Building Your Forever Business – Step 1: My Current State.
Turn Your Life Journey into An Adventure
Do you want to start a business or side hustle but have no business ideas? Well, you have come to the right place. I started out in the same very place you are now, so know what it feels like. Having been there I know now how to guide you towards achieving your goals.
Welcome to Step 1 of how to build your forever business. A business to take you to your desired future. Let’s begin by understanding what we mean by a forever business. This is you starting a business from a solid foundation that will grow and be with you for the rest of your life. Or until you reach a point where you may want to sell it for a tidy profit. We treat this endeavor as an exciting adventure.
The following series of steps explains how to do this from which you can learn and be able to implement through meaningful action. Best analogy is to think of these steps are your flight plan with the destination being your desired future you wish to find yourself in one day. Look at the diagram below, what do you see?
This diagram is a high-level concept of what @LightSpeed wants you to achieve. To move from where you are now, your Current State, and take you on An Adventure along the Happy Path to your Desired Future State. All the steps on this site break down the content learned into actionable tasks for you to complete. For the first step we look at My Current State, so let’s get started.
Firstly, what does The Current State mean in the context of building your forever business?
The Current State is how you describe your current situation right now. And not just the problems and obstacles you are experiencing but also your behaviors, likes and dislikes, needs and wants, your mindset, and aspirations/dreams.
Understanding your current state is important to your transformation because you need this starting point to communicate where you are heading. Think of this as the airport from which you will take off. Think of the current state as the starting point of your adventure to take you from now, through the “happy path” (transition), and on to your desired future state. To your happy place.
It’s called the ‘happy path’ because these steps are focused on doing things right the first time, and not going down a rabbit hole. Whilst there will be lessons learned those lessons take you towards the desired state. This will all be explained in the coming steps.
The Desire Future State is your vision, dream goal in life that you have. And @LightSpeed is the airplane, pilot and crew that guides and helps you get there.
As an example, what was my current state? I had been in the management consulting industry for over fifteen years. However, like many of my peers and colleagues who had been doing the same thing for so long, I had felt a growing sense of dissatisfaction with my career path. I had made mistakes along the way that also put me on the back foot financially that I would have to keep working past 60 to have enough to retire. I found myself in a predicament, frustrated career-wise and panicking financial-wise.
It all started when I began to look back on the last several years of my life. Sure, I had plenty of memorable experiences: consulting for big business, traveling to new cities and countries, working with brilliant people…
But as much as I was enjoying the present moment at that time — from working with smart people to solving challenging problems — there was also an underlying feeling that something was missing.
You maybe understand what I mean or want to prevent this from happening to you. It can feel like we’re just not meant to live our lives always making someone else wealthy and get all the freedom.
That we need something more fulfilling focused on our own desired state of enlightenment.
I guess we can call it our destiny, or a calling, whatever you like, it doesn’t matter. It just needs to mean a lot to you.
And while many of us don’t actively think about it every day, these feelings creep up on us eventually.
A Few Months Ago, I Began to Ask Some Tough Questions, starting with:
Where was I currently?
The feeling of growing dissatisfaction with my career path was the first sign that change was necessary. But before you can decide what you want to do, you must ask yourself some tough questions.
It’s easier said than done, but I found it helpful to get it all out on paper, so I kept a journal and wrote down everything that was going through my head.
For me, the first question was easy: where was I currently?
I knew exactly what I was doing at that moment, working as a management consultant bringing transformational change to companies.
As challenging as this was at times, I did have flexibility in my schedule, worked from home twice per week, and had frequent “sit down and think” time.
But I was always on someone else’s clock trading my time for money. The bottom line is I was not free. And that is my burning desire, to be free to do what I wanted to do. That is what I want my desired future to feel like. It’s a feeling. Both financially and mentally.
What did I want to achieve?
This led to the next question: what did I want to achieve?
That one was harder. Most people have some idea of what they want to achieve, but they don’t know how to get there.
I asked myself what I wanted to achieve in my life, not just in my career. Sure, I could get more promotions or make more money in the next few years, but that wasn’t what I truly cared about.
I needed something that was more fulfilling on a personal level. I get inspired by being creative in the ways I can help and guide people who want to build the business of their dreams. Putting my know-how and experience into action.
This is what first drew me to management consulting when I left university, being able to solve problems and save money in a short period of time. I am a problem solver by nature.
Why was this important to me?
This question led me to what I truly wanted to achieve. I wanted to start a business that helps others. And by helping others I too will grow. Create a cycle of continual learning and development.
I wanted to be a guide and mentor to people who were just starting out in building their own business, someone who could guide them along the ‘happy path’ of building a business and be there when they achieve their desired future state.
I am aware that starting a business goes through the ‘messy middle’ (transition) part before it starts to reap the fruits of the founder’s labor. Unfortunately, the majority don’t get through the mess. That’s why I focus on the ‘messy middle’ and turned it into a ‘happy path’. It won’t be all blue sky, we need to be real, there will be turbulence but what we offer is how to handle this and push through.
I wanted to give back so much what I have learned in management consulting. There is one main reason this was important to me.
I often found that people in similar situations to mine (me when I was younger) appreciated my advice and guidance. I know that by guiding others, I will also help myself to learn and grow. Reciprocity is a wonderful thing. I’d always had a desire to “give back” on whatever level I can.
These Questions Led Me to Discover My Calling
My questions above led me to discover that my dream job will have the following characteristics:
- Helping people, especially those who don’t know what they want to be doing in the next 5 years and are just starting out, with the skills and resources they need to succeed and excel in the digital world.
- Having the flexibility to work remotely and spend time with my family.
- Having the ability to travel frequently, either for work or to attend events or leisure.
- Having the opportunity to make a difference in people’s lives.
- Creating the opportunity for those I work with and myself to achieve the freedom to make our own choices on our own terms.
There are so many different paths we can take in life and it’s important to traverse across many of these and see them as adventures.
Changing Career Paths seems Daunting, but Worth It
As I continued to answer these questions and write down my concerns and fears, I came to an inevitable conclusion: I needed to transition away from my job by starting a side hustle that will grow into something new on a different path.
The more I pondered it the more I knew it was doable. Some of the big questions I pondered and found solutions for were.
- How could I find a new direction that would let me take care of my family and life, while still allowing me time to grow my business on the side?
- How could I make this happen financially?
- What if I couldn’t find something that I loved?
- What if it didn’t work out?
Luckily, I was committed enough to work on my future path while still working my current job. This took dedication to work evenings and weekends on what I called my desired future. It meant being selfish with my time initially, but it was the best decision I’ve ever made, and it’s been a wonderful experience so far.
There’s no better way to take control of your life, or to get to know who you truly are, than to put yourself in a position where you have nothing to rely on.
Now let’s talk about the first step to building your forever business using the happy path to get you to your happy place.
Step 1 – What is Your Current State?
We all have dreams, and we all have reasons for wanting to achieve them. But most of us never take the time to sit down and write down the questions and concerns that are on our minds.
I encourage you to do this, even if you’re not actively searching for a new job, changing careers, or starting your own business.
We all have issues and problems that we can’t solve, but we also have a lot of knowledge, skills, and resources within us that we can’t access without some guidance.
By sitting down and writing these questions down, you’re giving yourself the tools you need to solve them or move forward. You can’t change what you don’t acknowledge first.
If you don’t know how to start or what to write about, start with these questions. They’ll serve as a reminder of what you’re trying to accomplish and keep you from drifting away from your goals.
- What’s holding you back from starting your side hustle/own business?
- What would make it more appealing to you?
- What’s stopping you from taking that next step?
- What are you afraid of?
- How can you remove that fear from the equation?
- How can you test out your idea?
You don’t have to start your own business right away but starting something will help you test out your idea and see where it falls short. The key is to focus on your growth. This adventure will see you grow, learn and it’s fun.
The diagram below is a slightly more detailed illustration of the happy path to building your forever strong business. These steps on the path can all be done even without starting a business or changing anything career wise. You will gain an immense amount of knowledge that could spark ideas and/or inspire you into taking action. With @LightSpeed guidance, you have this. So, follow this Happy Path Flight Plan.
The starting point is the bottom left-hand corner, My Current State. Each dot along the happy path are milestones. And each milestone has their steps. For the @LightSpeed Flight Path there are a numbers of milestones and a number of steps for each. The image below depicts this in more detail. We shall move through each of these in the steps that follow.
“The present defines the future. The future builds on the foundation of the past.” – Lailah Gifty Akita
Ultimately, we want to get to the big pink dot – My Desired Future State (the ultimate goal)
The desired future state is made up of four target areas:
- Core Values
- Purpose
- Mission & Goals
- Defining your Desired Future
‘My Desired Future State’ is your Ultimate Goal, your vision of where you see yourself in the future. Vision is specifically what you and your company aspire to become in the future.
Before you start defining your purpose or set any goals you first need to understand certain things about yourself.
The foundation needs to be laid first. This is done by answering questions in the workbook called My Current State. This is downloadable together with all the other workbooks and guides you will need on this flight plan.
As you may have guessed the happy path to building your forever business is an action plan that requires you to act. Retained knowledge and growth is learned though doing. Not reading and dreaming.
So here we go, the purpose of My Current State is to get crystal clear on who you are now. Your present helps define your future.
It forms the groundwork for identifying your purpose as well as guides your decision making as we move through the transition milestones on the happy path.
It will be difficult to discover your true purpose without doing this step.
The below screenshot of ‘My Current State’ is what the first page of the current state workbook looks like. There is no right or wrong answers. Answer in the right-hand column for each question on the left.
There are a few sections, but we kick things off with an easy one about your demographics. The remaining sections go deeper into who you are, so keep this workbook private and confidential.
This information will prove vital for later so it’s important to complete it now before moving onto the next step. You are going to need your current frame of mind and thoughts at this minute as this is when you are the most hesitant and your decision making is weighting all the options of whether this is worth your time and effort. Write all these thoughts you are experiencing in this workbook as they are what your customers/clients are going to experience too.
Get started immediately as you need to capture your current emotions in this workbook. And not have your frame of mind altered by moving onto the next step before completing this steps assignment. This isn’t a rush but a well thought out approach to the desired future you seek. So move at a pace you are comfortable with.
So, before continuing to the next step please complete the MY CURRENT STATE workbook! Download link is here.
Finishing each workbook or assignment on the happy path before moving on to the next step is vitally important.
Make completing workbooks and assignments your priority. Thank you.
Lastly, read your completed ‘My Current State’ workbook daily for the next two weeks, make it part of your daily routine for a bit. Keep it fresh and on your mind.
Without further ado download and get started.