Brad and Jonathan discuss multi-level marketing, side hustles, expanding your zone of awareness, and energy audits.
Multi-Level Marketing
Recently, Jonathan was approached by an old friend with the offer of going to lunch. At less than five minutes into the lunch, the MLM pitch started. Amway was the MLM of this pitch, but Jonathan pushed back on the pitch and asked questions about the business model and the products. The answers are always something along the lines of this is a passive way to build an income. However, it is anything but passive.Quite possibly the least passive way to earn an income because you aren’t in the business of selling a product. You are in the business of selling people to sell other people to sell other people.Many new recruits in various MLM programs find it very difficult to sell the products once they have burned through their immediate social circle. The attrition rate of many of these programs is absurd. This isn’t to say that it’s impossible but statistics make it unlikely that you will thrive long term with this structure. But if you are interested in an MLM business model that’s a great indicator that you are at least intrigued by the idea of entrepreneurship and there are many other (much easier ways), to build additional income streams.
Work for an MLM, maybe make some money. Start an MLM, you’ll make crazy amounts of money…or forget the MLM structure altogether. What would it look like to take to create a product, find an audience and create marketing around it?The sheer number of side hustles out there is amazing. We have covered many over the course of hundreds of episodes. Related: Find Your Side Hustle Idea With Nick Loper
Side Hustle
If you have started down the path of an MLM, then you likely have the drive to pick up a side hustle and make it work. The key is to find something that you are really passionate about. With passion and authenticity, you can really build something profitable and worthwhile. The hurdle you might face for starting a side hustle is simply bandwidth.[Financial independence] gives you the bandwidth to pursue something that maybe you didn’t have the courage to pursue when you were 17 or 18 years old when you picked that inital job…as you get a little more space between yourself and the financial cliff you can pursue something that would have been a little bit scary.As you start to put more distance between yourself and the financial cliff, you might be able to pursue something that seemed scary before. Once you have that bandwidth, try everything! You will not know what you love doing until you do it. In Alan’s case, his bandwidth or suit of armor is allowing him to follow his dreams and write a movie script. What is your dream? Listen to the whole episode with Alan here.
Lion Or Lamb?
Free to Pursue wrote Lion or Lamb- Which Would You Rather Be? The article kicked off a conversation about how Financial Independence can turn you into a lion. With the freedom to pursue whatever you like, you will not be operating from a place of scarcity which will allow you to withstand scare tactics more easily. You can and should choose to put your time into experiments. Keep going until you find the right place of alignment for you.Let’s just be very intentional about what we take on as a community because we don’t have to do something just because someone is hard selling us on it. It does not have to be that way.To avoid becoming the lamb, choose to build your talent stack. Make sure that you cannot be taken advantage of by building your own resources to take care of yourself. Most importantly, take action. Do not expect results tomorrow. Instead, know that you will need to stick with this over the long term to achieve success.
You put in the work and you will see results down the line.Plus, there really is no good alternative to giving things a try. The other option is to stay at home watching TV and regret it. Start by increasing your zone of awareness and see what interests you.
Increase your zone of awareness and be willing to try something new.Luckily, Brad and Jonathan have interviewed many people that have been able to break out of the “normal” and build something exceptional. As listeners, we have the option to take this information and build out our zone of awareness.
It is not that every single thing you find out you use. But over time, you start to weave a strategy, a comprehensive strategy.Take advantage of this knowledge and increase your zone of awareness. With that, you will be able to move forward and create a better life for yourself. Our goal is to create a resource of strategies on how to best approach life. Find what is useful for you and build your best life.
