Join the conversation when you can. While I love conversing with you and everyone else, I’m most interested to know that you’re gaining success in your business ventures. The blogging, really, should serve your business and not be in place of it.

Sorry I haven’t been around too much lately. I just landed a new job (yay!) and getting started with CC is a lot of work, but I’m enjoying it and looking forward to the future!

I think it is all part of the journey. The one thing I’ve learned about life is that it’s always changing. Sometimes drastically, other times subtly. How we move with the change is often what determines our happiness.

And I’ll keep calling you Katie.

Jean,
We do have different interests – and different businesses. He runs a wholesale business where almost all of his work can be easily outsourced. I run a service-based business where people want to interact with me because of my abilities and expertise. So we have different needs when it comes to outsourcing, for instance.

More than anything else, I’d say Tim Ferriss has opened my eyes to what can be outsourced and made me really ask myself what parts of my business can I be a bit looser with without losing the quality of my service.

You asked what I do: I am a web developer and project manager who ends up doing a lot of other office support tasks for my varied clientele.

Known by some as a “virtual assistant,” and others as a “remote professional,” (and to some as just “katie”), I handle projects of all sizes and durations for my clients who are scattered all around.

Right now I’m still in my hiking clothes from this a.m., looking out my office window at a rainstorm about to begin, listening to the cicadas tell me all about it!

Fun getting better acquainted with you.

But even better was to go along with you as you described your real life. This was a lovely scene. My home life is relaxing and gentle. I often begin my days with a brisk hike in the mountains behind our home or a paddle in the lake a few miles away. And more than anything, I have a nice separation between my home life and my office life.

Sounds like you have made a peaceful partnership with your business.

I love your writing, by the way. What are you plans?

Jean,
Thanks.

Katie,
Sounds lovely. I miss my kayaks and I miss climbing mountains. As my kids get older, I should have ample time to share in those joys with them.

I’m still in my thirties, and I chose a late start on business. I took much of my twenties – unmarried, with few worldly needs – and ‘retired’ while I still had a young, strong, healthy body. I usually spent between 3-4 months climbing, hiking and paddling each year in my twenties somewhere in Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, California and Washington.

Now, with a family, a home, and kids, I’m working hard to bring my business to the maturity of its forties so we can all enjoy the fruits even more. Everything in time.

What do you do, by the way?

I started my business as a second career, and would say that after 11 years, it’s in its 40’s, and I find myself looking at some new directions and ideas lately.

I live in a beautiful mountain town where I, too, start my days with a hike and get in some paddling as often as possible.

I love how this working from home blends with my personal interests and goals. In fact, it’s because I am an individual contractor that I have been able to craft a business that is client-centered while still satisfying my need to have a lifestyle that isn’t dominated by my job.

In the years since I have been self-employed, I have come to be grateful for the blessing that comes from living in a modest neighborhood in a home that is paid for. And to be driving a vehicle that gets my dog, my kayak, my hubbie (when he has time) and me here and there, from the lake and back.

Learning to live a simple debt-free life as a result of a great client base gives me much to give thanks for. I guess both my business and myself ARE grown up, and it’s a good place to be.

The life you’ve created for yourself both personally and professionally sounds wonderful, like a dream come true for you! Do you find it to be a bit of a struggle sometimes to put down work, especially if it’s pressing, to spend quality time with family?

What do you think the biggest gift you bring to your clients is?

Carma,
Ah, thanks for following along. That’s great.

Is there something you can do, something small, each day, that will help propel your writing business? Give it some thought and let us know.

Jean,
Book…maybe. Really my gift seems to be in the interactions with people. I’m not sure how that could be captured in a book.

I take a different approach to outsourcing and passive income than Ferriss does. I’m not looking to stop working directly with people – as most web-based business owners do. Instead, I’m looking to establish my expertise in a way that’s more and more refined. I see the value in outsourcing, but only certain tasks for me at this point.

And, as I’ve said before, I never take an idea wholly. I picked what I like from Ferriss.

My writing business is my second career and is in its infancy. I am just learning to crawl.

However, I also have another business that has repeated the 12th grade for a number of years and if it doesn’t go on to college and perfect its trade, then it will be stuck forever more in the minimum wage pool and will have to rely on social security, which we all know will not sustain us.

It is time to take it into the future but it is a little difficult to perform a balancing act between the two since I am favoring my writing career and want it to be one to fill in the gaps.

My first business is my “day job”. Can’t quit that yet.

So, I have to play favorites with my children and one will no doubt suffer from my neglect. I want to let the oldest child down gently and not toss it out like rubbish.

I want my first business to be able to retire gently and I want my new business to surpass all the benchmarks of the first.

For me, teaching is all about engaging people. Allowing and prompting the interest to thrive within them. Your conversations here are testament to your methods.

Thoughts?