How You Can Make More and Work Less

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THIS ISSUE

1. Feature: Yours truly! 🤘🏽

2. Key Lesson: My four biggest learnings about building a one man business

   • ❤️ Heartset: Perspective Cures Everything

   • 🧠 Mindset: The Path Appears When You Walk It

   • 🧰 Skillset: The Four Lessons

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FEATURE

Breakdowns lead to breakthroughs.

March of 2022 was one of my biggest breakdowns. I was laid off from my dream job one Friday afternoon. I was a managing director of brand strategy at one of the largest independent healthcare focused marketing and communications agency and in two minutes, my job disappeared.

But once I was gone, I never looked back. I became a corporate dropout and it was one of the best things that ever happened to me.

People say time at an agency is like dog years, but time as a solopreneur? It can be even more intense, now that you have full control of the pedal.

If you are on a journey as a corporate dropout or even thinking of starting your own business, I have a few lessons to impart.

For those ahead of me, I continue to be inspired by you 🙏🏽

❤️ Heartset: Perspective Cures Everything

As a solopreneur, I’m in my head more than ever. Is this going to work? Is this going to bust? What if no one likes it? What if this is the wrong move?

I’m thinking and rethinking my business - thankfully it doesn’t regularly cause a tailspin.

But when I do engage in negative and non-helpful thoughts, I have a simple reminder that keeps me feeling full:

“That it’s a privilege to build a business on my own terms.”

If I’m still feeling overwhelmed:

“The future is a projection, the past is a story, the only thing that is real is the present.”

If that still doesn’t help, the ultimate perspective shift:

“We are living a finite and miniscule exeistence on a floating rock in the middle of nowhere surrounded by darkness and occasional balls of fire.”

There, that should help, just keep moving forward, nothing really matters - “when in doubt, zoom out.”

🧠 Mindset: The Path Appears When You Walk It

I have worked with numerous coaches, and joined many communities. The most important thing to keep in mind is that “there is no ONE way, there is only your way” and you can only find out what it is for you when you start to walk it.

You can listen to the most successful people talk about their path, just know that it’s not yours. Don’t ever adopt the path of others as your own and judge your journey by comparing with theirs. Use them for inspiration, not as a step-by-step road map.

🧰 Skillset: My Four Biggest Learnings

Here comes the skills you can hone for you to make more and work less.

1. Charge for the value you bring, not for the time you work

This is the most important thing to understand. You need to be willing to charge the value that you bring to your customer. How much would they gain? How much would they lose? When you understand the implications of your work, you can charge them for the value and not how long you worked. Why should you get paid more if it took you longer to do the work?

• Don’t charge hourly rates, charge by project deliverables.

• If you have to give an hourly rate, start with a rate that’s high, something that you would be more than glad to accept.

2. Your network is your net worth

I hear this so often, but it never became real to me until I was out on my own. When you know the right people, the right opportunities will show up. It’s not a question of if, just a question of when. Invest in the people around, you. Build relationships constantly and help as many people as you can. It will come back to you tenfold.

• Join communities for the learning but more importantly for the people

• Pay coaches and tap into their network

• Help people get what they want (yes, even if it means free work at the beginning) - I coached 10 clients for free to get my first testimonials.

3. If you want a customer, ask

Seems so simple and stupid, but it actually works. It works because if you don’t ask, you won’t get any!

The fastest way to get a paying client is to ask a client who has paid you before. If you take 2 minutes to message a past client (they must have had a great experience with you) and ask them how they’re doing, you will get a new customer.

It’s happened to me multiple times, all I did was message them and asked them how they’re getting on!

4. Work on your passion or your business (it’s seldom the same thing)

People who are already rich will tell you to follow your passion. It’s not wrong, it’s usually not the quickest path to money. They themselves probably didn’t get wealthy from their passions, they picked an area where there was opportunity and they had an overwhelming knowledge and/or distribution advantage.

Think of the folks who are wealthy:

• Bill Gates: access to computers early

• Daymond John: access to hip-hop artists

• Barbara Cochran: trained in real estate

You just need to be clear what it is you want. If you want to pour yourself into your business, don’t worry about passion, you will become passionate when you start to get traction. If you want to spend time working on your passion, don’t berate the fact that money is not stacking as fast as you would like it.

Who would you like me to interview?

As I continue to interview “legends” to reveal the hidden forces of influence and attraction so we may live a life more legendary, who would you love for me to interview?

P.S: Hit reply and let me know who I should bring on the podcast next!

See you next Sunday.

Make your mark, live your legend 🤘🏽,

Howie Chan

Creator of Legend Letters

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