It has taken me a while to sit down and write this post. Despite being asked by lots of people how I left corporate to start my own business, I never wanted to answer it until I had at least a year of experience under my belt. So much can (and has) happened in a year and I wanted to write authentically from experience. Taking a hard look at the past year and a bit, I have been able to narrow down 5 things that I did to get to where I am today. But before we get there, I feel the need to share my backstory.
So here it goes.
As many of you already know, my first “real person” job out of grad school was in marketing for a large Canadian real estate company my dad worked at. I worked there for over 4 years, gradually moving up the ladder into more prestigious positions. I didn’t particularly love the work I was doing and even more so, I felt like I sucked at it. But I also felt like I owed it to my dad to stick it out, put my time in and the truth was…I had no idea what I would have rather been doing.
I remember meeting my mom for lunch one day and bursting into tears about how unhappy I was at work. She asked me, what do you want to do? I couldn’t answer her. I knew what I didn’t like: sitting at a desk all day. I grew up so active and now my 9-5 left me feeling sluggish, tired and a few pounds heavier. And that is how I discovered my passion.
Some innocent research on how to get back in shape lead me to the wonderful world of health and fitness blogs. (Keep in mind this was before the days of Instagram). I spent my lunch hours reading all the great fitness websites, fell in love with group workout classes and started cooking and meal prepping.
Friends and family started to notice my positive transformations and I loved sharing all my tips and tricks with anyone who would listen. I also got more and more into spin classes and decided I wanted to teach.
At this point, about a year into my healthy transformation, my dad left the company. By this time, I already knew what my passion was, but convinced myself it would be impossible to make a living doing it, and even more impossible to tell anyone that I wanted to leave such a prestigious job for fitness. So 6 months later I followed him over to the new company. Deep down I knew it wasn’t the right fit for me. But I thought maybe at a new company I would really fall in love with real estate and everything would be okay.
Despite being super busy and having a lot of responsibility at this new company, I couldn’t suppress my passion for health and decided to channel it into an Instagram account. It felt like a safe place to post photos, I didn’t have to show my face and, of course, no one had to know about it. I called it “Nikes by Night” because I felt like I was living 2 lives – real estate by day and fitness by night.
Even when I didn’t show my face or tell anyone about the account and had only 30 followers, I treated my Instagram as a full-time job. I took it seriously when I didn’t think anyone else would.
For a year I lived a double life, leasing space to tenants like Popeye’s and posting green smoothies online (kind of funny when I think of that now), and I spent a lot of time daydreaming about how I could actually quit and do this full time. And this is where my 5 steps come in. My decision to quit took a long time and I worked really hard leading up to it.
My hope is that if you are stuck in a job you are unhappy in and have a passion you want to pursue, you can use these 5 simple steps to help you get there.
Just remember if I can do it – anyone can!!
Step 1:
What is the worst case scenario?
When you quit, what is the worst thing that can happen? Ask yourself this seriously. Like actually seriously. What is the worst thing that can happen? Hitting rock bottom? Okay, what does rock bottom look like? For me, rock bottom is being homeless on the street. There, answered. Would that happen if I quit? No. Would that happen to you? Well I can’t answer that for you. And maybe your rock bottom is different. But take a moment and ask yourself. Even if it sounds ridiculous. I was terrified to quit to my dad, scared of disappointing him and obviously afraid of not making enough (or any!) money. But at the end of the day, for me, the worst thing that could happen was none of those aforementioned things. It was being homeless. And I knew that quitting wouldn’t put me in that position.
Step 2:
Prepare yourself:
Now that you know you can quit, I’m not asking you to hand in your resignation letter today. In fact, once I made the decision to leave, I spent a year at my job. What did I do for the year? Side hustle baby. I got certified as a health coach and personal trainer, I taught spinning classes at 6 am and 7 pm, I blogged like crazy, worked on my Instagram page, networked, went to events and worked with brands. It’s pretty much exactly what I do now minus the school part. Was I busy? Yes. Did I have a social life? Kind of. I did get married in that year haha. But the point is that I did enough prep work so that I could leave knowing that I had something to do on day 1. So, what can you do while you’re still at your current job? Night school? Start a blog? Teach a fitness class? Set yourself up for success while you still have a steady pay cheque coming in.
Step 3:
Say ‘Yes’:
So you’ve done the groundwork and finally started your business. Maybe you have a few clients or one project you’re working on, but you know you could be a lot busier. So start saying yes. Say yes to coffee dates, yes to the crappy jobs that no one wants to take. Yes to taking on clients who live far away from you. Yes to 5 am wake ups. Yes to working until 11 pm. Yes to the nitty, gritty, shitty stuff you don’t always want to do. And yes to working for free. Offer free sessions or consultations. Reach out and collaborate with other people. You never know what one meeting, client or opportunity might bring you. Put your time in and earn your right to be picky.
Step 4:
Work Hard:
It sounds silly right? Obviously you’re going to work hard. But I never really knew the meaning of hard work until it was my ass on the line. It’s not like working for a big company. There is no salary coming in. No one paying me for sick days. No cheque coming in if I don’t do anything. At this point, it’s all up to you. You get what you give. You will also work harder because when it is your business, only you will actually care about it. Yes, hopefully, you have the support of friends and family, but no one will ever care as much as you. It’s also likely the most proud yourself you will ever be. Despite not making nearly as much money in my first year as I did in real estate, I had never been prouder of what I did make. Because every cent was a result of my blood, sweat and tears – literally. Which brings me to my last point.
Step 5:
Hard Work Pays Off…Eventually:
Now this is a little more specific to the fitness industry but in the world of group classes and personal training, you are doing a lot of hard work (especially on the body) for not a lot of pay. On days that I got really frustrated with how little I was making, I had to remind myself I didn’t become a spin instructor to make money. And even more importantly, the job that did make me a lot of money was also not making me happy. It’s also extremely hard for people in our line of work (health coaches, trainers, nutritionists) to feel comfortable charging a lot of money for our time. So I also want to throw in a reminder to know your worth and charge for it. The right clients will come. I made the mistake of not charging enough at the beginning and it’s a lot harder to ask for more from existing clients. Have a positive outlook on money and the hard work will eventually pay off!
At the end of the day, leaving your day job to pursue your dream career is scary. But I’ll leave you with my favourite quote that I have framed in my office: everything you want is on the other side of fear.