Lesson number one, how freelancing success can change your life.
This lesson is going to show you what freelancing has the capability to do for you.
So Upwork did a study, and they do this study every year.
And in this study, they found that freelancing and how it impacts the economy is much more than a lot
of people think.
It's actually as big as the construction industry and transportation industry, and it's on par with
the information industry.
So what that means is you're in the right place.
Freelancing is only going to keep growing.
And it's one of the biggest industries, even though a lot of people don't know it.
For the first time since they started doing the survey in 2014, freelancers are now starting to report
that they're looking at it as more of a long term career, as opposed to just a temporary way to make
money.
This is important because some people think freelancing is just something you do because you have to
or in-between jobs.
But when you do it the right way and you do it how I teach you, you're going to find that this is an
extremely sustainable and lucrative business.
The next really important stat to understand and to realize is that nearly half so 45 percent of the
skills provided in the survey were programming, marketing and business consulting.
And that's exactly kind of what I suggest because I'm in the digital marketing space, the business
consulting space.
And no matter what your skill set, whether you're into design, you like writing, you're more into
organization tasks.
It doesn't matter.
You can find a marketing or a business skill, and that can help you make money quicker than anything
else.
Nearly half of freelancers agreed that freelancing gives them the flexibility they need because they
have either limitations or personal circumstances where they're not able to just work a normal job.
And for me, you know, I had a nine to five.
For a few years, I was rising through the ranks.
But, you know, I didn't have what I wanted.
I didn't have that freedom in my life, and freelancing has given me the flexibility I really craved
in life.
And that is actually worth more than the money, in my opinion.
And the next really, really interesting stat is that every generation had more than one in four workers
who freelance in the past year.
So this is telling you it doesn't matter how old you are, literally you can be like, you know, a
teenager all the way up to in your 60s, 70s.
I mean, it doesn't really matter.
Like as long as you use these principles and you understand how you can provide a skill and solve a
problem, you can make money freelancing.
It's not just for one certain age group.
So next, I want to go into where freelancing and freelancers are headed.
So by 2027, it's projected that over half of the U.S. workforce is going to be freelancing.
So what does that tell us?
What can we learn from this?
These projections show us that businesses are looking to hire freelancers more and more, and they're
shifting away from hiring actual in-house employees.
There's a lot of reasons for that and freelancers, they have more flexibility.
They can be more cost effective because they don't have to pay for, you know, benefits and and pay
for an office space for, you know, an employee.
So understand that your mindset needs to be aligned with this.
Understand that what you're doing is the way of the future.
Understand that if you start now and you don't hesitate, you can really get ahead of the curve.
And if you start freelancing before you have to, when you start freelancing because you learn what
it can do for you, it's going to put you way ahead of the pack.
So how can freelancing change your life?
Well, I want to let you know that businesses, they're hiring virtual teams more than ever.
So this is what I was just talking about.
Businesses want to be more agile and if they hire a freelancer, they can hire from anywhere in the
world.
They can get top level virtual talent teams, right?
They don't have to like just hire these salary employees anymore.
So that's how it can change your life.
Is that change your mindset.
You don't have to just work for one company.
You can start working for multiple companies, and that is what a freelancer does.
And it's a win win.
That's the most important thing to remember is that it changes your life because you're no longer just
kind of slaving away for a nine to five.
You're now in a mutual relationship with a client.
And that actually adds a lot of value to your life and more money.
So freelancers versus agencies, so another thing that people start to talk about when they when they
talk about freelancing is that, you know, while you're starting to compete with different agencies
and do people really hire freelancers, aren't they looking for like these big agencies?
Well, want to tell you a story like I was working my nine to five and I was a marketing coordinator.
So what that meant was I coordinated all the marketing from my company and the marketing teams that
they hired.
So I worked with some of the biggest marketing agencies in the country, you know, paying five ten
thousand a month just for their services.
And what I learned was that you don't get the level of actual service that you get when you're working
with a freelancer.
So for example, what does that mean when you're working with one of these big agencies, you don't
have someone you can just call, you know, right off the right off the bat.
You have to go through their messaging systems and you have to like submit tickets when things go wrong.
And a freelancer has much more flexibility and the ability to also provide exceptional service.
So that's something that I learned and literally this agency before my nine to five actually fired them
outright.
What happened was we hired them to do like a keyword study, and the keyword study they gave us was
so bad that the one that I had initially done, like when I first started out as an intern, was like
leaps and bounds better.
So what that showed me right there is that.
I was adding value to this business, and I understood that, oh my God, I can just do this for other
businesses.
I don't have to be stuck just in this one box.
So I'm really trying to start to shift your mindset, start to understand how there is so much potential
here once you learn how to really leverage your value.
Next, that gets right into it, leveraging your value, getting paid for your value and not your time.
So the rise of the gig economy has made it easier than ever for people to take their work lives like
into their own hands and get the freedom that they want and that they deserve.
This is so powerful once you start to understand that you don't have to punch the clock just to get
paid, you can start charging monthly for services and really escape just that hamster wheel.
That is, when you're going to start to see the shift in your mindset.
And that's when you're going to start waking up even more excited every day because you're not just
tied to that clock tied to the desk anymore.
It's all about the value that you're providing.
Next, you were directly tied to your success, so you don't have to work your way up like up the corporate
ladder over 10 20 years, if you want to start making, you know, six figure income that's on you,
like obviously you have to put the work in to get there.
And not everyone gets there because a lot of people quit.
But what I'm saying is you're the one that's tied to your success.
So if you don't get to your goals, that's just on you.
Whereas when you're in a nine to five, you're in a salary job, it's very easy to just get complacent
and to just kind of sit back because you just, you know, you have your salary rolling in.
There's no reason to really grow.
Next, freelancing really has given me and every freelancer I've spoken to agree with this a sense of
purpose.
It's not just about the money, of course.
The money is important, but there's people.
There's real life people just like you and me that went from this traditional mindset of working just
one job and started working a freelance career.
And one of the byproducts that you didn't even know was in a come with that was this increased level
of purpose, because now you're working on your own business, it's your own brand, and that is really,
really exciting.
And ultimately, freedom is what equals happiness, like being able to do what you want to do in life.
In my eyes, that's what happiness is because that means you don't have to report to anyone else.
You take your power back in life because the truth is you're either working for someone else's dream
or you're working on your own dream.
And this is the first step.
Understanding how to shift your mindset.
Next, let's go over understanding financial, personal and professional freedom and what that looks
like.
Well, the actual definition of freedom is important to understand because it really is the foundation
of what freelancing is.
I mean, it has the word free in it.
So freedom is the power or right to act, speak or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint.
This means you get to choose your path.
It also has an alternative definition of the state of not being imprisoned or enslaved.
When you think about it, that's what freedom really is, because if you're stuck doing something you
don't want to do, you really are imprisoned.
You're you're enslaved in a certain way of living or acting.
And you know, you might be telling yourself it's out of your control.
But the truth is, and this is what the millionaire mindset is all about, is that it is in your control.
So look for ways you can create freedom in your life.
Look for ways you can not be imprisoned or enslaved to anything, even if you're being imprisoned in
an old way of thinking.
So step number one to financial freedom.
It's doing the math, and what that means is looking a little bit deeper into what financial freedom
even is.
So let's just break it down.
If you want to be a millionaire, you have to do the millionaire math to see how it's possible.
This is the process I like to use for anything.
When you want to look at how you can achieve a goal, you need to break it down.
So a million dollars is a thousand people buying a thousand dollar product.
So if you do know that, you know, a thousand times a thousand, that's a million.
But more importantly, this starts to help break it down because, you know, let's say you are selling
a thousand dollar product, you know, all you need is a thousand people to make a million dollars.
Say you're selling a $2000 product, you only need 500 people to buy that to have a million dollars.
400 people at 2500, so obviously, you know, the higher you can kind of upsell.
The last number of people you need to get that million and look at that's that's 400 people, I mean,
obviously, you know, a $2500 product needs to be very, very valuable.
But what I'm trying to show you is this is possible when you break it down and you do the math.
It gets even more exciting as you start to look at the power of once again multiplying and increasing.
So now instead of that 2500, if you charge $5000, you only need 200 people to get that million dollars.
Now here's another way to look at, you know, millionaire math.
34 people pay you two point five K a month for a year.
So now that's like, let's say you have, you know, a service that you offer for two point five thousand
a month.
You need thirty for clients or 30 for people to pay you for a year and you literally made a million
dollars.
And let's, you know, double that again, let's do some more math.
You only need 17 people.
The pay you five K per month for 12 months to make a million dollars a year.
And what this is trying to show you is, you know, not how easy it is to make a million.
Of course, you know, it's going to take a very high level of work and focus.
But what it's showing you is that it's possible because a lot of people have the misconception that
it's nearly impossible to be a millionaire.
You know, only the lucky people have money.
They were born into it.
But the truth is.
There is no shortage of money on planet Earth.
You know, there really isn't.
You could take a billion dollars off of Earth tomorrow and no one would even notice.
Money is literally transacted every single second.
Not only is money transacted, but credit is transacted.
That's literally people buying, buying things, buying products and services with money that they don't
even have.
It's just an IOU to a bank.
So what I'm trying to tell you is that you need to shift your mindset, understand that there is no
shortage of money.
And you know that saying money doesn't grow on trees?
Well, I mean, it's actually does grow on trees in a way, right?
Because it grows from a cut in bush and in a way that's that's a tree.
So shift your thinking, get these old sayings out of your head that have been instilled in you for
years, you know?
A penny saved is a penny earned and you know you're never going to be rich, just be realistic.
You need to throw that thinking out.
Understand that there is abundance out there if you know how to get it and if you go and do it.
Next, I want to talk about what personal freedom is, so now that we've discussed like what financial
freedom is?
We did some millionaire math.
I want to talk about what personal freedom is and what it means to me.
To me, personal freedom is being able to make your own schedule.
Having the freedom to work not only when you want, but where you want and where you get to spend your
off time, you know, so like when you're a freelancer and you don't have to specifically be in one
place, you can work from wherever you want.
So that means, you know, do you want to go visit family?
Do you want to go on a trip?
Do you want to just, you know, have your home office and be able to work from home and, you know,
spend time with your kids?
It's all up to you.
And then the other beautiful part of it is you get to structure your schedule.
So what I'm showing you is that not only does does freelancing have the ability to change your life
in a financial way, but it's also going to help transform your life when you're not working.
And it's really all about choosing how you want your life.
Everyone is different.
You know, everyone wants to do different things and value different things.
But that's the beauty of it is you get to choose how you want to live your life.
You get to choose where you want to work.
You know, do you want to work on the beach?
The mountains?
Do you want to be, you know, hiking on your off time?
It doesn't matter.
The beauty is I've worked from all over the country, everywhere.
I've been traveling for the past three four years freelancing and when I had my nine to five, it wasn't
that way.
I literally wasn't able to do anything.
I only had a couple days of PTO time and that was really for holidays to see family.
So just being able to choose where I want to work and go, where I want to on my off time, not have
to ask for permission to take a vacation.
For me, that was the personal freedom I was looking for.
You also get to choose when you want to work.
So like we spoke about previously.
You know, you get to be in control of your time in control of your schedule, in control of your life.
And this is something that is very, very kind of underrated in a way.
But it has such a big impact because when you when you get to actually plan your schedule, how you
get to choose, whether you want to do a three day weekend or you get to choose, you know, whether
you want to work night shifts and have mornings to spend time with your family or, you know, do a
hobby you love.
But what I'm trying to say is you're no longer stuck in this box of and you have to show up at these
hours.
You now can kind of shift your schedule around your life and not the other way around.
And that is when you start to really understand that not only does money become more accessible with
freelancing, but your life starts to even just get better overall because of it.
And really, having the ability when you work is having freedom over your schedule and having freedom
over your schedule, like we said, is having freedom over your daily life.
And lastly, you get to choose what you want to work on.
And this is something else that you get to focus and provide skills that you enjoy doing.
You can find what it is.
That's a high, in-demand skill and you can do that for a business.
And that's really, really powerful because when you do something that you enjoy doing, time goes quicker.
It doesn't really feel like work and you really feel like a different sense of purpose as opposed to
when you're working a job that's just very monotonous and you're not contributing to something bigger.
You're just overall in a better state of mind, better mood, and that gives you what I call professional
freedom.
And here's a really, really good quote I like true happiness is the ultimate feeling of freedom.
You experience the freedom of choice when you live from the inside out, not allowing your happiness
to be defined by the traditional benchmarks, but creating your own.
Listening to your own inner voice and trusting your choices will lead you to a life of happiness.
And that is really what I resonate with when you have that true sense of freedom.
That's when you start to feel this underlying layer of happiness really start to increase.
And that's what the millionaire mindset is all about being able to not only be a millionaire financially,
but be a millionaire in other ways.
Have abundance in your self, in your confidence, have abundance in quality relationships.
It's not just about the money, it's about financial, personal and professional freedom.
So now you know how freelancing can change your life.
Ultimately, happiness is what occurs when you have freedom.