Stop letting strangers on the internet dictate your income goals
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Cash, dinero, bucks, moolah, credits, or whatever you want to call it. We’re talking about it.
Six figures. If you’re not making at LEAST six figures, you’re a failure as a freelancer and entrepreneur.
And once you hit that six-figure milestone? Baby, you better be ready to scale to seven figures, or why are you even doing this?! Get a job in a cubicle if you’re not going to go all in.
Or that’s what we’re told.
We’re told, by strangers on the internet, that if we’re not Scrooge-McDucking a bank vault of cold, hard, cash, we’re doing it wrong.
And yes, Scrooge-McDucking is a verb, and no, it’s not dirty.
Except that money really is filthy and swimming it would be gross.
Anyhow, the point is that we are being told by literal strangers on the internet that we are successful–or not–based on how much money our businesses bring in.
These strangers don’t know us.
They have no idea who we even are, and yet, we let them tell us whether we should feel good about our businesses, or like we should give up.
We have got to stop listening to them.
Truthfully, most freelancers I know don’t need to make seven figures to be happy. They don’t need to make multiple six figures. Most don’t even need to crack $100,000. But we’re told that’s how we know we’ve made it.
Now, of course income needs vary.
If you live in an expensive city, or you have a family to support and you’re the only provider, then your numbers are likely to be near or crack the $100,000 mark.
But if you live somewhere where the cost of living is reasonable, then pulling in $50,000 a year might be all you need to support a comfortable lifestyle. Even if you have a family or want to go on vacation!
Making arbitrary income goals that some online guru thinks you should make (and feeling like a failure if you don’t) is not what’s important.
What IS important is knowing your own, REAL numbers and making an action plan to reach them.
Forget what online strangers are telling you, and get real, solid numbers to aim for. Not only are you more likely to hit your goals if they’re based on actual numbers–not arbitrary ones that sound flashy–but when your income goals are based on what you actually need, you’ll feel more content when you reach them.
Tl;dr:
Stop listening to strangers on the internet who think you should earn a certain amount. Figure out your real numbers and make a plan to reach them.
