jMoore!

The big thing when I started in affiliate marketing was working at home in my pajamas. There were days when I would get up, see Dave off to work and start building links and lose all track of time. Of course I wandered to the fridge, and let the dog in and out and out and in, but I could go for hours without being aware of the time. Sometimes I would hear the garage door and realize that I was still wearing my pajamas and Dave was home from work!

Now, because of articles in FeedFront magazine and challenges issued at and after Affiliate Summit East 09, the new craze is walking while you work (all day). Everyone is searching for some way to make or buy a treadmill desk. Me, I’ve ordered a laptop stand* for my treadmill. I am not ready to commit to 6-8 hours of working at 1-2 mph, but I think I could easily devote my goofing off time to the treadmill desk. I’ve been thinking about swapping our room configuration around and trying to find a place for the treadmill anyway. It’s currently sitting on my side of the bed, facing the TV because I know for a fact I can’t walk for more than 5 minutes without something to watch. The problem is I’m using it as a clothes hanger instead.

I’m motivated to give this a try and since we are currently driving to the City Fitness Center almost every morning to walk and since I spend most of the rest of my waking hours making my rear end wider by sitting in front of my computer, this has to be a huge improvement, even if I only get 30 minutes every other day, right?

*Disclaimer – whenever I find a great idea, I look to see if they have an affiliate program. Today was no different. SurfShelf looks like one of the few ready-made solutions to the problem of keeping your laptop or DVR from falling off your treadmill while you walk.

I’ve always thought that the biggest problem with working from home is getting the butt into the office chair and actually executing on a plan instead of checking email, stats, Facebook, Twitter and then the clock. Whoops! Out of time. I have all kinds of motivation and a million ideas, but the discipline to sit down and do real work often eludes me when I’m home.

The reason is pretty simple to figure out. When I was a high-powered corporate exec, the days were long, the commute was torture and home was where I rested as fast as I could so I could do it again tomorrow. Before that, when the kids were little and I was limited to creating marketable crafts or sales copy after bedtime, my home was a way station between activities.

When we semi-retired (meaning that we only do this work-from-home marketing) I had a million things to do with our new home, our new community, our new life. Home was where we rearranged furniture, ignored the chores, tried our hand at yard work and unpacked shopping bags. Sitting down to do “real work” was a chore in itself because there was always something more interesting to do. Just dinking around with Dave was a new full-time pleasure that I indulged in at the expense of business.

Today, as I start getting myself re-organized after a major life event, I see that the Tuesday Topic this week is “When one door closes, another opens“. At first I thought “Well, maybe next week. After all, I have a good excuse”. Then I realized that the new structure of my life is exactly why working at home is so valuable to me and such a great potential gift to others in my situation.

When Dave tipped over this time, it was worse than ever before and his recovery is slower and more unpredictable than we’ve experienced in previous episodes. His health was always the underlying reason for our precious retirement plans and my creating an online business; we thought that we would be in exactly these circumstances “someday”. On March 22nd I saw more clearly than ever what a precious gift our life together is and how wonderful it is to ignore work for a day or two without worrying about getting fired or demoted or laid off the next time a RIF comes along.

Seems like I should get to the point here soon: I have always thought that this particular domain could be a place for information about the things I get asked every time I spend time with people in the community. “How? How Much? Who? What? Where?” The problem with that is finding time to run my business is already difficult and adding some tutorial stuff seemed like a daunting task.

But now I suddenly have a door firmly closed. “Dinking around with Dave” is limited to caregiving and my time spent running around and shopping and exploring new places is temporarily on hold. Two days ago I thought I would never get a grasp on the routine we have now. Today I see potential for blocks of time I can use for work. (Door open) A friend of mine here in my new community is a prolific watercolor artist. She routinely produces stacks of paintings for any exhibit, sale, or show. I know she has a full schedule and works like a horse on her home and garden and helps anyone who needs it, so I asked her “When do you find time to paint?”

She said “Last year, when XXXXX (her husband) was going through chemo, we had days on end sitting at home watching TV. I started painting every day instead of watching endless war documentaries on the History Channel. I got everything set up so I could grab a minute here and a minute there and I still do it, even though he’s better and we can get out and about again.”

I realized yesterday that I can put lots and lots of minutes to use here on my online marketing work. My “door open” is forced time at home, a chance to rediscover what home and work-from-home can mean. I have a chance to recreate what I want from this part of my life. So far I’m discovering that I still want all the same things, that almost all of them require some major “butt in the chair effort” and now I have a reason to embrace that instead of chasing butterflies all day.

Who knows? Maybe I can even get some of the structured advice posted here for others who are ready to try making a second income while they recuperate or take care of someone else or even just enjoy retirement!

The beauty of being self-employed is evident in who I am today (the Tuesday Topic of the week). I’m going to have to burn the midnight oil to get this post finished, perform minimum upkeep on my web marketing work, and make a list of to-do for another try tomorrow.

My dear friend Annie posted earlier:

Who am I today?
Whoever you think I am.

I would prefer that answer for myself today. I tried to pin down which one of me showed up this morning, but it was a jangled mess of Becky HomeEccy and the ever-so-schizo Wife and Devoted Companion crossed with Witchy Caregiver who gladly takes on all crappy chores during the bad days but negates the effort by snarling and snapping and kicking ass about all manner of little things.

So, how did it go? I went to the library before noon, but didn’t manage to get to the hardware store, the drug store or the grocery before running home to regroup. I defrosted something and prepared sides for a balanced dinner, cleaned up after 3 meals, gathered all the trash, changed the litter box and swept the floor and managed that never changing load of laundry. I did the heavy lifting with the oxygen and I dug some of our durable medical equipment out of storage and back to being in my way around the house.

Somewhere in the middle I poked a few things around on one site and tallied the sales on another. I made a list of things I’m going to promote tomorrow night at a meeting. The ratio of business to life was heavily weighted in the life direction. I even got positive confirmation that I’m on the Board of the local Habitat for Humanity.

So, most of all I thanked the Universe and my previous smart-planning self that:

• I have work to do and a flexible schedule to do it in (Yeah, affiliate marketing!)
• The ability to live in chaos, if not in transition (I like change to be my idea and under my control)
• I have a group of online colleagues who cheer me on, support and motivate me, and don’t drop in when the house is dirty.

Who am I today? I was driving down the road today and fervently hoping I got all the crazy figured out before senility set in. That’s my goal and I’ll find away to arrange work and my tomorrows around that.

I still maintain that the hardest part about being self-employed is the actual disipline it takes to do effective work without a manager waiting for the corressponding report.  Anything that motivates me to add value to my own business is worth a comment. 

My first Thank You goes to someone I follow on Twitter.  In response to the general topic of getting things done, he responded that he tries to build a web page every day BEFORE he checks his email.  How simple; how profound!  I find lots of good advice and friendly contact on Twitter, even though I only set it up on my phone if I’m at a big event.  I can be found (and followed) at Twitter/judiM.

The second Thanks for the motivation (and the new skill) goes to the Affiliate Manager of MyWeddingFavors, who yesterday offered a small bonus to affiliates willing to make a Squidoo lens that included a banner for MyWeddingFavors. He managed to impart his advice about being specific rather than general, while inspiring me to finally go to Squidoo, sign up and figure out how to include something new in my media toolbox.

Will these new tricks work? Only time will tell. But I’m betting on the fact that anything that gets me excited about the drudgery of everyday technical matters like pasting links and finding new ad banners will also get me excited later when sales come in off 1 or 2 year old pages.

What’s the very best thing about working for yourself and probably out of your home?  Freedom to choose your own hours and work style.  What’s the very worst thing about working for yourself and probably out of your home?  Freedom without true motivation breeds bad habits that will eventually ruin your business.

Example:  If your main criteria for success is to make enough money, what happens when you do?  Let’s say you suddenly have “enough”.  It might be the first time you’ve ever had some leftover money and some available hours at the same time.  That can be a dangerous combination if you have no other motivation, or if you fool yourself into thinking your business is set on “automatic” for good.

When you’re hungry – for money or success or whatever your dangling carrot is – you work harder.  Sometimes you even trade away your health and common sense, perhaps even your relationships to work longer hours without a break – chasing that day when you can rest because you made “it”.  And then you make “it”.  Time to play?  Of course it’s time to play.  But my point is that you need a compelling reason to stop playing at some point and put your butt back in the chair to work.  Otherwise you’ll eventually run out of money and free time again.  Probably both at the same time.

What motivation could you use besides money?  The first one that comes to mind for me is motivation to stay in tuned with the industry so I know how to keep the money flowing.  Times change.  Products and methods both disappear.  So using the motivation of remaining an expert might be enough to also keep the business successful.  If you make an effort to stay involved in the industry, you’ll get motivated over and over again to try new things.  Just reading the articles, staying involved in the forums and events, and attending seminars and meetings should give you plenty of exercise for your brain and your motivation.

Another motivation for continuing to build a business is to contribute to others.  If the business is providing for your financial needs, maybe it’s time to add other family members or employees who could benefit from the steady employment and creative education.  If you’re already there and still growing, maybe you can leave a nice big footprint in the world of charity.  There are so many thousands of ways to help others and it seems like the majority would be ready-made for the online marketer.

Maybe you just get your kicks out of being “top dog”.  If that’s the case, you already know that you have to keep running if you want to stay in the lead.  Trying to stay ahead of everyone else in your field should keep your butt in the chair almost continuously and your biggest problem will be to avoid the same burnout experienced in Corporate America every day.

What’s my motivation?  I’m still using the enough money goal.  I left Corporate America to take the next step in a personal plan and my goal was to conquer this business enough to match that income.  Since I’m not even close yet, I’ve got to keep my butt in the chair for at least the next few holiday seasons.  After that I intend to build and modify individual niches to match up with the knowledge sets of specific children so they can inherit and continue or know enough to sell profitably.  It’s a motivation that should last for awhile.