I guess it doesn't have to be all business all the time

bykathrynluisa

105 followers

4 years ago

I've been here on WA for a couple of weeks now. During that time I have been hesitant to post to this blog because I felt like if I didn't have anything to say that would help others in their productivity I should keep to myself. However, I noticed one of my favorite blogs on here is from someone who consistently posts about their day-to-day life and started getting more comfortable with the idea. This space can be my personal break room to dump my everyday thoughts so they don't mess with my productivity.

The progress I've been seeing as I follow one lesson a day has been amazing. I have also been reading other people's blog posts here and going through some extra lessons posted by individuals. I have to say it's been very enlightening and has to lead me to make some changes on my older sites.

I'm so happy to be here, so much so I decided to move all three of the websites I had already on Bluehost over to WA's hosting platform. Because I wanted to be able to use all the features on all my sites, I had some complications. Thankfully, I was able to sort those out quickly by using one of my sites, the one I cared about the least, as my first experiment before moving the others over.

After getting them all moved I went over each site and realized the one I cared about the least, one I created in 2020 to use as a portfolio for my modeling work, wasn't worth maintaining anymore. I already had a personal blog and I could easily create a gallery page on that new blog to showcase example photos for photographers and followers who were interested. It's not like I needed a whole website dedicated to my modeling when that work has been leaning more towards promoting affiliate products rather than just myself and I post photos on my Instagram. Plus, I should be withholding many images for the sake of consistently posting for potential paid subscribers as I had at one point with my modeling site.

Rain, rain, please stay

Today it's raining in my part of AZ and I just want to curl up and watch the raindrops fall from the sky. I can't do that for long due to the fact that I have a client I have to see in the afternoon.

While I am grateful to have so many consistent clients in my massage business, which is currently my primary source of income, I feel sad on days I have clients. I have amazing clients, it's just that I have been working as a massage therapist for over fourteen years and it's taken its toll.

For over 2 years I worked my butt off to get my business to the point it's at now, after a dozen years working for other people, and the freedom and success it's given me has been liberating. However, with that small taste of freedom, I am wanting more. I work only 3-4 days a week working only 4-5 hours each day. I don't need much money to live comfortably and making $80/hour plus tips makes it easy to say no to working full time.

How I feel

My issue is I feel every minute spent with clients is another minute I'm selling to someone else. When I worked as an employee or an independent contractor for other massage businesses I always felt like the time I gave them was time they owned in return for my paycheck. I didn't like that feeling, and no matter how I turned those thoughts around to find something positive about them, I never felt truly satisfied.

It's because of this I'm so proud of the business that allows me to work less than half the time while making double the income. The lost hours of sleep each night, which I still feel like I'm making up for, and the annoyance of people gossiping about how tired I looked was worth it.

Using that feeling for motivation

This is why I'm really putting in the work here on WA. To have the freedom that will allow me to own 100% of my time and break free from being stuck in one location. That's another problem I have with having an in-person service-based business, I can't just up and go to another city, state, or country whenever I feel like it.

I no longer have to request days off from en employer or spend extra time getting another employee to cover my shifts or have the requirement to pick up extra hours. However, I do have to make sure my clients are aware of my vacation time and I have to limit that time so I don't inconvenience them too much or leave myself with too little income.

I inherited something from my family, call it a condition if you will, a travel bug. I love to travel. My mother was a truck driver, both her husbands were truck drivers, and my grandfather was in the Air Force. Before my grandparents, their parents and their parents before them enjoyed traveling as well. It's in my blood and I get bored, uneasy, and annoyed when I'm in one place for too long.

In high school, my goal was to go to college, then graduate into a career that would have me traveling all over the world throughout my twenties. That didn't happen and the disappointment in the back of my mind has been making me crazy for years. So just as I used my desire to make more money and have more time to build my massage business, I'm using my desire to travel and not have to sell any of my time to drive me as I build something amazing here at WA.

One day I'll get to enjoy all the rainy days

As I take each small step I plan on celebrating each tiny success, because without the small things you can't achieve the bigger visions. My cats get annoyed with me and how much I work on all my projects, but I'm sure they understand on some level that this is for them too.