Why is it so hard to keep your motivation when you have a side hustle? Is it the fear of failure? The constant pressure to succeed? Or maybe the fact that, in order to succeed, you need to spend hours and hours every day working on something you aren’t even being paid for?
Well… Maybe all of these things. Having a side hustle and working towards a goal can be incredibly overwhelming at times. But there are ways to stay motivated and get through those rough patches.
Working on your side hustle is not easy. Lots of people give up when they see how much they need to invest in this side project, how many hours they need to spend on it every week, how much time they need to invest in researching, brainstorming and testing new ideas, as well as how much time they need to invest monetarily if their business doesn’t bring any profit from the start.
Set small, achievable goals
We often get very big and grandiose ideas about what we want to achieve with our side hustle.
We want to quit our job and start a full-time business that allows us to live the lifestyle we’ve always dreamt of.
We want to make six figures in three months with a side business that doesn’t require any investment.
Unfortunately, when we start setting big goals and expecting big things from ourselves, we also set ourselves up for a big letdown when we realize that it doesn’t happen overnight.
That’s why it’s so important to set small, achievable goals along the way. Make sure your goals are realistic and not too far off in the future.
The more you achieve small goals along the way, the more confident you’ll feel. The more confident you become, the more ambitious you can be with your goals and the bigger they can become.
Revisit your why
You have to remember why you’re doing this in the first place. Are you doing this to provide for your family? Or are you doing this to provide for yourself? Are you doing this to build a legacy or to leave a mark on the world?
Whatever your why is, you have to make sure you’re staying true to it. If you lose sight of your why, it’s so much easier to give up on your side hustle.
You have to remember that nothing is achieved overnight. Successful people built their empires one stone at a time. They didn’t become billionaires overnight and neither will you.
What will keep you motivated is remembering why you started your side hustle in the first place. What do you want to accomplish with your side hustle? What do you want to leave behind?
It’s incredibly important to make sure you stay true to your why and don’t let yourself get caught up in the small things that might throw you off track.
Build a support network
Having a support network is crucial when it comes to keeping yourself motivated and always seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.
Whether you do this in real life or online, it’s important to find people who are going through the same thing as you. Whether it’s finding people who are in your situation or finding people who’ve already achieved what you’re trying to achieve.
Building a support network will help with keeping you motivated. But it will also help with dealing with the inevitable doubts and fears that will come up along the way. When you’re working on a side hustle, it’s only a matter of time until you hit a low point.
Whether it’s because you’re experiencing entrepreneurship for the first time and it’s harder than you thought it would be or because you’ve been working on it for a few months and haven’t seen any results yet, it’s bound to happen.
Building a support network will help you weather those low points. And it will give you people to talk to when you’re having doubts or fears and don’t know how to deal with them.
Take breaks and reward yourself
There are times when you just need to take a break. When you’ve been working on your side hustle for a long time and you just need a break from it. Whether it’s because you’re experiencing burnout and need a break to recharge or you’re just feeling stuck and don’t know what to do next.
When you just need a break from your side hustle, it’s important to give yourself time to breathe. Maybe you need to step back from it for a couple of weeks. Maybe you need to step back from it for a couple of months.
Whatever you need to do, it’s important that you give yourself the time to do it. When you’re coming back, you should be able to approach your side hustle with a fresh mind and new perspective. When you feel like you’re just stuck and don’t know what to do next, it might be a good idea to take a break.
You might just need some time away to come up with new ideas and find inspiration again. When you come back from a break, it’s important to reward yourself for staying motivated and going on this journey in the first place.
Conclusion
Having a side hustle will never be easy. It’s something that will take a lot of time, effort, and energy. It will test your patience and your sanity at times.
But in the end, it’s worth it. It’s worth it for the financial freedom. It’s worth it for the sense of accomplishment. Having a side hustle is something that will take time and effort.
It might not be easy. It might not always seem worth it. But if you stay motivated and keep pushing forward, you’ll get there eventually.
This story was originally posted on Medium.
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