Why Your Future Self Can Help You Find Time for Your Side Hustle Now
The Overwhelm of Just Getting Started
Starting a side hustle can be overwhelming. There is so much to learn. First of all there’s learning how to build the business. Making the products or designing the online course. What platform to use? Where to buy materials from? What are you actually going to sell? Then there’s promoting it. Where should you hang out on line? What’s the best email service provider? Do you even need an email list? Is it worth paying to advertise? What about all of the legal stuff?
The journey is unlikely to be a straight line as you try things out, see what you like, what works best. But what can help when making decisions is knowing your destination. Like any journey you can plot an efficient route if you know where you’re heading. Without that you can get pulled in a million different directions. You can spend time on tasks that in the end don’t matter.
Whilst you may say, well in five years’ time I’m going to be an online content creator who makes £100k a year, that’s all well and good, but your destination needs more flesh on the bones. And when you take the time to create a detailed picture it can save you a lot of wasted journeys going in the wrong direction.
The Benefits of Creating a Vision of Your Future Side Hustle
It can serve as your North Star and you can use it as the lens through which to make decisions. That means that the decisions you make over the next five years will always align with your future self. You’ll know what things to say yes to and what to turn down. And believe me, the latter is the most useful. It’s easy when you’re starting out to try everything. A million expensive courses, joining dozens of Facebook groups, taking up the offer of being a guest on any podcast that will have you even if it’s those who’ll be listening to it are far removed from your ideal customer avatar.
So my question is, do you have a picture of your future self? Creating one of your whole life in say five years’ time would be great, but for this exercise just think about your side hustle. What does it look like in five years’ time?
Having a clear vision of your future can also keep you motivated when progress is slow, which it’s going to be at some time or another. When you know what you’re working towards, when you can see it in your mind, it’s easier to keep going.
Another benefit of having a vision of your future self is that it can stop you from feeling overwhelmed. As I said right at the beginning it can feel as though there is so much to do and so much to learn. Creating a picture of your side hustle five years from now will help you to focus on the more important tasks. Basically, you’re able to work smarter rather than harder.
Why Thinking Long-Term is the Key to Side Hustle Success
Everyone starts somewhere. Everyone starts small. But that doesn’t mean that you have to stay small. Whilst it may be a hobby at the moment that doesn’t mean it can’t replace your day job at some point in the future. By imagining that future you will start to think of your side hustle as a proper business. You will start seeing yourself as the entrepreneur that you are and avoid wasting time procrastinating. Whilst you’re procrastinating you’re not making money.
When you think about the future it also makes you think about your ‘why’. What made you start this side hustle? What is the outcome you want to see? How is it going to change your life? If you want to read more about the importance of your side hustle ‘why’ take a look at this post.
What Could Happen if You Don’t Have a Vision of Your Future Self
If you decide to skip this I guarantee you’re going to waste time doing stuff that you later realise was not worth your focus. It can also be easy to feel fed up and discouraged when you don’t have any goals to aim for. And that can mean giving up before you’ve even got very far.
So why not take some time this month to think about your future side hustle self. It could just be the future side hustle in December 2025, but no matter how long into the future you look you can use it to set the direction and actions for the next year. But whatever you do I am sure that you will find this worthwhile.
If you want more help with finding time for your side hustle then grab your copy of this free guide ‘Five Simple Steps to Making Time for a Side Hustle’.