TELL YOUR BOSS GOODBYE! TOP TEN TIPS FOR TURNING YOUR PASSION INTO PROFIT

Tired of working for someone else? Looking to find a business idea that really excites you? Or are you already in business but find it's beginning to feel just like a job? Well, you may want to think about looking someplace other than the opportunities section of your favorite magazine for business ideas. The next million dollar idea might be hiding in a most unlikely place: your own heart. A recent survey found that entrepreneurs are increasingly starting businesses in search of personal fulfillment and there's no better place to find it than in the things that you love to do. Whether you're looking to launch your business online or just around the corner, discovering what really moves you, is a key part of success. Here then, are a few tips and suggestions that just might help you turn your hobby, talent, skill or passionate interest into a thriving business that might free you from having to work for anybody else ever again and give your life a meaning you never thought a business venture could! [The following is an excerpt from Turn Your Passion Into Profit: Information, Inspiration and Ideas to Help You Make Money Doing What You Love] This book is for anyone who has ever dreamed of being free and in control of their own life, to go to a movie in the middle of a weekday, play golf on a Tuesday, pick the kids up for lunch, or just see what it's like to make decisions about how they spend their days without anyone's input. It's for anyone who feels enslaved by the situation ninety-five percent of society finds itself in working for someone else. It's for anyone who has ever thought that it was unnatural and demeaning to be forced into confinement for 8 or more hours every day, told when to eat, how to dress and how to speak. It's for anyone who wants to break free from such a life-style of servitude in order to start doing something that really inspires and fulfills them. It's for people who are searching for their life's passion. This book is also for the individual who may already be an entrepreneur, and who may have found profit, but not passion. This book is for the person who wants to make more money, or at least have no limits on the amount he can make. It's for the champion who is tired of playing a mediocre game just for security, benefits and someone else's idea of "a lot of money." It's for the person who wants to create success on his own terms. This book is for the person who feels mentally unchallenged by what she does day after day and wants to experience a bigger world of bigger people, bigger places, and bigger ideas. This book is for people who have started to ask questions. It's for people who may have spent many years building someone else's dreams and have started to wonder if that's all they were put here to do. It's for people who are feeling the need to do more, be more, experience more and leave a lasting legacy that's theirs and theirs alone. They want to make their lives monuments to something other than a paycheck, to something other than a profitable third quarter on someone else's year-end statement. They want to make a difference in the world and have therefore, started to ask themselves "What am I building? What am I really doing here? Is this all there is?" Your L.I.F.E. P.A.S.S.I.O.N. The thing that is your passion and which will eventually find expression as your passion business and provide you with the satisfaction you seek, will be what I call your LIFE PASSION. Life Passion doesn't mean that this is what you'll spend the rest of your life doing. It simply means that it is one of many passions that has significance in your life. It is "A" life passion not "THE" life's passion. L.I.F.E. P.A.S.S.I.O.N. is an acronym you can use to remind yourself of the qualities of your passion. L-love Your passion will be something you love to do. I-interest Your passion is usually something that interests you. F-fulfilling Your passion gives you a sense of fulfillment. E-empowering Your passion usually empowers and energizes you. P-personal Your passion has personal significance to you and you alone. A-abilities Your passion capitalizes on your assets, attributes and abilities. S- service Your passion will usually provide a service or fulfill a need of some kind for others. S-spiritual Your passion and the pursuit of it represents some aspect of your spiritual growth that you are here to experience. I-inspiring Your passion is inspiring to you and therefore will inspire others too. O-obvious Your passion, once found, is usually something obvious to you. N-natural Your passion is often unstudied; and comes naturally to you. FINDING THE RIGHT IDEA There will be many ideas that come to you. What you will find as you grow is that the most intimidating part of listening for ideas is not the fear that you won't find one, but that there are so many that you won't know which one to pursue. So all that's left is to offer you a few filters through which to hear the ideas that come to you. So here are a few tips on how to assess them. 1. Don't Limit Yourself to Just One For All Time As was pointed out before, the passion you decide to pursue may be one of many that you indulge throughout your lifetime. Don't feel that any decision you make today is written in stone, or that you are obligated to pursue this single passion for the rest of your life. 2. Don't Limit Yourself To Currently-held Jobs, But Use Them As Clues Did you take the job at the record store as a way to be close to the music industry? Is your current gig as host, maitre d' or waitress masking your own passion for starting your own restaurant. Use these jobs as clues to your true passion. Consider them "fact-finding" missions to get the experience you need to take the next step. 3. Beware the Aptitude Trap I was good in Math and Science, so my high school guidance counselor in school sent me off in the direction of my aptitudes. I ended up in a job I hated, doing something I was trained to do, but which provided me no enjoyment. Don't get caught in the trap of following your aptitudes. As you read through this book, you'll come across people who are doing things that you could be doing. Sure, you say, I know enough about real estate to help people buy a house. But, keep in mind that your goal is to follow your passion, not just your proficiency. The title of this book is NOT "Turn Your Competency Into Profit." 4. Create Your Own While it's possible to make money selling someone else's product, my advice to the passion seeker is to focus on creating something of your own. There's greater personal fulfillment as well as more profit in being first in the creative totem pole. It's said that you only have to be 10% different from the competition to be perceived as radically innovative. Of course, it's hard to quantify a 10% difference between two slices of pizza. But the point is that many seemingly new products are simply the repackaging of things that exist. It's easier than you think to create your own product. 5. Beware the Gold Rush Beware the "lemming effect" of rushing headlong off the side of the cliff simply because everyone else is doing it. There are many new frontiers of business and "flavor of the month" concepts and products that may be lucrative, but have no chance of offering any sustainable interest or passion. 6. Look Closely At Things You Already Do Like Kermit Pembreton, who at age 16, capitalized on the fact that he already loved to talk about pro sports, and set up a custom tour package for a single fan, and ended up making $1000 from that one person visiting from out of town. He grew his love of sports into Sports Services of America helping prestigious corporations improve their image by linking with sports figures who would then endorse products or make special appearances. Often, your passion is something indirectly related to something you're already doing. 7. Finding Your Passion in the Traditional and Nontraditional Since there are as many passions and ways to express it as there are people in the world, many passions don't fit neatly into the boxes of traditional job descriptions that exist in the corporate environment. However radical your idea is, however, it helps if you can fit it into a larger category. These categories include Writing, Teaching, Consulting, Entertaining, Making Crafts, Designing, Inventing, Cooking, Creating a food Product, Social Work. If it can fit into one of those broad categories, you can then search for the information necessary for you to create a business around it. At the same time, not everyone who discovers their passion will find expression of it by jumping out into entrepreneurial waters. As was said in Chapter 1, being an entrepreneur is not a prerequisite for living a life of passion. Many people find passionate fulfillment within the parameters of structured, traditional employment, as long as they are doing something they love. Neither of these courses is better than the other. 8. If The Need Doesn't Exist, Create It Sometimes effective selling is about finding a need and filling it. At other times you'll need to create the need, and force people to ask themselves "how could I have survived this long without this?" Who would have guessed that we all needed to have doves released at our weddings? But it's now something I'll consider for mine! 9. Go with your gut If it feels good in your gut, go with it. 10. Don't tell the world right away Keep the energy of your new idea within the incubator of your mind. Give it time to grow in the energy of your commitment before you introduce it to the world and the possible ridicule, judgement and speculation of well- intentioned, but small-minded visionaries.