My wife has a deadline to hit for a gallery she supplies. So I said I’d take charge of the kids for the day while she worked.

Now I spend a lot of time with my children because it’s great fun. A friend of mine boasts how he’s never changed a nappy (diaper) in his life despite having three kids.

I’ve changed HUNDREDS of nappies – the contents of which have been as wide and varied in colour and ponginess as you could ever imagine. I did it because I wanted to – I’m a dad after all – and because it’s part of what life is about.

We could easily get a live-in nanny or au pair, but what’s the point of being a parent if you outsource it?

It’s all part of your life – experience.

Anyway so I took the day off ,and the offspring and I spent the day pratting about in the garden. First time I’ve ever seen a white spider actually so there you go.

And I kept getting HUGE flashes of inspiration, business-wise. I keep mentioning my ‘ideas book’ in this blog but today was quite extraordinary. I’ve come up with two ideas that WILL add $30,000 – $50,000 a year to my income and that can be put together in less than a day. Of course the sales pages, traffic driving and all the other stuff will take a couple of months to put together, but the point is, the idea arrived while I wasn’t working!

I’ll let you know when they come out and how much money they bring in of course but the crazy thing was how quickly it all came together in my head, and all because I took a step back from business for a day.

The feeling reminded me of years ago when I walked out of a job. The boss was a t*t and for once my calm and sense of hunour deserted me so I walked.

And walking out of a job as most people know involves euphoria to start with, then total FEAR sets in as we wonder how we can pay the bills.

Anyway this time the anger I felt seemed to push the fear away and I just didn’t get scared. I wasn’t married at the time and didn’t have a family to support so it wasn’t as worrying as it could have been.

But the fear stayed away.

And in their place I realised that I could THINK. I wasn’t totally knackered after a 40 hour week, or completely fixated on my pay cheque. So my brain seemed to rediscover what it was for.

And I started to have weird and wonderful ideas. Some compete rubbish of course, but other that I worked on and finally put into practise and actually made money from.

Which is how I got into home publishing (before computers though – this was all by mail and photocopier), and I’ve never looked back.

And I reckon this is why people talk about ‘taking the plunge’ when they think about quitting their 9-5 and working for themselves.

It IS a plunge, but once you free up your mind to do the job it was designed for and allow it to stop worrying about crap like paycheques, office politics and your employer’s problems, it’s a pretty wonderful business tool.

Someone Twittered (to see my tweets click the icon on the top right of this page) recently about booking a hotel room to get away and ‘brainstorm’ with yourself, and I think it’s a great idea.

Maybe consider booking 2 or 3 days off work when nobody else is at home and working on YOUR ideas – cos we all have them – and thinking about where you would ideally like to take an online business.

Your results will both terrify you and liberate you, but you’ll never be the same again. Once you see the possibilities your own mind has to offer, no job will ever satisfy you again.

Go do it

Cheers 🙂

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