4 Month Focus

Welcome back everyone. I have news.

tl;dr – I am dedicating 4 months to narrowly focus on 3 goals:

1. Start an online business
2. Finish the Back-end Development portion of Launch School
3. Get a six pack

For those wondering, I’m not quitting my job. I’m still learning there, and I need to earn the right by making money through launching products, which currently yield me $0/month. I’ll be sharing my journey via a weekly email and bi-weekly YouTube video. They will not be pretty, but they will exist. Links to follow will be at the end of this post.

I’d planned to spend 4 months in Argentina doing this, but COVID-19 blew that up. I may stay in Oregon, or go to a rural state like Montana when things calm down. It doesn’t really matter, the goals haven’t changed.

I know this is going to be really hard – I’m anxious thinking about it. I’ve spent days writing this post because I know once I hit publish, I’m officially accountable.

But at the same time, I’m an extreme guy. I always have been. I set this plan in motion after my Think Weekend last winter. I re-examined areas where I have passion but lack execution to better understand why. Primarily I looked to the field of Behavior Design, and BJ Fogg’s famous behavior model: Behavior = Motivation * Ability * Prompt.

I was reminded that motivation is fleeting, it comes and it goes, this is expected. Where we have a lot of influence is in our ability to execute behaviors. For example, well-designed weight loss programs don’t say “be more disciplined”. Instead they recommend throwing out all the junk food in your house, making it much harder to eat poorly regardless of your motivation.

In order to improve, I’m making changes to increase my ability to start businesses & code, and decrease my ability to do anything else:

• decrease social activity to nearly zero (easy, thanks COVID)
• remove myself from my friends & family (hard, thanks COVID)
• postpone all other projects that don’t keep the lights on (done)
• perspective shift by writing this blog post (done)
• create a calendar of execution (next up)

Temporary vs. Permanent

I’m not doing this to build new habits, but to learn new skills.

To use an example from another area in my life, I used to think that if I did Whole30, or an eating challenge, or a sober january, I could get more fit in the long-run. I was wrong. This 4 month focus might feel like that, and I understand why. What worked with eating was making incremental changes I could be consistent with. But, consistency is easier with the right set of skills.

I’m in the best shape I’ve been in probably 5 years. The main reason why is that I’ve learned to cook. Learning sucked. I ruined tons of dishes, blah blah blah. I got a lot of help here, and eventually turned a corner where I enjoyed the process instead of dreading it. It felt like magic. I only got there because my girlfriend at the time taught me and supported me, we learned together. Without her I likely would have given up.

It’s time to turn that corner with respect to building companies, and coding. I want to stop feeling bad about not starting businesses and not knowing how to code. The abs thing – I just won’t sacrifice my health for anything.

At then end of this, I will feel joy that I started a business. I will look forward to starting another company or running my existing one. I will be proud of how much programming I’ve learned. I will be excited about the million things I can build. Most of all, I will commend myself for how much I sacrificed to get there. I will be Will 2.0.

As far as ideas for what I’ll make, I’ve had a lot. Domain names? Bought a bunch. I always get stuck right before getting started. So I’m forcing myself to launch something. I will not return to Denver until I’ve built and launched something. As of writing this, I’m very close to helping my physical therapist launch a product online. It’s something, but it’s not mine.

Coding? Coding just always takes a back seat. When I do it, I enjoy it. My dream business combines software/eCom/info products all into one. I can’t say why. I just feel like there’s some kind of genius at the intersection, and I love all 3 of those spaces. There’s interest in all of them but I lack experience in software/info.

Not knowing how to code is also one of my great work insecurities. The no-code movement is great, whatever, they do them. I know that I can learn to code, make a lot of money off it, and enjoy it. Therefore, I’m investing a hardcore 4 months into it to see if I’m right. If I’m wrong, and I fail this time around, I should probably hang it up for good.

The other thing that inspires me to this level of extreme are role models like David Taylor, Conor McGregor, Ryan Kulp, and Tim Ferriss. Before a big fight, the athletes do a training camp. Isolated away from the world for 12-16 weeks. They understand tunnel vision and sacrifice for a big payoff.

The non athletes Ryan & Tim both did similar things with extended travel. Ryan learned to code and changed his life. Tim wrote the 4-Hour Workweek and launched himself into the stratosphere. This is my training camp, my extended travel.

Creating & coding without sacrificing fitness. That’s what I plan to do. That’s all I plan to do. Man, I feel good.

Today is April 23rd, so I have until August 23rd to finish. Thanks for reading and feel free to follow along. YouTube is here and Newsletter sign-up is in the footer below.

See you on the other side.