The bottle on the left is red wine brought over by an uncle from where he lives in France (in the hills not too far from Rodez), and it’s solid drinkable stuff.

Sort of ‘vin de table’ that you would plonk onto the table when eating.

In England something similar would cost around £6. He buys it locally to him at the equivaleint in Euros of £1.80

He brought us a case of it and it’s almost gone already…

The jar on the right is homemade by us (my missus actually) but it’s not wine it’s Sloe Gin.

There are one or two sloe bushes that grow locally and their location is kept VERY secret by locals.

Despite that my clever wife managed to get enough berries to make our slow gin back in September and it’s gorgeous.

It’s thick and sweet and best taken in very small measure but when we had a houseful of visitors last weekend we served up our sloe gin in shot glasses after a returning from a cold walk into the village and it certainly got the conversation flowing.

We saw some mass-produced stuff in a National Trust shop yesterday priced at twenty-five quid for a small bottle. The alcohol content was 23%

We made five times that amount for maybe £15, the alcohol content of ours is a ballsy 40% and the taste is wonderful.

It was designed to make rough gin palatable but if you use decent gin to start with it’s even better.

Goes well on a cold night in front of a roaring fire with a boxset of Breaking Bad.

Just waffling…

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Well the least remaining veggies in the above patch is a small but lovely clump of leeks.

If you grow leeks you’ll know they’re around for ages because they take so bloody long to get to a decent size.

I’ve had my eye on these chappies for Christmas dinner since August.

Then some bright spark said to me:

Leeks aren’t a traditional Christmas vegetable!

Well apart from telling him to bugger off I also informed him that in England turkey isn’t a traditional Christmas food either – we imported the idea at the start of the century from our American cousins.

We used to eat mostly Goose.

Anyway, so our guests at Christmas will be offered home-grown leeks as part of their vegetable choice.

Bird wise we’re not sure yet, although I always thought it would be funny to offer Red Grouse, but by it’s other traditional name.

Just so I could tell people that my wife was looking forward to moorcock for Christmas 🙂

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Been looking through some old notebooks from when I more or less first started out an an online marketer and BLIMEY my targets were well-defined.

The one I just read through showeed how I gave myself 12 months and after that time I wanted 50% of my internet marketing income to be automated as much as possible.

I flipped forwards 12 months and found that I’d actually automated around 30% of my income which was pretty good, and I increased that to over 50% during the next 6 months.

It was simple to do – I just collated my best broadcast emails and spun them into an autoresponder sequence for both my own products AND products I promoted as an an affiliate.

This was a bit easier to do than it is now because products seemed to have a lot longer shelf-life than current WSO’s and products.

Somewhere out there is your BEST stuff – your best blog posts, articles and broadcasts so far…

They are the ones that got the best results for you.

They were the best ones for a reason too. Maybe you were inspired the day you created it. Maybe you were esepcially passionate about a particular product or subject or maybe you just stumbled onto a topic that captured your reader’s attention.

Whatever the reason, don’t let your best stuff be best just ONCE.

Re-use that content. Bring it up to date, or if it’s still releavnt use it as it is – don’t change a word.

After all it worked spectacularly once.

It can do again 🙂

Anyway the moral is that’s why I keep my notes going back years – because it’s far too easy to forget the basics and what worked for you…

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So I was eating crumpets with strong blue cheese on them.

Sort of brunchy-type snack around 10.30am with a cup of green tea,

On my to-do list I had a few things – get in touch with my techy about a disk space issue, read the review copy of a WSO I got sent through to see if it would help my list, share some of my results with my Private Facebook Group and buy some solos ads.

But I wasn’t about to do anything until I’d eaten my cheesy crumpets and eased my stomach into the day gently

So I was browsing Youtube, and especially the TED Talks that are on there because some of them are fascinating.

And I came across a woman who called herself a ‘death educator’ giving one of the talks.

It was an interesting talk ranging from how we’ve taken death out of the home and into hospitals so we don’t really see it any more and therefore we don’t talk about it and are removed from what is (or was) a perfectly normal part of life.

I kind of agree with that.

Then she moved on to death bed experiences and being around dying people and how it’s healthy to talk frankly to people who know they are dying.

Anyway so I Googled her name and immediately found her site.

She has a lot of content on there – videos, accounts of the dying experience and so on.

She also has a book on the way and various services, consultations and what she called ‘experiences’ ranging from $300 to $1500 that you can purchase from her site using Paypal.

She even lets buyers know she doesn’t offer refunds.

I enjoyed her TED talk, and there’s nothing more I can really say about it apart from we’ll all find out about this issue personally at some point right?

But what an interesting niche eh?

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The major driving force for me quitting my 9-5 and going into full-time internet marketing, working from home…

…was the impending birth of my first child 🙂

Now THERE’S a deadline you can’t argue with eh?

There’s no asking for an extension or ‘an extra month because you’re not quite ready’ when it comes to babies.

Give or take a few days, when they’re coming…they’re coming.

So in order to be able to quit I knew I had to be earning at least the same amount as my current salary and I had around six months to get to that level.

We only found out my wife was pregnant when she was 8 weeks along, and then it took me even more time to realise that I wanted to be working from home when my daughter was born.

I had a simple strategy to replicate my salary from home.

Work my arse off.

I got up a couple of hours before work every morning and worked until after midnight every night.

My wife was (and still is) hugely supportive so that made things easier but I’ll admit I was knackered most of the time.

What I actually DID to quit my job isn’t that exciting. I basically wrote some ebooks, and sold some of them online and sold some of them as printed reports via national newspaper adverts.

It was HOW I went full time that is still vivid in my memory all these years later (our daughter is now almost ten)

I just REALLY wanted it.

I didn’t just think ‘it would be nice’ to work from home.

I REALLY, passionately wanted to be able to be there while my kids were growing up.

I wanted it more than I wanted to say in bed when my alarm went off at 5am so I could work for two hours on my online business.

I wanted it more than I wanted to open a bottle of wine and flop in front of the telly after a full day working my 9-5

I wanted it more than anything else.

Now I’m not a willpower superhero.

I’m the laziest, most pleasure-seeking enjoyer of life that you could ever meet.

I enjoy comfort, having plenty of free time and don’t like hard work.

But in my daily life I have choices, and still do (as everyone does) and on quite a number of these decisions I still hear myself say ‘I want THAT enough to really work for it’

And I put everything else aside and go for it.

And I think that’s the difference between success and failure.

It’s just a simple balance – a weighing scale.

You either want it enough to get it or you don’t.

No moral judgement or right and wrong, no blame, no explanations…just a simple equation.

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My brain and my imagination are just too powerful and scary!

(yes the picture is supposed to be my scary face)

I don’t mean that in an arrogant way – I mean they can BEAT me down any time they want

Which is why I have to do things a certain way, and luckily it’s made me quite a bit of dosh in the process…

Let me explain –

If I’m working on a new project or launch, or looking to strike up a new partnership or even entire mini-business…I have to get things moving almost immediately. I have to act.

Because if I don’t then my brain and imagination start working against me.

They’ll come up with all manner of potential problems and reasons that my ventures will fail.

BIG SCARY reasons that can stop me acting because of the fear

None of them are real of course because they’re just things that ‘might’ happen

But if I act – if I actually BEGIN to put my plan or business into action – then those imaginary fears vanish.

They’re replaced by REAL problems. The kind of issues that everyone comes up against when they start something new. They might be big problems or tiny ones…

…but the important thing is that they’re REAL and I can deal with real problems and usually overcome them.

Because real problems are never. ever as scary as the ones your imagination can come up with.

Which is why I get things moving very quickly…

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Yep when the mandolin comes out I know it’s my subconscious telling me it’s time to think about writing that new product that’s been bubbling under the surface for a few months 🙂

Small and twangy, straight to the point.

No unnecessary frills or flourishes.

Slightly painful but incredibly rewarding.

At least that’s what I HOPE my product will be like…

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Lately I’ve only been working a couple of hours a day.

Communicating with my groups and clients, writing blog posts, buying traffic, instructing outsourcers and concentrating on email marketing can be done in a few hours, usually in the early morning which is when I work best.

I’ve done this by either dumping some processes entirely and outsourcing the rest using Odesk or Freelancer.

I’ve found that this back to basics approach gives me TONS of clarity.

So not only am I getting more done, I’m more creative, more focused…

…and the end result of that is that I’m working fewer hours for more profit.

It’s not that I’m doing that much MORE than I was when I was working 8 hours a day- obviously I’m doing LESS…

…it’s more that I’m doing the RIGHT things.

Focusing on the essentials in my business

It all came about by me looking at where my online income came from and found (as you’d maybe expect if you know Pareto’s Law) that the bulk of my income came from 20% of the things I did.

So with initial fear and trepidation I dumped much of the other stuff and concentrated on the systems and processes that brought the most money into my business (not including partnerships and outside businesses)

I then took those processes back to bare bones so that I did the essential, creative stuff myself (like producing content, emails, ideas) and outsourced the rest.

You’d be surprised at how much ‘stuff’ you simply don’t need – how much is fluff and maybe only actually adds a few quid a month to your bottom line but takes much more FROM you in terms of work, stress and management.

Having a tribe of people you can easily communicate with, having some degree of rapport with them, having something to offer them and giving them access to you if they need support.

The rest can be outsourced if you want to keep it and dumped if you don’t.

Frees you up to be creative, to work on your other projects and to maximise the profits yet minimise the time you put into your core business.

Quite therapeutic too – like cleaning out the garage or weeding the garden 🙂

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We all want to be different…

Most people are offended if you say they are ‘just part of the herd’

So why, in reality are we really so AFRAID of actually being different?

As a society we’re a bit freaked by people who step outside the boundaries

If you don’t believe me think about someone with cancer who chooses not to accept chemotherapy as treatment.

We might think they’re crazy or have a death wish or are being ‘selfish’

It’s rarely considered that they might believe that it’s not the best solution and have their own ideas about treatment.

In fact some of who who have been through this dreadful disease or have family members that have might even be angry that  I’d mention something like this in a blog post.

And what about people who homeschool their kids?

Are they hippies?

Or preppers?

Or some other kind of weirdo family?

Maybe it’s not a big issue until you learn that some companies won’t employ homeschooled kids.

Just a gentle reminder not to do things differently or a legitimate reason because they don’t have a recognised high school diploma regardless of what other education they embark upon?

 

Look at this list issued by the Department of Homeland Security in the US

This list ‘qualifies a person as a potential domestic terrorist’:

>>Expressions of libertarian philosophies (statements, bumper stickers)

>>Second Amendment-oriented views (NRA or gun club membership, holding a CCW permit)

>>Survivalist literature (fictional books such as “Patriots” and “One Second After” are mentioned by name)

>>Self-sufficiency (stockpiling food, ammo, hand tools, medical supplies)

>>Fear of economic collapse (buying gold and barter items)

>>Religious views concerning the book of Revelation (apocalypse, anti-Christ)

>>Expressed fears of Big Brother or big government

>>Homeschooling

>>Declarations of Constitutional rights and civil liberties

Dunno about you but I’m ‘guilty’ of three of those.

Stepping outside normal these days isn’t just eccentric, it’s bloody dangerous.

Take online business as another example.

If as an internet marketer you earned £40,000 last month online from home, and happen to mention this to (for example)  bank teller that you earned more than their YEAR’S salary the chances are you won’t be believed.

But many of you reading this know for yourselves that it’s true.

Stepping outside the norm again.

If you tell someone your professions – accountant, teacher, office clerk, cable installer or whatever then most people have  a rough ides of what your salary is.

Some are higher than others but on the whole they’re ‘normal’ salaries.

If you earn this amount in a MONTH yet look like a normal person (no Porsche or yacht) then people start to wonder about you – are you a criminal or into something iffy?

They think it’s not normal…

The thing is, in online marketing it’s the people who step outside the norm that make the most money

We’re drawn towards techniques that are ‘new’ or ‘different’ because we instinctively know that doing things differently  results in different results.

Not ALWAYS better, but often so.

If you’re involved in business, different is usually better.

But if you’re working a ‘normal’ job, being an internet  marketer – being different – doesn’t seem quite right or fair.

Watching someone earn £2,000 from sending out two emails to their mailing list in three hours doesn’t seem fair if you have to work an entire month crawling through dark wet tunnels on your hands and knees to install sewage pipes.

The thing is…

…it’s not internet marketing that’s not fair.

It’s society.

Because it makes it difficult to be different. 

It’s not for the faint-hearted though…

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It’s a yawn by the way – in the pic – not some kind of medical attack or martial arts move.

It was early this morning when I took this – not quite light – and it’s quite normal for me to be up before anyone else.

I love this time of day and I can’t ever see myself having a lie-in past 9am ever again!

Not always been that way though

When I was working my 9-5 I had ‘THE alarm clock’

You probably had something similar. A sound or tone or beep or whatever that you dreaded.

I dumped my ancient radio alarm clock a couple of years ago but before I did I tested whether it still worked so I knew if it was recycle time or tip time.

I triggered the alarm and those memories of dark, cold mornings getting up to do I job I hated came flooding back.

I wonder if pre-industrial revolution our ancestors found it any easier getting up when it got light and going to bed when it got dark?

My point is that when you work from home with your online business you don’t have the same time constraints (unless you choose to set them for yourself)

If you have coaching calls you can work them around your personality – maybe start them at 11am or in the evenings or some other civilised hour.

And it’s little things like dumping the horrible grating beep of your alarm clock that’s the great thing about having a home based online business NOT the money or the flash car or the business class travel.

It’s being able to wear what you want. If you think you can do that most of the time try going into your office job wearing jeans and a T-Shirt that says ‘F*ck Capitalism’ on it – or wear a suit to your forklift driving job and see how long it takes them to refer you to a doctor.

It’s being able to go to school plays in the middle of Tuesday afternoon, or go for lunch or to see a film with your partner on a whim one Monday.

It’s feeling like you are your own person again. It’s feeling human.

That- for me – is the real gold of an online business…

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