How Much Time to Invest into Starting a Side Hustle

People ask me this one a lot — they think that they can quantify how to start a side hustle. I find most people want to try and put everything into these organized boxes so that their mind can approach it more easily. Unfortunately, I am going to tell you why that is the opposite of how you should be thinking if you want something, like a side hustle, to take off for you. It’s going to get messy and there is no set equation. That’s the foundation of all of this that you’re going to have to get comfortable with if you want to be part of the gig economy.

So when starting out launching a side hustle, I see a lot of people make the same mistakes. They tell themselves they’ll give it a try for ‘one month’ and that’s it. When the first, second, or 10th time doesn’t work for them, they quit. They get on my social media and let me know my tips didn’t work for them and that this ‘doesn’t work for everyone.’ They gave it a shot and they believe ‘it’s just not meant to be for them.’

Let me first off start by saying that any person can do anything they set their mind to. Period. If you believe in your mind you can do something, then you will do it. If you envision a future in which that thing has already come to pass, then it will come to pass. It’s up to you to do the subconscious work to be kinder to yourself.

But these people will give Fiverr a shot for a few weeks. When the profile isn’t making $5,000 per month after just a few weeks, they quit. They tell themselves that they tried, and clearly, they’re just not one of the lucky ones.

I sit here and go — ok so you tried 10 times. What about 100 times? What about 500 times? Nothing falls out of the sky for anyone. No one is lucky — they just worked really, really hard. They tried 100 times before they got their first client.

I always use the example of having applied to over 200 jobs in NYC to get just one to hire me. 200 jobs! It took me about four months to apply to all of these jobs through Indeed.com. I wanted to move to NYC from Albany so badly I didn’t care. I didn’t sit there and go, “oh nobody wants me, guess it’s just a pipe dream.” I went, “nope, I am going to NYC, I am getting out of this upstate New York town, and I won’t take no for an answer.”

I applied and applied and applied. The company that eventually ended up taking me actually had me come in months earlier to interview me — and rejected me! Then they called a few months later when an opening came up and probably didn’t feel like looking for somebody else. That was my golden ticket, ironically, to the worst four-working weeks of my life. But it was all by divine planning because look where it put me today! It made me more obsessed with the idea of working for myself than ever before. I was absolutely obsessed with applying to these jobs and in the end, I got what I wanted. Not because it just happened to fall onto my lap, but because I ran up a hill for as long as I needed to until I got to the top.

Side Hustling Requires Hard Work

That’s the attitude you’re going to need to have to make side hustling work. I am not going to sugarcoat it. You can’t just waltz into the world of passive income, try it a few times, and expect everything to stick. You have to show the world/God that you are willing to put in the work.

This is the point when somebody will say to me, “well thats promoting toxic hustle culture.” First off, there’s nothing wrong with hustling. Working towards a passion of yours is an incredible feeling. There’s a difference between pursuing something that fills you with joy, and running in circles to the point of mental burnout. You need to show God that you are willing to do whatever it takes to make this side hustle a reality for yourself. Once you get to the top of that hill, everything gets easier. I worked so hard to build my freelance writing business for five-years that I took no days off. Now I have a team that runs it for me, but that wasn’t without five-years of hard work. But again, what’s five-years of hard work for a lifetime of financial freedom? A lifetime in which you can travel the world and do whatever you want with your time? It’s not even a question to me.

As Many Hours As It Takes

So how much time should you invest into starting a side hustle? The answer is as many hours as it takes to make it a reality for yourself.

• How badly do you want this to work?
• Are you willing to take accountability and be tenacious?
• Are you willing to work through the setbacks?
• Are you willing to wake up one hour earlier to change your life, or forgo Netflix at night for a few months to make some extra money?

These are all choices that you get to make. Think back to just 50-years ago. Do you know what your great grandparents would have done to have had this kind of easy opportunity online to make money? They wouldn’t even believe it! They wouldn’t believe that just five-months of time could make them six-figure earners. People used to have to put in decades upon decades to hit that earnings point. I think, in a way, making this kind of money has become so accessible today that we are all taking it for granted. It may never be like this again, which is why I am so passionate about hammering this point home. This is a remarkable opportunity no one else in history has ever been able to access.

Not to mention, with the impending recession on the way right now — don’t get mad at me, I am just stating what all the economists are putting out there — you want to put yourself and your family in the best possible position to make money so you can afford gas and food. Relying on one singular source of income is not how I’d want to head into a recession. Life is unpredictable, you could get fired, or the labor market could change. The company you work for could go out of business. There are so many variables. You will wish you were patient with the side hustle now, instead of one or two years from now when you don’t have the time anymore. The quickest way to financial freedom is through multiple sources of income, and thanks to the internet, it has never been easier to make this a reality for yourself.

The real question is, what are you willing to put on the line to make this work? How badly do you want to change the monotony you are currently in? What are you willing to do to have a few side hustles that make you $10k per month? If you’re willing to get focused and put in the work, I promise you it’s a reality. But sitting there trying to put a timer on how long it should take for a side hustle to take off for you is not the answer. It’s the opposite of how you should be thinking. And as I always say, one of the best ways to stop thinking like this is to see it all from a place of gratitude. A gratefulness that you even have the opportunity to consider starting a side hustle - that you have fingers to type on a keyboard or working internet. It’s gratefulness that this is even an option for you. Thinking about this will eliminate the entitlement of ‘well this better work for me in X amount of days or I’m over it.’

I don’t mean to get too tough loving on everyone, but I want to make sure everyone is aware of the unique opportunity to make money online today.

If you want to join a community of 24,400 freelancers who are working together to make their side hustles successful, feel free to check out my free Facebook group here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/3715810965116993/.