This idea is revolutionary.
If you want to create something online the biggest struggle you’ll have, bizarrely, is finding the time.
When I worked in banking I suffered from the same problem. I wanted to start writing online but couldn’t find the time, so I made zero progress for three years.
There’s a better way.
Working to the bone is the worst decision
I’ve met dudes online who love to say…
“Well, you just gotta work 18 hour days at the start if you want to build an online business.”
You go to a job for 8–12 hours then come home and work a second job. The problem is this isn’t sustainable.
The quality of work will be worse than a $2 iPhone case from eBay that came from a sweatshop in Ch!na. What matters more than the number of hours worked is the quality of those hours.
The first 5 hours of the day are different to the last 5
This idea knocked me out. Fashion icon Brunello Cucinelli said this:
“Do you think that during the first five hours of the day you are the same as you are in the last five hours? No way.”
At the end of the day you’re tired. This means if you work on your online empire after your job, you’ll have no energy and the quality of work will suffer.
The riskiest decisions are made when you’re tired.
I lost $1.2M because of tiredness. It had been a long day. I was messing around with some crypto stuff. Instead of going to bed at 10 PM like normal, I was still awake.
Because of this tiredness I made a series of accidental decisions that led me to lose $1.2M in about 30 minutes. If I’d gone to bed this never would’ve happened.
When we’re tired we also stop listening to customers and people we’re building alongside with and just do whatever. The lens of tiredness makes everything online look impossible to build.
After work we’ve had our dopamine levels depleted, and been doing boring admin like replying to emails all day.
It’s the worst frame of mind you can get — yet this is when most people build.
The 1 hour a day realization I had
Getting started online is the hardest part.
What worked for me was committing to building something online for an hour a day. To make that hour of power even more useful, I chose to build something for 1 hour a day in the first 5 hours of my day.
An hour of work in the first 5 hours of the day is the equivalent of 10 hours of work in the second half of the day.
But building in the first hour of the day is hard. We have to wake up, eat, get dressed, and get ready for work. That’s why I recommend you wake up an hour earlier.
Most won’t do this.
It’ll be too uncomfortable or it feel strange. But, often, it’s the only way. Otherwise, you won’t have a free hour in the morning.
Before I built my online empire, I’d wake up at 7 AM. When I started building, I’d wake up at 6 AM. And when I got some momentum online, I even found myself waking up at 5 AM.
If you want your online goal bad enough there’s always time. You just have to make time.
To be motivated to do that you need a strong why. That’s why it pays to know who your audience will be and to have a mission that transcends you and goes beyond a useless and selfish “personal brand.”
Final Thought
The morning is the best time of the day.
If you want to build online you must adopt a grandma and grandpa routine. Watch less TV. Exercise daily. Go on long walks for creativity. Have an early dinner. Go to bed early.
Then wake up early and get your hour of power done, before the rest of the world wakes up to dump their obligations on you via mindless emails.
Just 1 hour a day is all it takes to build an online empire. Start there.
