About 8 years ago I was inspired by the book, Your Money or Your Life. I wanted to break the connection between making a living and spending my time, which is actually my life, to do it. I wanted to stop trading my life for money.

My ideal solution was to make money online. The potential seemed unlimited and it would allow me to perpetually travel. I got suckered in by every Internet marketing guru that came along. In retrospect I think the way to get rich in the Internet marketing niche is to act like you already did and sell an info product telling others how to do it.

My first website was a template, like thousands of others selling an Internet privacy product. I don't think it ever had a visitor except me.

Then I tried an Internet marketing info product review website. It was one of the first ones, now there are thousands. So I bought $1,000 in clicks from Google. It took about 10 minutes to use them up and I had made no money. Trying to save the site I spent another grand on a coach. I thing the year the site was up it made about $100.

Then I started to realize making money online was actually going to require some real work. So I found another guru that said you could get rich in 33 days by writing an ebook. I eventually wrote a very good one with valuable info that was never before published. It sold for $49.97

It took several months to do all 33 days. I was getting praised by leaders in the industry, I was getting interviewed and trade journals were asking me to write articles. Yet I wasn't selling very many ebooks. I was doing everything I was “suppose to” and I wasn't getting rich. One guru in the niche wanted to interview for his monthly audio cd subscription service. I suggested a joint venture and he laughed. He said my price point was much too low and that I should be charging $397.

I knew I needed more traffic to my sales letter page so I tried buying it from Google again. It turned out that a click was worth $.50 to me but cost me about $1.00. I realized I would have to attract free traffic from search engines. I now had about 2 years of experience failing behind me.

I built a content website. For the first time I did real keyword research and realized this wasn't a good idea, but I had already come this far so I went on. I wrote content pages, a special report, a course and an ezine. I exchanged links and paid for others. The site was a PR3. Many pages ranked in the top 30 but the traffic just dribbled in. I was selling some books but I couldn't make a living at it.

I realized I could make more selling my traffic to Google instead of trying to sell them my book. I added Google ads to all of my pages and stopped developing back end products.

I got discouraged and stopped working on it. I was going to cancel the site at the end of the year but then I realized it had more than it cost. Now 6 years later it has dropped to PR2, but it is making over $3000 a year. I am making money without trading my life for it. I did the work once and was getting paid for it 6 years later.

I have a much greater passion for learning than doing. I still devour Internet marketing info products. The time has come to put those years of knowledge into action. I recently started updating that site and doing some other stuff. My efforts have been sporadic.

It's going to take me over 5 years to get out of debt on my current income. If I was happy with where I was that would be fine. I am not and I can not afford to change my life right now. I obviously need more income.

I know what I have to do to make money online. I have the tools to do it. I just need to do it, day after day. So I am committing to working 20 hours a week developing a second income. I will work 52.5 hours a week for someone else and then 20 for myself.

I will work in super intense 25 minute sessions followed by a 5 minute break. After 4 sessions I will take a 30 minute break. After two sets, I will take an hour break. This is the Pomodoro Technique for increasing productivity. The ebook is free.

My goal is to make as much after work as I do at work. Then I will continue doing both until my debt is paid off and I have 3-6 months living expenses saved as well as moving expenses.

I made it through the first week of eating nothing but plain beans and rice!

I was expecting to have to eat extra meals during the day to keep from getting hungry. To my surprise three bowls of beans and rice kept me going all day.

One lunch time I looked at the cold beans and rice, then through them away. I figured I could skip a one meal. I got really hungry and the drive thrus were calling to me. I resisted the call.

I have been eating plain beans and rice long enough to appreciate any additions to them.

Now I am going to start adding some seasonings. The first pot will be Indian Kitchiri (mung beans and rice) and the pot after that will be Korean black beans. Yum! Later I will experiment with different Thai Curries.

After awhile I will start adding the prepackaged organic vegan food I have on hand to the meals.

I have been doing very little spending. Starting October 1st I will start keeping a record of it and posting it here.

I have also decided to start spending 20 hours a week building a second income.

I enjoy reading other blogs and the comments people leave for me. I think daily blogging would support my efforts. Unfortunately I have found that I do not have the time.

A 52.5 hour day job work week and now another 20 hours of additional work on the side doesn't leave much time. So I will be posting mostly only the weekends.

While working out of town I smelled exotic spices. I followed my nose and found a store with a sign that read “Patel - Our Culture, Our Food”. I figured I would check out all the food I couldn't eat.

It turned out to be a large Indian grocery store. I bought $27.67 in beans. That's 24 lbs of beans. I would have never guessed what the store was without the aroma.