This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Hey, hey, what's up, my friends? Listeners, community, it's not a school school. I'm so glad you're here. My name is Chris Guillebeau. We have just finished week number 38 of season three.
We're coming up on a thousand episodes, just five episodes away. It's 9.95 today. This week featured the massive Kickstarter success that raised more than $415,000. That was by two friends of mine who made this incredible camera accessory. We also had Atlanta food tours, a data scientist who turns teaching frustrations into recurring income and more.
Now, because it is the fall, at least Northern Hemisphere fall, it is the season of books. Lots of new books out or coming out soon. A couple of weeks ago, my friend Marie Forleo launched her book, "Everything is Figureoutable." I mentioned that at the time and she's just done a fantastic job with her book launch. So much to learn from that. Another good friend, Chase Jarvis, has a book called "Creative Calling," coming out the day after tomorrow.
Highly recommend that as well. And then Ryan Holiday has a book called "Stillness is the Key." These are just a few of my book recommendations. I don't want to push a library on you, but at the same time, lots of good books come out in September and October. So I do want to make sure they get some attention. Now let's see what else is happening.
Oh yeah, we're also coming up on the end of the year. And I mean, it's not quite there yet, but it's on the horizon. And so a number of people have asked, okay, we've done three seasons of "Saddestal School" now, soon to be a thousand episodes and counting. What's going to happen? Are you going to keep doing it?
Have you run out of stories yet? Well, something different is coming. That's all I want to say for now. Still working out some details, but something different is coming. I'm not saying that this is going to end.
I'm just saying we're going to make some changes and I'll tell you more about it at some point soon. I want to make sure that I am improving and changing and growing, just as I encourage everybody else out there to do. So you'll be the first to know. That's the first thing I've said about it to anybody. So you'll be the first to know when I have some details.
Now in this last weekly recap before episode 1000, I want to look at a topic I'm calling stages of hustle to business growth. If you have any background in traditional business education, which by the way, if you don't, that's okay. It's actually probably to your benefit if you don't. But if you do, you've probably studied stages of companies. This is a common thing in MBA programs and elsewhere.
And like so many things, the stages of going from a side hustle to a more sustainable business are a bit different from what you may have heard about before. So let's look at that a bit. And it relates to the audio update you'll hear in a moment from one of our previous featured case studies as well. So first remember that people start side hustles for all kinds of different reasons. And not everybody is trying to build a business.
That's really important. I think there's a lot of value in just having something that creates an extra $500 or $1,000 a month or whatever the number is. So we have lots of people out there with that goal, lots of people out there who are making that happen. So totally cool. Or if you're trying to do it more as a creative outlet or any other reason.
But for those people out there who are trying to grow this into something more substantial, one common path or one common stage transition we could say is when you realize you want more control over your life. So you've got something that's actually working a little bit and you're like, wow, I get paid to provide this service. This is pretty cool. This is incredible. And it is pretty cool.
It is incredible. And that since lasts for a while. But after some time you realize that while it is pretty cool to get paid, whatever time you're taking to do that is coming at the expense of something else. Therefore, one of the most common stage transitions is when someone goes from accident to intention. So I say accident, it's not always an accident when somebody starts a project and it makes money.
Some of the stories we feature are essentially happy accidents. But let's just say there's not a whole lot of intention behind it. And then all of a sudden they're like, okay, I've got something that works a little bit, but it's also coming at the expense of other time in my life, other things that I want to do. What fundamental change can I create in the structure of this project to where I can buy some of my time back essentially while still bringing in income. And the audio update you'll hear in a moment is a perfect example of that.
So I don't want to preempt her. Just hold that thought and you'll hear an example. The second stage transition that I want to mention is when you go from what I call accept anything mode or say yes to anything mode to being much more selective. Okay, so in the beginning, if you're a service provider, and if somebody, if a client comes along who remotely meets what you're looking for offers you remotely anything close to the rate you're trying to get, even if it's not desirable for whatever reason, you're probably going to work with that client or you're probably going to pursue this opportunity, whatever it is, just because it's new, it's exciting, it is a way to make money and so on. But then over time, of course, as we see in lots of different stories that we profile, you learn some lessons.
You realize, actually, I'm going to be more successful if I focus on what I'm best at, if I focused on not just what I'm best at, but also what I'm interested in because this is my side hustle time, it's my time that's limited. And so I want to do something that I enjoy. So then you start saying, okay, how do I pare down? And what actually is my, whatever it's called, your zone of genius or your unique skill. And even if it's not so lofty, we don't have to make it such high level, this is your life mission kind of thing.
But the point is you go from being willing to do anything to being more selective. So you got this stage of accident to intention and the stage to more selectivity. And this is something that is very common that's not really explored in any of that traditional business structure. And it's not every stage of a side hustle, of course, but I do think it's something that probably 80% of people go through as they progress in this world. So what stage are you in?
Are you in that accident stage, that intention stage? Are you accepting anything? Are you becoming more selective? What's your goal? Of course, because everything comes back to goals.
I'll have more to say about this in an upcoming email. So hopefully you're on that list. If not, you can just join it from sidehustleschool.com or from my blog, which is a slightly different newsletter at chrisguillebeau.com. That's G-U-I-L-L-E-B-E-A-U. All right, in a moment, we're gonna go to that audio update.
It features Stephanie from Boise. She's got a great story. Kind of bring us full circle all the way back to episode 397. But first, here's a shout out to our sponsor. Really appreciate them allowing the program to be completely free for 995 episodes and counting.
So sponsor message, then we'll hear from Stephanie. [Music]
Hi Chris, this is Stephanie Lovell from Boise, Idaho. And I was featured on episode 397. I am the creator of musicforkidos.com and I create high quality children's music. I'm a music therapist, a music educator, a Berkeley College of Music graduate.
And the joke is that I have a very low tolerance for cheesy children's music. When that episode aired, my primary income was from recording personalized lullabies. I loved it, but it was taking up too much of my time. So I shifted to a more passive income model. And right now I create online courses and have a membership community for music therapists and educators.
And on that community, they can access all of my resources that I've ever created. It's been an absolute game changer for me and for my family. It's created reliable, consistent income that takes far, far, far less time for me in the long run. If I could share any advice to listeners, it would be to listen to what your audience is asking for. I'm very introverted.
I didn't think that I would ever, ever be comfortable doing online courses, but I'm so glad that I listened. So right now I'm writing and recording my next course that's launching in early November. I really, really appreciate Side Hustle School. It was the thing that sparked my first idea and it's grown into something that will be completely life-changing for my family. So thank you, thank you, Chris, and have a good one.
- Awesome, thank you so much, Stephanie. Indeed, personalized lullabies sound pretty time intensive. I remember when I worked on that episode, I was like, wow, that's a pretty cool thing. It also sounds like something that takes a lot of time. Listeners, that was episode 397.
Music therapist writes custom lullabies for restless children. And as you just heard, she's moved on to something that is much more passive by design. She has gone perhaps from happy accident to being really intentional and also focused on creating something that is sustainable. So if you're selling personalized lullabies and that's your main source of income, if you're not writing personalized lullabies on any given day, you're not getting paid. Whereas with the membership community, the money's coming in day after day, week after week, and so on.
And last but not least, I wanna touch on what she said about being introverted because I am an introvert too. I am 100% introverted, even though I do a lot of speaking. People often assume that just because you could go and give a talk or something, you are an extrovert and that is not the case at all because being an introvert is largely about where you recharge and where you get your energy from, what takes your energy, what drains it, and so on. So if you two out there are an introvert and think you can't do an online course or you can't give a talk or write a book or whatever it is, I assure you that you can. So learn from her, learn from some of the other people that we've featured on the program and go and check out her site at musicforkidos.com.
[Music]
More to come as we pass episode 1000. I'm gonna have more audio updates. I'd love to feature more questions and comments from listeners in general. If you wanna leave a message for us, you can do that on the website, sidehustleschool.com. Look at the about page, scroll down.
There's a little place where you can send us a voice note. You can also submit a side hustle for consideration to be on the show. If you know somebody with a side hustle and you're like, wow, they should be on the program, reach tens of thousands of active daily listeners who are all doing something like this or trying to themselves, go and fill out that form or tell your friend if that's the case to go and fill out that form, sidehustleschool.com. This is my last sign off before we cross over the Rubicon of episode 1000. And most of I just wanna say thank you.
I wanna say thank you so much for taking us so far. I'll probably say more about that in about five days when we hit that episode. And then I'll just keep moving on because I wanna focus on bringing you more stories. That is the whole point, not to be overly self-referential, but to say how can we help our listeners create the kind of freedom that is important to them. So listeners, if you're out there and you commit to listening every day, just 10 minutes a day, I too commit to supporting you in your quest to create that new source of income.
This is something you know you need to do, you know it's important, but I also know that you have limited time and you're busy and you're not necessarily trying to quit your job and run away and back back in Thailand or whatever. You're just trying to do something to diversify your income and give yourself more options, which are wonderful things that I think everybody should do no matter what your goals are after that. - Big thanks to our team, including Chuck Reed, Jed Chang, Tina Hart, The Show Cat, Libby Gilliboe. Everybody on Teams Haddestal School is also part of the Onward Project that is led by best selling author Gretchen Rubin. Go and check out her show "Happier with Gretchen Rubin" as well as "Happier in Hollywood" and "Do the Thing".
This is a free listener supported show. You're actually all free, go and check them out. And if you're enjoying this one at least, I'd be very grateful if you'd give me a quick rating and review in Apple Podcasts. It just takes a second and it helps other people discover the show. You can also tell your friends that even better show them how to subscribe.
If you know somebody out there who needs another source of income, send them to us, we'll take care of them. As I said, much more is coming up. Really excited about the fall. A lot of good stuff is on the way and I can't wait to share it with you. Our episodes go online at 6 o'clock a.m. Eastern time
every single day to come back to subscribe. My name is Chris Guillebeau, this is "Side Hustle School". [Music]
From the Onward Project.
