Introduction
Have you ever dreamed to quit your job, say good bye to your boss never to come back? Ever imagined "living the dream", sinking your toes into the hot sandy beaches of the world and be where you want, when you want with who you want to be with?
Stay tuned. Because I am here to tell you what may be at the end of the rainbow by sharing my personal story and how a home-based business or a laptop lifestyle may not be all it's cracked up to be (for some people).
My Story
Age 25, I decided that I would look for a job that allow me to pick up my laptop and work from anywhere around the world. Now age 30, after much struggle, I somehow succeeded at making this dream a reality. (you can read my introduction post here)
I have an online marketing agency and my job mostly consist of running ad campaign, maintaining and designing websites and put out any fires that may occur on the marketing front for my clients. The business is setup in a way that we have about 10 clients that pay us a monthly retainer for our services. As long as we make them money and keep them happy, we get next month paycheck.
I can work the hours that I want from home in Canada or from Thailand if I can find a good internet over there.
Let me give you a reality check on the "other side" of the dream that people are selling with online money making opportunities.
NOTE: On the theme of this article, I'm going to quote Alphonse of the Full Metal Alchemist series:
Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is alchemy's first law of Equivalent Exchange. In those days, we really believed that to be the world's one, and only truth.
1. Work is only a few feet away from you at all time
One of the thing that I sometime miss from a 9 to 5 job is that whenever I was done working, I was done working. I could go home, unplug and be 100% attentive to the people around me. When you have a home-based business, work is only a few feet away. An emergency can come up and you have to jump to solve the problem right away.
It's also tempting to become a workaholic...since it's easy to drown your own problem in your work without having to go anywhere.
Finally, you could be on vacation on the beach and then all of a sudden, my partner sends me an emergency sms...I must drop everything I am doing to solve the issue right away. In many way, I am living expecting to be interrupted all the time.
If you are working on your own home-based business, be ready for this to occur. It may be mitigated by having rules on yourself and your work. But there will always be a possibility to fall back into bad workflow habits.
2. Lack of social life
I start working at 9am (sometime earlier) and then finish around 7-8pm on most days. I spend all that time starring at a computer without co-workers to meet. I don't have people I can go for a 5-7 drink at the pub after.
I have to force myself to go to social events. Church really helped me in that regard. But it is very easy to become an hermit. If you are an extrovert like me, it's definitely something that weight on your life as time goes by.
3. Sitting in front of a cpu for that long is not good for your health
It's not natural to be sitting for that long. I have yet to build myself a standing desk but I am definitely considering it more and more now. Physical activity is definitely something you have to think about because since you don't have to go anywhere to work, you don't have to walk, go up and down stairs, etc.
Also, the health of your eyes. Dang, it's bad. Invest in gear that make sure you don't end up with eye problems. Go outside and stare at a distance. These are all thing that has "laptop lifestyle artist" we have to think about.
Conclusion
All this to say, if you've been sold the dream, beware that there is a cost to it. Nothing is free in life. For some people, it may not be the ideal situation to live in. Okay, now that being said, I wouldn't go back. I'm doing this so that I have more flexibility and mobility. Stay tune as I work on my next article about all the sweet perks of working from home.
SteemOn!