(ThyBlackMan.com) Why don’t you work for yourself yet? If you do, kudos and hand claps. Keep grinding. I often ask friends, colleagues, and associates about their professions and their passions. More often than not, those two things are not in alignment. Then I’ll pose a fun, “what if” question, as I watch their eyes light up with wander and possibilities: “If you could pick a profession, make at least $100,000 a year every single year for the rest of your life, what would it be? For me, I would just record music. No tours, no interviews. Just record my music.” From there the ideas float around and I feel the energy rise. Usually this is followed by a puzzled stare and a, “I don’t know.”
If most people are unhappy with their current professions, or at the bare minimum not passionate about it, why stay? In today’s work climate, with technology and small and large businesses collaborating more frequently to provide services to the public, opportunities to adjust and move on are everywhere. Fear?! Comfort?! Loyalty?! From personal experience one if not all of those things can be true of why we stay in our jobs. Even more, security or the thought of having job security is likely involved in sticking it out with an 
employer. But the truth is, there is no loyalty or security in something you don’t own and control and manage 100%. No protection from a company deciding to go in a different direction with your job or downsizing your position. Ever been on a job interview and told you were overqualified? The only guarantee is that there is no guarantee.
Millennials, the generation coming through college years now, and young adults in their 20’s, are breaking the mold, moving away from the paradigm set forth by their parents, grandparents, and great grandparents. Staying at one job for 40 years and then retiring is no longer a common goal or methodology for career fulfillment. Starting a business today, with resources and information literally seconds away, is simple. Growing and scaling that business to success still takes money, time, creativity and a little luck, but the options are endless.
We are in the decades of the startup. From the San Francisco Bay Area, services and businesses we use across the country and globe, have been profiting substantially with ease of use products and little overhead, minus the engineering to begin. Airbnb. Uber. Twitter. PayPal. Companies that don’t exactly own anything except a concept that millions use daily. Entrepreneur coach, author, professional speaker and business development expert, David Shands, authored a book, Dreams Are Built Overnight, highlighting his climb from the 9-5 shuffle as a waiter, to thriving entrepreneur and speaker. Shands, at night after working a full shift, would go home and work on concepts for his businesses he wanted to start, eventually landing on a T-shirt line, “Sleep is for suckers.” Eventually Shands got to the point where the money he was making on his side business, matched the money he was making from his “secure” job. And then something intense happened: David’s day job began to cost him money at his side job. He would miss appointments for sales. Later, he left his job as a waiter and went full time into business, for HIMSELF.
The lesson here is simple. Don’t quit your job but don’t use it as an excuse that keeps you from your passion. Passion and profession can be one in the same. Information, free information, is everywhere. If you aren’t happy with your day-to-day, get out. Do it now. Start a business. A side business, a small business, a 1 hour a day business. Operate it from home in between cooking dinner and watching Netflix. Expand it.
Staff Writer; Charles Foster Jolivette
This talented young man can also be found over at; The California Creole and also Charles Patreon Page.
