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Written from our RV kitchen table, while Alyssa’s driving through Spokane, Washington
A great business book I read years ago is called the “E-Myth”. It talks a lot about entrepreneurship and how to run a successful business. One key point of the book is this:
You have to take time off of working in the business in order to work on the business. For instance, if I were a pizza maker. It would be important for me to take days off of making pizza in order to focus on things like marketing or growing my pizza restaurant to two locations. Working on the business is big picture thinking.
I thought of this quote as I drank my coffee this morning. What would I be doing right now if I had never quit my job and left Austin? I’d be packing up my things and headed into the office for another eight hour day of work
What am I doing instead? Well, last week we filmed a conference of over 5,000 people up in Portland, Oregon. We met authors, speakers, and other influential people who Alyssa and I both look up to. We had dinner with two editors from Random House Publishing who empowered us to think about publishing our first books. We’re currently driving to Missoula, Montana to work our 8th job of Hourly America. And as I write this from a moving RV, Alyssa is jamming to “Forever” by Chris Brown in the front seat. I would say that’s a nice alternative, right? Not to mention the scenic places we’ve seen, other great people we’ve met, and other adventures that happen when you’re a full time RV’er.
I’ve written more blogs in the last three months than I have, ever. Tens of thousands of eyes have seen my blog posts since we left Austin. I didn’t all of a sudden become a better writer, I just created freedom to dream. I took time to work on the business instead of in the business. I took time to work on my life, to think big. What came out of me taking the time to think big was a sponsorship for our documentary, a closer relationship with my wife, and an opportunity to spend seven months traveling America.
Why do you need Freedom to Dream? If you’re constantly working yourself tired every day, when do you take the time to dream up big picture ideas? Most likely, you don’t. This is why you hear of big time CEO’s and entrepreneurs taking weeks and months off every year. They need time to recharge and time to reorganize priorities. If you want to build something meaningful, you have to create this kind of freedom too.
Alyssa and I chose freedom over making a lot of money at this point in our lives. It was a risky decision, and it still is. But living simply has freed us up to create opportunities for ourselves that would have never come if we chose finances over freedom. Money is the golden handcuffs, as they say.
I’ll be writing more about how to create freedom for yourself in my upcoming eBook “Build Something”. I’m getting a little sick writing this right now as we’re going up switchbacks in the mountains.
