s work. It’s that simple.
And why has Unfinished Man lasted 5 years? Definitely because of you awesome readers, but how did we attract you? We stuck around writing (hopefully) good content day after day, week after week, year after year. Did you know that most bloggers quit after only a few weeks? They don’t see immediate success, and they give up. That’s great news for people like me.
It’s tough to start a new business, and yes… even if it’s an online business. I was working a full time job for the first few years, writing articles and promoting them after work, each and every day. It took a long time before I could leave my job, travel the world, and do this full time.
But I’ll tell you one thing: it’s absolutely worth it. I believe in you, but do you believe in you? Your biggest impediment to action is you. The biggest hurdle is actually starting. Money follows mastery, so get started, experiment, and you can read all the SEO and marketing articles along the way. Believe me, there’s nothing worse than trying to get it all “perfect” right from the beginning.
