Another baby step under way

In the past I have mentioned that the key to traveling freedom is going to be through the laptop. If I can work through my laptop and make a living, I can do so anywhere in the world. At least anywhere that has power and the Internet...

To make money through the Internet we need to have multiple revenue streams. 

My first baby step in this department was to start blogging and to then monetize that blog so I can make money from it. You can read a little more about that here.

The next step is to find some work you can do through your PC. The basic idea is to become an Internet freelancer. There are a few legitimate websites that allow you to do this. You can find work writing E-books, blogging, editing, translation, transcription, and more. You can find work doing customer service, web design, or anything else that someone could do telecommuting. These are real work from home jobs but, there is real competition for them.

Here are the companies I recommend to find freelance / work from home jobs:



Odesk is great! Whether you're looking for freelance work or looking to hire a freelancer I would give them a try!

Next is Elance. I just got my first job though them! Some one is going to pay me to blog for them! More on this later as the deal is not 100% finalized. You can again find all kinds of freelance work for yourself or hire someone through this link here!

Another site I have not been able to use yet but have heard good things about is Guru.com.

So there you have it. 3 places to start looking for a little extra daily cash. Like most services these sites have a free "basic" membership that only allows you to do so much without paying. To get more use out of each site I would suggest purchasing some form of membership.

I hope you will continue to stay tuned in as I make my journey step by step toward mt dreams and financial independence.

*Disclosure; If you signup with either Odesk or Elance I will make money from that. I don't suggest them for that reason but thought you should know all the same.*

Staying Pumped!

I'm a somewhat emotional person, especially for a dude. So, when it comes to motivation to be effective for me I need something that's gong to get me pumped up! When it comes to writing, music normally does the trick, but when it comes to things like goals and dreams, I need a little bit more. I need people who are going to support and encourage me, small victories, and sometimes props. Sometimes planning on success is a big motivator for me because I am beset by the emotional energy when I can picture living out my dreams.

So, I made a prop that is also a picture of my plan. This is a super technical travel map...

Okay, so this is really sloppy but, it gets me really excited. This is roughly our first 6 month trip! Now this may not happen for a year, or five, or ten, but it will. When I start to plan for future success, I can't help but to get excited about it. I also get restless which, motivates me into action!

What gets you motivates? What helps you stay focused on your goals?

Globe Trotting

Sometimes for us to be able to have the energy to keep moving toward our goals we have to remind ourselves why we have them. We have to remind ourselves of the end results. We also have to be willing to take a lot of small bites out of the things that keep us from them.
For me I need to remind myself why I would save money, why I would create new revenue streams, or read tons of information on traveling.

For me traveling represents Freedom and Adventure. To me it would be amazing, almost unbelievable to travel constantly and not have to worry about money. To take my family to Italy for several month at a time and be able to come home with out financial burdens. To rest at home for a few month only to then return to another country for several more month.

For this dream of being a constant traveler to happen with a family we basically need to be able to make money wherever we are. I need to make at least $150.00 per day from my computer. Now who doesn't want to be able to do that? At first glance I can almost feel my brain saying to me that's never going to happen. I can't believe lies though. I have to take small bites out of the problem. What if I said I only needed to make $10 dollars a day online? I think a lot of people would say yes that's possible. Now if I can make just $10 per day online, why can't I make $20? And if I can make $20.... You see, we just have to take little bites and remind ourselves to just take a step at a time.

Anyhow I am still in the learning process of this dream. Learning about what it will take, how much money it will cost, and how to come up with that money, is taking bites out of the goal.

Stay posted, because things are looking up!

Getting Started

So I have several dreams / dream jobs. The common denominator of all of them is that they would ultimately provide a way I could travel. The most very tipy-top of my dreams would be to travel full time, to live a life of vacations. Now don't take that to mean that I don't want to work or that work wouldn't be involved in that dream, just that if I had to pick one dream job it would be associated with frequent vacation like travel. For me there is something wonderful about the idea of seeing new places, meeting new and different people, and trying new things.

As I start to picture what this would look like, and to start to count the cost, a plan is staring to form. Now I know my wife would not be cool with me gallivanting about the world for prolonged amounts of time without her. I also know the traveling and living abroad costs money. Not to mention other logistic matters that would have to be dealt with.

If you're like me you have probably wanted to see the world. If you're like me you've procrastinated on doing this in your youth and now have a family. So now we need to think outside the box. The dream is not lost and gone forever, it just needs to be tweaked.

Here is my vision for my family as I have been processing this idea. Optimally I would love to explore Europe with my family for a prolonged amount of time. Ideally we would go on trips for 3 to 6 month at a time. Traveling from country to country with my daughters learning about foreign lands not from a book but from experiences.

In a lot of ways our family is pretty well set for such an adventure. We will be completely debt free somewhat soon. Our daughter who is school aged is homeschooling and can do so anywhere in the world with the curriculum we use. My wife wants to see the world with me because I'm awesome. So we are all set to go, oh, except for we need one thing we are missing. Money.

Now to make this grand plan work we are going to need some serious capitol. In future posts I hope to show the progress we are making in a traveling budget that will allow us to get to our destinations and live on the cheap. But even with creative options on the table we will still need money. To make this happen we need a money tree. Well, more realistically we will need either a stock pile of cash (Savings) or a revenue stream that doesn't turn off when we leave for our adventure. In our case I think we will need both. While a big, fat, and juicy saving account could do the trick, what happens when the trip is over and we return "home" broke? Not only would it feel like I was starting over from scratch but, what would be worse is it would feel like I was doing what Jon Acuff calls the reverse Superman. I don't want to to live that way.

After doing some research I have learned about and am looking into legitimate ways to make money online. One of those ways is through blogging and free lance writing. One of my goals for starting this blog is to not just share ideas and start a global conversation but to also help forward this dream! I am currently learning more about this method of generating online revenue and I look forward to sharing with you more details later. Another way to create a consistent stream of revenue is through the concept of passive income. Examples of passive income would be things like rental property, possible investments, and other things in that vain.

Here is a list of the practical steps we will take to make this goal of traveling semi-full time happen:

1. Making a plan & counting the cost ( We will need to have a clear idea of how much money it will cost to get to our destinations, room, food, and all other expenses. In short we need to have a plan and we need to count the cost so we don't run out of steam mid way through. It would be embarrassing to have to call friends and family to beg for money cause your stuck in Istanbul.)
2. Build up an emergency fund. (An emergency fund is not a savings account. A emergency fund is strictly for emergency's. Like getting stuck in Istanbul )
3. Build up a savings account. (This will cover the bulk of our expenses, but hopefully our "revenue stream" will be replenishing it faster than we are spending it.)
4. Building a "revenue stream" (I need to find ways to generate passive income and to also find a way that I can work from anyplace in the world. If I can make what I make now through my laptop, our family could travel indefinitely!)
5. Act! (That's right, no excuses. You have saved the money, you have a sustainable plan, now all you need do is jump into the water. No cold feet here!)

So this is the first baby step in moving this dream forward. I hope you look forward to learning from my progress or lack therein. I do have a feeling that if I do accomplish this goal, my blog will suddenly jump in popularity and in readers for multiple reasons...

Traveling with "baggage"

I have always wanted to travel  the world for as long as I can remember. Years ago in my immaturity I thought I was giving up on that dream when I decided to marry my beautiful wife and start a family. I said to myself (There goes all my money and dreams) I thought  that even if travel would be possible it would be limited and diminished by having a family. I began to look at these beautiful woman God entrusted to me as "baggage." I am sometimes not all that bright, and in this situation I was down right dim. While I have not yet traveled the world I plan on doing so now with my family, not as baggage but as fellow explores. This page is all about discovering together how to make traveling the world as a family work and to do so on a extremely limited budget. I'm starting from scratch as a beginner. I plan on covering everything from traveling cheaply, making money as you travel, to traveling with toddlers. Hopefully you will be inspired and learn with me as I discover the "how" and be able to celebrate with me when we take our first trip and the blog moves to "where" we are and what were doing!