Nurturing The Spirit of Freedom

I’ve been pondering some life changes for a while, because I’ve been feeling like I’m stuck in a bit of a rut. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining about life here. It’s a very comfortable rut 🙂

I have everything I need.

A stable and secure 9 to 5 job, I own my own car. and I pay very reasonable rent to live with awesome people. I have a couple of hobbies (I make electronic music, I’m a fire spinner, and I’ve just taken a liking to snowboarding). I have an amazing family, some amazing friends, and I’m so grateful for everyone that supports me.

All in all life is rather excellent.

However…

I feel like I could be doing more. More for myself, more for the community, and more for the world. It’s not enough for me now to just be content with living a comfortable existence. There are so many people in this world that aren’t able to enjoy this kind of lifestyle, and it’s pretty arrogant and selfish of me to just keep plodding along complaining about how complacent I’m getting because I have everything I need and nothing to challenge me.

It’s time to create some challenges.

It’s time to build a platform that enables me to create change.

The Goal

Develop a knowledge-base (ie: blog, books, etc), that can be leveraged to create passive income. The new income streams will free up my time, enabling me to focus on creating value for the community and inspiring others to do the same. This value will be in the form of knowledge, information, leadership, and artistic projects (such as my music projects).

The Challenges

I’m a procrastinator, I’ve always been someone that’s “gonna rock that shit tomorrow”. I’m pretty good at making excuses about why I probably shouldn’t do things, or why it wouldn’t be worth it.

I have a few limiting beliefs, which I hope to face and overcome, one by one:

– I’m getting too old to make such dramatic changes in my life (almost 30 while I write this).

I know this may sound trivial to some of you (what, 30? Really? Come on..), especially if you’re past your 3rd decade, but to me it’s a very real issue. It originates from comparing myself to younger more successful individuals, instead of simply allowing myself the credit I’m due for my current life path.

– It will take too long, and isn’t worth the effort.

All good things take time. I understand the logic. Still, this is a subconscious belief that holds me back from starting projects, even before I realize it’s an issue. My mind tells me that I’m not going to get the results I’m expecting (there’s the hook) within a reasonable time frame, so why bother?

– Everyone in my life will think I’m crazy and won’t support me.

The passive income mindset can be a strange one to adopt. There will be a lot of people around you that don’t believe it can be done, and these people are usually the most influencial in our lives. Parents, partners, best friends, all have a good knack for gaining our deepest trust, so when they don’t believe something is possible, we trust that judgement without questioning it.

– I don’t have anything of value to share with the community.

I’ve grown up with the knowledge that I procrastinate, so I’ve always held the belief that I’m never going to really amount to anything spectacular. This affects me when I’m creating projects and artwork, and I find myself seeking other’s opinions as a way to validate my work.  This in turn leads me to be constantly talking about my ideas and projects, rather than just getting down and dirty and getting things done.

– Someone else is already doing it better than me.

There will (almost) always be someone out there that is already putting your idea into action, at least in a similar way.  I find it’s easy to start thinking “well they’re already doing it, and they’re way ahead of me, I may as well not worry about it.  I’ll come up with another idea instead.”  This is dangerous, because it leads to never starting anything.  I’m really good at talking myself out of starting projects.

Where to from here?

As you can see, the challenges seem to far outweigh the goals, but I believe the goals are important enough that it’s going to be well worth overcoming the challenges.  This is a chance to learn, to grow, and to explore everything the universe has to offer me.  It’s really quite an exciting concept!

HERE’S A THOUGHT:

Do you have a goal that you’re aiming for right now?