Side Hustles are Enticing, But Dumb
One good primary hustle beats a dozen crummy side hustles
The Myth
It’s enticing isn’t it? You work a job you hate, and someone promises you a course or an email subscription to help make your side hustle your primary hustle.
You just have to work two jobs, one that hopefully pays something, and one that will effectively not pay you anything until you put in enough hours to strike gold.
The message: get up earlier, stay up later, work harder… Rise and Grind!
The Reality
When you work a job that’s drastically different than your side hustle, you’re most likely doing a crappy job at both.
Phoning it in at your job is a good way to both not grow your skillset, and not provide any value to your employer.
People pay you (ideally) because they think you provide value. They hope the dollars they spend on you will in turn generate more dollars for the business. When you phone it in, you’re “sticking it to the man,” but you’re most likely not doing learning, which is how you really benefit from employment. Also if you have a boss who’s not phoning it in, eventually they’ll notice.
A 9–5 is not just a paycheck, but an opportunity to be paid to learn. Side hustles are pay to learn, where effort and money go in before you see any returns.
When you work a full time job that doesn’t align with a side hustle, you:
- Grow two independent sets of skills more slowly
- Perform more poorly at each job than you would at one individually
- Have less free time to spend with loved ones
So what should you do?
The Solution
Very simple: spend all your effort to find the right job.
You should be to always be on the lookout for a job that:
- Pays well
- Teaches you what you want to learn
- Lets you interact with people you like
Don’t pretend you can just fiddle ~8 hours of your day away to get home to your real job and not pay for it later. If you don’t get laid off, you’re definitely not forming any useful connections or deep engagements.
I’m not saying you don’t want to
The author of Rich Dad, Poor Dad states this well: you work to learn, then start your own business. I’d trust his word over mine; there’s nothing in the book about side hustles, only about gathering and growing assets.
To summarize: dump your side hustles for one good primary hustle.
Thanks for reading!
