BiggerPockets Money Podcast - 305: What to Do Before You Quit the High-Pay & Benefits of Corporate World

Episode Date: May 30, 2022

Before you quit your job, you will need to prepare yourself not just financially, but mentally. If you’re thinking of leaving your W2, and you're not at retirement age just yet, odds are you have a��side hustle or even an entire small business. As the side hustle begins to grow, you may be torn between spending time at your job and putting in the hours to scale your business. This is doubly true if you’re like Daniella Flores from I Like to Dabble, who is at a high-paying, fully-remote job with a solid share of benefits. Before she decided to scale down her full-time work, she had to come up with an action plan that would allow her to slowly slip away from corporate life, so she can avoid the instant shock of being an overnight entrepreneur. Daniella has some helpful tips for anyone who thinks their time at a job is close to the end. She has spent the last year or so planning for the departure, so when she leaves her job, she doesn’t need to search for a new one! Now, she can spend more of her time writing, designing, and building something that will truly set her up for long-term financial (and time) freedom. In This Episode We Cover The importance of having a side hustle (especially when you’ve been working for a while) Job hopping and negotiating more than just salary at your new or current job Prioritizing yourself in your company and the downside of saying “yes” too often Building a stable reserve fund so you can quit with confidence Self-Directed 401k and other retirement options that self-employed individuals have Self-employed health insurance and how to keep your benefits as you step away from full-time work And So Much More! Links from the Show BiggerPockets Money Facebook Group BiggerPockets Forums Finance Review Guest Onboarding Mindy's Twitter Connect with David Apply to Be a Guest on The Money Show Podcast Talent Search! Subscribe to The “On The Market” YouTube Channel Listen to The “On The Market” Podcast: Spotify, Apple Podcasts, BiggerPockets I Like to Dabble Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to the Bigger Pockets Money podcast show number 305, where we interviewed Daniela Flores from I Like to Dabble.com and talk about the things you need to consider before quitting your job to go full-time self-employed. I got in therapy last year, and that was the one thing that helped me a lot. We were talking about this because I was like, I'm not sure if this is the right move because my job has all these amazing benefits. But I really want to do this. I really want to do this full time because I feel like I'm wasting all this time. not wasting, but you know, you use your energy throughout your work day doing these tasks, and like the energy to build up for the stuff you want to work on. So then after that, I'm like, oh, there's all these things I want to do,

and I feel like I'm losing this time to something else that my heart isn't into. That, like, you know, I don't see a future in. And we talked about it, and she's like, I see the way you talk about your blog. And she's like, I don't see your face light up like that when you talk about your work. She's like, that's all you need to know. She's like, it sounds like you know what to do. I was like, that's right. I do, I guess.

Hello, hello, hello. My name is Mindy Jensen. And joining me today is David Perret from the military millionaire group. David, what's going on? I'm not finding the unmute button. That's what's going on. Hey, that's my job. Apparently, because you can use the space bar to unmute, which means that I leave myself muted, so there's less noise.

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for me over over 10 years. Kickstart your well-being journey with your first audiobook free when you sign up for a free 30-day trial at audible.com slash BP money. A few months ago, Danielle posted on Twitter that they were thinking about quitting their job, but there was a lot more to it than they originally thought. And if you're struggling with it, you're not alone. I know this firsthand because my own husband, hi Carl, struggled with this too, before he finally took the plunge.

So I feel qualified to talk about this, both with Daniela and to give advice to people who are listening as well. David, you're also successfully unemployed, right? Yes, ma'am, have been since October. Now, is that official? Do you have a job? Do you do any sort of work at all? Or you just sit around on the beach all day and eat bonbons?

I'm technically still in the reserves for the Marine Corps, though I have not actually gone and done anything for the reserves in the last five months. So we'll see how long that lasts. I have not received a paycheck from anything outside of my LLCs since October 10th. Okay. So then I would call you unemployed, because if nobody's paying, then you're not, you shouldn't be doing any work for them. So Danielle is here today to talk about both the circumstances leading up to their potential

retirement or separation from employment and what they're going to do once they get there. One of the things I like most about Danielle is that they don't like to hustle. They like to dabble. Their blog is called I like to dabble.com. And they do not promote the grind at all costs mentality that really makes. makes life kind of suck. To quote Daniela, stop this you have to hate your life to become successful rhetoric. Hustle culture doesn't work. You can do meaningful work in moderation and be happy. Daniela has taken these dabblings, combined them with their full-time job in IT and their low

expenses to get them to the precipice of retirement, which is where we join them today. Daniela Flores from I Like to Dabble.com. Welcome to the Bigger Pockets Money podcast. Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited. I love this podcast and I can't wait to get into it. I can't wait to jump into your story. So let's get a little bit of a background from your money journey. Where did you start and right up to about now where you are considering leaving full-time employment? Yes. So I guess I'll start my story back when I started side hustling. So when I started my first like go at side hustling was when I was in high school. I didn't really think of it as side hustling at the time. I had a problem with spending money because I just didn't, I wasn't familiar with how I was kind of triggered by money. So I would basically spend my, at the time I worked at the movie theater. So I would spend like the whole paycheck on things that didn't matter.

Like food and clothes. Like these were things that I didn't necessarily need at that time. You know, I wanted them, but they really didn't matter. And like through all of that, by the time I had my bills come, I would need money for those because I did, you know, I was paying for my car. I was paying for my cell phone. I was still in high school. So I didn't have like rent and stuff. but I would go and sell my clothes as well as go to thrift stores and buy stuff and resell those at online.

So at the time I was using Craigslist for this stuff because this is back in the day. And I was trying to basically remake the money back that I've already, I blew because I didn't really, I didn't, I had the education of how to have a good financial, like a good financial, here. Let me re-say this. So I had the education to have a good financial foundation from my parents. but I was somebody that would never listen to any of that. I thought that, oh, I have it covered. I'll do it. This works for me.

And it did not work for me for a very long time. And I went on that way for about a couple of years until I got into college. I had to get a little bit, you know, more serious. I stopped side hustling, per se. I had basically there were jobs. There weren't like these little one-off things I was doing. I was working three jobs through college, trying to graduate. I was so eager to, at the time, working at my mom's surgery center and hating doing,

I was doing health insurance verification, and I hated the tedious of it. I was like, I can't wait to go out of college. I'm going to work in tech. My life's going to be so easy. I can't wait to do all these things, have control of my life. It's going to be great. And I got out of school. I took an unpaid internship.

I was making $0 for those first couple weeks. I got hired on eventually at $30,000 salary. I thought that was a lot. I was not making much after taxes or anything. Like, it was maybe $1,500 a month after taxes, health insurance. stuff for life insurance, for 01K, like the benefits that cost money at the place I was working at. From there, I actually had my first real experience in IT. I was a web engineer, but at this startup, the environment that the way it was was,

everybody was around my age, right out of college. We were all working 80-hour weeks. They would have alcohol in the office, all this food for you, they'd have parties and go to concerts and free, all these things so they could keep you in this environment so you're always working. And I burned out hard and I burned out very quickly. It took maybe 10 months and I, I burned out so bad I just stopped going to work. And I was actually fired from my first job out of college.

And that was when I started my first legit freelance kind of side hustle. I got a job waitressing and then I got a freelance gig with one of the former clients that worked with me at that startup. I didn't sign like an NDA or anything, so I was totally fine just by the way. So like working with that freelance relationship doing like a freelance, basically what I was doing at that startup, but as a freelancer, and they asked me, like, what would you like to get paid? We can pay you $100 an hour. And that blew my mind. It was crazy because they, like, they really valued my work. At the time, I was completely clueless about what I

should ask. They're like, how about $100 an hour? It was only for 10 hours a week. So I was like, that's perfect. I can do that. And so I did that for a while. And I worked as a waitress. And then I still had this pressure, though, from my family to get a real job. You need to get back into a real job. Like, where are you doing? You're not going anywhere. So with this kind of like mindset my whole life is like you go to, you go to college, you get a job. That's what you do. And then eventually you retire. You know, like there's no like really stuff in between that you think about too much because you're thinking about all the time of like, I got to work. I got to make this money. I got to like live, I guess. And it was like at that time I was trying so hard to get another

job. So I eventually got another job. And then from there, I kind of moved up these different positions. I did a lot of lateral moves around my career in tech. I did a lot of job hopping because I felt I was just stuck a lot of the other salary ranges I was in through these jobs I was taken. So I had to kind of job hop to get my salary to kind of bump up as I went. And I never really got like any of my money stuff though together during any of that. I was still like spending like I've always been spending. And it wasn't until about 2017 where we finally had to start getting our stuff together. I was having student loan. The student loan offices calling me all the time about student loan payments that needed to be made. We had credit card debt that we had to

pay and we had like car debt that we had to pay. At the time, my wife was also paying for her house because when we met it was her house that was in her name. So I was like, okay, we need to kind of get our stuff together and that's kind of like what actually, you know, propelled us to basically get our money stuff together. So as a long-winded answer, I went through kind of like all of these weird events in my life that were kind of telling me like, hey, you need to get your stuff together and eventually kind of just got it together eventually. Yay. Better late than ever. Yes. Okay. So I have a few things I want to unpack from this. First, you said, I can't wait to get out of college so my real life can begin. And that is going to be the callback for later when you

talk about your retirement because, you know, I hear you saying, oh, everything's going to be great once I can quit my mom's job or quit this job with my mom where I'm verifying insurance benefits, which has to be just a horrible job. And then, you know, then I can get this great job. And it's, I hear that mentality from people who want to retire. Oh, once I retire, everything's going to be great. And then you went on to talk about the life that you had. It was not great because it wasn't the life that you wanted. And the retirement, and I know this firsthand from my husband's experience, I'm going to call a David to get his firsthand experience, is that if you don't plan your retirement, it's not

great. It's kind of sucky. And it's like your life gets pulled and your attention gets pulled and your time gets pulled in all these different directions because you have no plan. And I'm really excited to talk about the next phase of your life because I want to see what you're planning because I can see so many good things. Like you have learned from the time you were in college that, you know, oh, I can't wait to get my real life planned.

And I know I follow you on Twitter. I read your blog. I know you've got plans and your retirement is going to be great because you're not just jumping into it with both feet and, hey, whatever happens happens. It's like you have to plan things in life or life will happen to you. So I just wanted to get that out there. You also had this pressure from your family to get a real job. Everybody listening, stop pressuring people to get a real job.

Whatever they want to do, if it's covering their bills, if they're not asking you for money, don't bother them. And then in one of your blog posts you say, I am an advocate for job hopping to increase your salary within reason. I want to dive into that a little bit because I'm old. and I come from an era where you don't job hop because you look flaky. And I can remember how many times my parents told me, well, you don't like this job, but you can't leave because you'll just look like a job hopper and nobody will ever want to hire you. I'm like, I have applied for so many jobs that I have gotten or been offered because I'm a good interviewer. Like, they're not going to care, but apparently they do.

And now they don't within reason. So what does within reason mean to you? So within reason for me, I think that's more of an open thing like, hey, if you're job hopping every couple of months, like two months, three months, and that's all your resume looks like, you know, that's, I'm not going to say that that's a good idea. That's what I'm about what's in reason. Okay.

So job hopping for me, I, you know, if the job isn't working out for you, whatever it is, however long you're there, though, you know, leave, find whatever way you can to leave that job and find a better job. But if you're doing job hopping to just raise your salary, you know, don't do that. Like, here, I'm going to job hop. 10 different jobs and get a 500k salary. It's like, what are your goals, though, with that, you know? So let's get to where we are today. You are considering leaving your job. But there's a lot of things to consider, not just, you know, okay, I quit, bye, I'm done. And I liked

your most recent article on acorns.com. Is it acorns.com or grow.org.org.com or grow.org. grow.acorns.com. It's the CNBC acorns, I guess, publication partnership that they have. Yeah. It was, it was hack your job to earn more money. And step number one, you negotiated for full-time remote work. I love this tip from you. During the pandemic, I made sure to negotiate for this because I knew we would be asked to come back to the office eventually. And we wanted to move to another state. So you negotiated before anybody else was asking to stay home full-time. you're there right at the beginning of the pandemic. Talk about that. Let's talk about how you negotiated this, because this is not just, hey, I want to work from remote forever. Right.

Oh, absolutely. So with a first, I just want to say like a preface here. So as somebody who works in tech, it is a lot easier for me to negotiate remote work than it is for somebody who is like a teacher per se. I just want to say that for anybody listening. So negotiating remote work for me was something that I had a lot of actual experience. with, so with the kind of positions I've had throughout my career, I've always worked remote

in some capacity. It's either been a hybrid remote relationship where it's at least like one day remote to as much as being full-time remote. The last three jobs that I've had, I've been a full-time remote worker. So I kind of knew already what they were looking for in a full-time remote worker when it came up to, you know, we were all sent home during the pandemic. And I was like, yes, back in the full-time remote role again. I want the stay here because what I worked at, so where I work currently, when I was originally hired, they had told me that I would eventually have the chance to become full-time remote. But at the time, their policy was hybrid. So I was actually going into the office before the pandemic about two days a week. So once we were home

full-time, we wanted to make our move happen because with the client, with the way everything was at that time, we thought it's like, it's either now or never. We've got to move now. We just got to make it happen. So my wife was looking for jobs in the area we wanted to move. to and I was doing kind of the data analysis on my side with my job looking around at the different programs and kind of because there were already people that worked full time remote in other locations that have always been doing it that way because they had like little jobs not little jobs but they had like positions that were open as like remote only because it was a global company these this company has offices all over the world so that's so they already had groups that were

working remote they had people that were working remote and so I look at around first to kind of look at that. It's kind of like the climate of the company is like, how are they going to receive it if I ask it? So I did that. And then I used our ticketing system. So the way that we do our work, everything's tracked in tickets. And there's all these different types of tickets. So I can actually pull my own metrics of how I work and how much I get done, which is the same stuff that I use every year in our reviews. And I, you know, I'm going to go through all the stuff that I do. And then I showed them all the extra stuff I was able to do by working full-time remote since the pandemic. And I also showed that it was like this push of, you know,

they kind of made it that way, though, anyway. They made it every, when they sent everybody home, the expectations increase like crazy. If anyone's listening to the work in tech, they probably understand what I'm talking about because now there are things in tech that weren't there before. There are like measurements that they measure how you're working. They measure the tickets that you're doing. They measure the data that's in your tickets. They have these KPIs now that are set up to actually have people lose their jobs, which is kind

of a whole other conversation. but it's like I kind of presented all this to them and I was like, look, the job is already basically demanding me to be remote. My wife and I are preparing to move to Washington State and then I kind of presented all the information. I talked with my manager and he was like, I'm okay with it. We just have to go to legal and, you know, maybe sign some stuff. But it was like that also personal relationship I have with my manager and the way that I, he said I was always present. I was never able, like I wasn't somebody he had to try to chase down. He said I always did my work. You know, he never had a doubt of me being full-time.

remote, if anything would change. He's like, you've kind of been hybrid remote anyway. I know how you work remote. I don't think anything's going to change. We just have to see how the company can legally do that. I think there's a lot of people out there who hate their job. And, oh, if I could just work from home, it'll be great. But if you go to work and you hate your job, it oozes out of you that you hate your job. It oozes out of you that you're a miserable person. And then you're like, hey, I want to work remote. And your boss is like, why would I let you work remote? You you don't get anything done at the office, why would I let you go home and do even less at home? Like, you presented yourself as, I'm very good at working remote because here's my

past work experience. I'm already getting more stuff done because I'm already working remote. Look at how great I am already. It should be very easy for you to allow me to work remote. And, I mean, being a good employee is going to get you the most benefits for you. from your job. And if it's not, then, you know, that's a different conversation. You do need to quit your job if your company isn't appreciating you, but you have to be somebody that the company wants to keep. They're not going to bend over backwards to keep a crappy employee. So I love this tip that you, like, I went through the tickets. That's, I don't want to offend you and call you a big data nerd, but. Oh, well, I am a data nerd, so.

Good. That's a term of endearment on this show. I bet you have spreadsheets too. Oh, yes. I love spreadsheets. This is something like Tim Ferriss kind of talks about this in the four-hour work week, right? Like the idea of being able to show that you were more like test out a day at home and then show you were more productive that day and whatever. Where was the company physically located at before you went remote? So the, so the IT headquarters in our specific region was. in St. Louis, Missouri. Oh, well, I don't, I can't even talk smack about you leaving because I'm in Springfield.

So, I went to college in Springfield, actually. MSU? Yeah, Missouri State University for my first year. Cool, cool, cool. Good, good area. Yeah, that's where I do most of my investing. So what I was going to say, though, is that one's kind of odd, actually, because I was going to ask if they gave you like a slight pay cut.

So I have a friend Daniel who lived in Carlsbad, California. he moved to a much more affordable market to work remote full time during the pandemic. And they gave him like a little bit of a pay reduction for the move. However, it was still, if you look at cost of living to pay, it was still a much large, it was like a pay raise essentially to move. But I guess if you're moving from St. Louis to Washington, you probably went to a higher cost of living area. So probably didn't give you a pay cut for that.

Yeah. And it was so the location. So it's odd for like my employer, they have offices. all over the world. So in every big financial market country, they have an IT headquarters. So with that said, there are tons of employees that work remote. So they have actual location markers that they could have put my name to. And I got the same salary that I was getting before that.

So they didn't change my salary at all. And it's actually shortly after that that I job hopped within the company to a higher salary. But I still was able to stay remote. Let's talk about that. Yes. So this was actually a little less than one year ago. It was about May. So I, my former team, if anyone's listening, I hope they're not, they were, everybody on the team is great. They're just a couple of people that made it a very toxic environment, even though I was working virtually. And I know a lot of people say that like, you know, the toxic environments, there's an extra boundary there with remote. And yeah, that is true. But at the time, think about like this time last year during the pandemic, people's attitude. and like, you know, there was like that tension everywhere with work and everywhere you went. And it came out in like team meetings and I was like getting on these 5 a.m. calls and trying to run these calls efficiently to get, make sure that we were on target for certain efforts that

we're doing in our iterations. And so I got on these calls and I would just get like screamed at for over the smallest things, like a link that they don't want to click to view a thing on a screen. I mean, it's the things that these people get. upset about it i was like okay this this team's not working out for me i can't deal with this every single day where i'm like on the verge of tears after just a couple of morning calls so i started looking around internally at the company they have an internal career portal that actually gets to everything gets listed there first before it gets listed to their external portal but i also looked into their mentorship program so i reached out to a mentor and we started meeting on a monthly basis

and then she kind of gave me some tricks to look at the internal portal to kind of be like hey this hiring manager, I know that that position is for the specific thing because it wouldn't be really in the job description. Everything so vague in all the descriptions. She was able to kind of give me more of like a lowdown of a certain jobs. So I was actually starting to apply to a couple of things internally. It didn't get anything and not really much traction was happening. And then luckily enough, somebody else that was in my network at the job. They were just somebody else on like another team. They weren't on my team, but we had talked because we worked on various projects together. And she said, hey, I have worried that there's a new organization being spun up and they're looking for

a lead reliability engineer for this team. They reached out to me, but I'm taking a manager position, so I gave them your name. And I was like, oh my God, thank you. And they reached out to me the next week for an interview. We interviewed. They said it's fine. You can stay remote. And they said the words, I don't see us ever returning back to the office.

But now they're all there and I feel horrible about it. But anyway, I was able to, like, I found this new team. I did and move. I was a senior software engineer then. and I'm not a lead reliability engineer. So I got a pay bump with that and I got a bonus bump with that. And that was a huge save for me.

I kind of got lucky on it because I was applying to other things and I even got an email back from one of the offices. It was one that was listed in San Francisco slash remote. And I was like, well, cool, it's remote. So I applied to that one and they actually were trying to set up an interview with me. But they said, okay, we are remote now,

but once we go back, we need you to move to San Francisco. And I was like, San Francisco is one of the most expensive places to live. Absolutely not. Like, no. I work remote now for the same company. I don't know why you would require me to be there. So that one actually, you know, they passed on me because they said that I, you know,

if you're not going to move here to eventually work in the office, then we, it won't work. And I was like, okay. And then that next week I got, you know, that came through with my friend and the other team. So that was pretty cool. That reminds me of a job interview I had once where the interviewer said, and if you're here after 6 o'clock at night, the company will buy you dinner. And I'm thinking of myself, I don't want to be here at 6 o'clock. Why are you acting all excited?

I can make my own dinner at home. I don't want to work till 6 o'clock at night. And they would also buy you a cab home. I'm like, the train's $1.50. I'll just take the train. Thank you. Because I don't want to be there so late. They make it sound like it's so great.

Oh, well, we're remote now. What do you mean you don't want to come into the office and move to San Francisco? And like I told her to take my name out of consideration. It sounds like they passed on me. That's a good thing. That's a great thing. Oh, yeah. Absolutely.

Because I was like, I was looking at houses in San Francisco. I'm like, pretty sure we can't get one under $2 million. So that's a no. It's a hard pass. And that's a shack that needs a lot of work and, you know, broken foundation. no plumbing. Electric is sparking, so they've turned it off. Right. There's no floors. Who needs floors? Why are you so picky, Danielle? I know. Right. Be nice. So you just mentioned 5 a.m. calls when you were talking to your team in Missouri. Yes. That's not cool. No, it's not cool. So the nature of that team at the time, since we were in an external customer-facing application, so these are people using like rewards on their credit cards.

We were an external-facing application, but we worked with various teams in different regions, which a lot of the teams at that company are structured that way, where you have a program, which is like your group of teams. And in that program, you have all the regions. And you all kind of have to find a way to connect when time zones never match. And that's, I was the one who got the, not the best end of the stick on that one. It also was a team of, it was a very male. dominated team. Well, I was the only woman of women. I was only like female present at the time I

identified as a woman now. I mean to people I'm female presenting, you know, as you look at me, you know, you think of female. But at my team, the only person who was a woman was a, she was part-time and she, I mean, she was, she was very good to work with it. It was like I, I kept getting, I wonder if any women in tech are listening to me right now, but they might often feel like they're being stuffed into secretary tasks or administrative tasks as someone in tech. And that often happens on teams like that. And I was someone who is often shoved in these things to run meetings. Like, hey, Daniela, you want to run this morning meeting?

Oh, we already, they like to work with you. You'll be great for it. And I was like, well, sure. I should have said no. And I say no now. Now I say no. Yeah. So here's the question is, did 5 a.m. call equate to two hour earlier being done.

Or was it like, in addition to your normal work hours, you're going to be on the phone at five? Well, I was able to get off earlier. As long as nobody sent me an instant message on Slack right at last minute that they need me to fix some, you know, life-shattering issue. And then, you know, that, that slashes their evening. I'm the weirdo who would have loved that. Like, oh, you mean, I can wake up early, but I get to be off at three in the afternoon every day. Yes. Sold.

Yeah, that is a good thing. I do get off earlier. So now I don't start that early. I start at six and I get off at two, which is perfect. Yeah, but still, 5 a.m. There's, I'm assuming, and maybe I'm just being too American, but I'm assuming that you're working with people in America on your team. So you've still got, I mean, even if it's Pacific and Eastern time,

there's a large chunk of time that you can still find in the middle of the day to not have to get up at 5 o'clock in the morning for some stupid meeting that probably could have been an email. I should clarify that when I say regions, I mean global regions. So we were on the morning. Morning calls are usually with India. So Pune, our Pune team. So that's a big part of all the teams are those teams over in the Asia Pacific region. Oh, okay. Okay. Yeah, maybe that's just me being American. Everything centers around us. I know, right. I've always thinking that my time zone is the one. It is. Except it's my time zone that is the one. Yeah. Mountain. And I'll even send emails to people that I know we're in different time zones. Like, can you do this at 10 o'clock?

And then they call me at 10 o'clock their time. They're like, hey, where are you? I'm like, it's 8 o'clock. What are you talking about? Yeah, I know. And the funny thing, though, and it would almost make it easier if you always spoke in your time zone. But Mindy's actually pretty good about remembering what time zone you're in and sending it in your time zone every now and then. So then it throws me for a loop when she doesn't.

And I'm like totally lost. I'm like, oh my goodness, now I'm super confused because normally, yeah. I try to put it in all caps to bring it up. This is Mountain Time Zone. But, you know, sometimes I forget. I'm like, ooh, I feel bad. But yeah, okay. That's a good one.

I know that one. It's only an hour after me. So. Yeah. Let's talk about this next tip you have. I made sure to prioritize my time. I love these next two pieces that you have. I stopped saying yes to everything.

I started denying meetings that would be emails, if only we all had that power, and especially denying all meetings outside of my working hours. Yes. So when I first started in tech, and even up until like a couple years ago, I would say yes to everything because I was anxious that if I didn't say yes, I wouldn't be seen as somebody who is performing well because there's expectations that they set, but always you feel like you have to go above those to feel like you're even being adequate. Obviously that's not true, but I figured out that me wanting to be available for

everything and wanting to do everything was only hurting me, not helping me. So I stopped saying yes. I started saying no. And I found out, it was like, it's not that bad to say no. People really don't care. It's okay. So that was, that was nice. I mean, sometimes occasionally you get that person who they really, really want to have that meeting. It's really necessary. And all you have to do is, I mean, what I did a lot of times is like, what are your questions that you want to address? on this email and then they'll sell me the questions and then send them their answers or send them the resources that they need and it's like there you go that's all you needed to do but now the number one thing that's helping me the most is because people will load up my calendar with meetings if they see

slots because that's how everybody schedules meetings I guess through slack is that they want to see like oh what your open slots are they don't really ask anymore so I've been time blocking the things that I need to do throughout the week at work so I make sure that those are actually taken up too because it's like all right I know I have a bunch of reports I have to run for a month end kind of data stuff so I have to block like this many hours on this day to do this. And so if I do that, that makes sure that that makes sure that I don't have all these meetings coming in and taking up my time. So then I have to push this work to, you know, whenever else it can get done. Because I don't want to do it on off hours. That's a no, not going to be working on off hours. And I want to get my time done when

I want to get it done. I mean, my work done when I want to get it done. Yeah, during work hours. Because especially as a working at home person, it's so easy for, I quit at 5 o'clock, but now it's 6.30, and I'm still sitting in front of my computer because I just have one more thing to do. I mean, in IT, in tech, in almost everything, there's always something else you can do. I am very fortunate that when I started at Bigger Pockets, I think Brandon sat me down and said, Josh will always give you 150 more hours of work than you can do. And he knows it. So do what you can and then stop at the end of the day and start the next day. There's always more work than you can do. And I was like, it was like week one that he said that. And I'm so glad that he did because I would have felt overwhelmed with all the work.

It's an online website where there's people who can come in and talk any day. And I was in charge of the forums. So anytime day or night, there's somebody posting there. So I could have literally been online all day, every day, and never slept and never ate and never saw my family and just trying to keep up and, like, frantically. And of course, that's not sustainable. And I would have to sleep and eat and whatever. But like, you can work 18 hours a day if you want. Don't want that because that's not a fun life. Oh, no, not fun at all. And it's, I guess a lot of people, for the folks that had the experience of going home to work

remote, you might have realized that there was like an influx of meetings. Like, I feel like when I went home remote. It was like all my days are just people are trying to make all, create all these meetings. And my, my dad works in tech too. And we were talking about this because he's like, I feel like all I'm doing all days in meetings. I can't do my work. And we like to kind of complain back and forth about our jobs because we have very similar jobs. So I'm talking. It's like, it's all these people. He's like they don't, they're just like managers of things that they don't know what they're managing and they're just sending me meetings so they look like they're busy. And so yeah, we talked about it's like, all right, stop,

stop accepting them and start filling up your calendar with the things that you know you need to get done and make sure that you know you're not completely sabotaging yourself at work. Yeah, exactly. Okay, well let's move into your next life. What does your next life look like? My next life looks like a little bit like my life now. So I've been working on my brand and my blog. I like to dabble.com. I've been working on that since 2017 on. off. So those first couple years, I stepped away from it a lot, like a lot because I was getting burnt out with the content generation. We, like, you know, kind of rollercoaster that you're on as you're generating content. So I burned out here and there and I thought, and I stepped away

from it, then I would come back. And then the last three years, I really, you know, I really went kind of hit the ground running, got more serious about it. And as I started to hone in on ways to help people like me, people in the LGBTQ community, um, creative. the people looking to increase their income, and they don't feel comfortable negotiating or comfortable looking for those opportunities. I tried to hone in on the things that I felt strongly about. And I was like, I feel really passionate about this.

And a long time, I've had a problem with the word passion because you can have so many passions in your life. You know, there's not just one. So I was like, this is something I really want to do. And so I got in therapy last year, and that was the one thing that helped me a lot. We were talking about this because I was like, I'm not sure if this is the right move

because my job has all these amazing benefits. But I really want to do this. I really want to do this full time because I feel like I'm wasting all this time. Not wasting, but you know, you use your energy throughout your workday doing these tasks and like the energy to build up for the stuff you want to work on. So then after that I'm like, oh, there's all these things I want to do. And I feel like I'm losing this time to something else that my heart isn't into that, like, you know, I don't see a future in.

And we talked about it. And she's like, I see the way you talk about your blog. And she's like, I don't see your face light up like that when you talk about your work. She's like, that's all you need to know. She's like, it sounds like you know what to do. And I was like, that's right, I do, I guess. Tax season is one of the only times all year when most people actually look at their full financial picture, including income, spending, savings, investments, the whole thing. And if you're like most folks, it can be a little eye-opening.

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I like to be prepared. That's why I remember 9-88, Canada's suicide crisis helpline. It's good to know just in case. Anyone can call or text for free confidential support from a train responder anytime. 9-88 suicide crisis helpline is funded by the government in Canada. So I have a firsthand experience with this from your wife's point of view. My husband said the same thing. I don't want to work here anymore.

I want to do other things, but I make all this money. I have these amazing benefits. Who am I to leave this great paying job to go pursue my passions, my dreams? like why would I leave this? It seems so selfish. And as soon as he, it took him a year to come to terms with this. And even then he, he asked his boss, could I just go three days a week? And his boss, and even that was like, oh, I should ask him, but I don't want to.

And what if he says no? And then he finally asked and his boss, like, yeah, I don't care. Like it feels like this huge decision because. It's so life-altering to you. But it's not such a huge deal to your boss because then they still got him. He had proprietary knowledge of, he wrote, he wrote blood bank software for the VA hospital, David. So if you need blood, if you got blood in 2010 to 2015, 2008 to 2015, he made sure you didn't die. So you're welcome.

I can't imagine that being a super high-stressed job. I mean, the VA does everything super slow and inefficiently, so they probably don't care when you get anything done. Except it could kill you. It gives you the wrong blood. So, yeah. Not me. I'm A-B-positive. I can, like, anything you got, I'm good.

I'm the one that can take everything. Oh, okay. Well, good for you. I don't know anything about blood. Carl knows it all. But it was like, it was really stressful. stepped down and the boss is like, yeah, sure, no problem. And then when he finally quit, he's like, wow, I should have done this years ago. And I think that that's going to be the same

too. You mentioned just a few moments ago that somebody at work works part time. Have you considered stepping back work instead of quitting cold turkey to test it out? Okay. So this is something I've been thinking about. And I, it's something I haven't tackled it. It's like, this is another one of those fears, I guess, where it's like, okay, I'm back at this thing where it's like, I want to ask this thing. I want to, I want to ask for part-time work. And I've looked into it and I asked that they haven't asked HR portal. And I asked like, hey, are you still, are we still, you know, eligible for benefits if I were to move part-time? And they said, yeah. So I haven't asked my manager yet, though, but I just ask HR for like informational. They didn't say,

yes, you can do it. It was just informational of, yeah, you can still get benefits at the same rate you do now if you're part-time. So it leaves me to, I can try to ask my manage with that. But I'm trying to take stock of the current situation I'm in. Unfortunately, it has been, they just started going back to the office a couple of weeks ago. So I'm on calls and all of my team is required to be in the office, like two days a week, I think, is what they're doing now. Some of them do like three or four. It depends on the person of like their style. But I can tell that there's like a, I don't know for sure if it's there or not, but there's like, oh, we all know Danielle gets to work from home all the time.

And they even have these benefits. So the job has actually added new benefits to their benefit package called Work from Anywhere weeks. But they have entire teams and people that work remote full time that always work from anywhere. And they were talking on their call the other day like, oh, I'm picking out my work from anywhere weeks and stuff. And I was like, no comment. You know, I can't say anything.

And it's like, okay, so if I bring this up to my boss like, hey, can I work part, can I move to part time? I don't know what her, what she will respond to that like. And I haven't tackled it yet. but it's an option I've been thinking about. Yes, but I'm also trying to think about the timing for it because it's right. Everyone just went back.

And I feel like I'm the odd one out and they don't like it. Just punch your own ticket in the IT system to make it look like you worked the full week. There you go. You run the system that catches people, so you're good. There you go. Legal disclaimer, I'm not an attorney, but. Right, yeah, exactly.

So yeah, I've thought about. moving to part-time. Maybe it's something I should ask before I try to quit. So I think that's great that you brought that up. All right. So your blog is all about side hustles, right? And dabbling and freelancing and a lot of those things are not passive or recurring income. So when you say retire, are you taking the money that you're making from there and reinvesting in something that is going to be able to give you like cash flow or passive income? Or is your, you're idea of retirement like mine where I'm retired and it's my office, therefore it's me doing whatever I want and you're going to continue to push the blog forward and freelance and everything,

but you're viewing it as retired just because it's on your own terms or just kind of curious the financial position there because that's usually when people, not like I'm an expert, but usually when people make the transition from employed to successfully unemployed, it's, there's a finance question. And then once you check that box, you're like, I'm good. Then it becomes like, well, now what do I do? And those are two totally different problems. But they both arise when you leave the employment world.

Right. So I'm leaving my employment world, but I'm not retiring and living off of investments. So we are still actively investing. But we won't be withdrawing from those investments during this. The only one that we have is like our brokerage account, which that is like 10 years in the future. kind of thing. So we could use that money if we needed to. But we also have emergency savings that we've saved up. I've been saving up for months. I actually originally wanted to quit last year and I just keep extending it because of all of my own doubts and yada, yada, yada.

So I'm not retiring from like all work ever. I'm just retiring from like a W-2 employee to being a self-employed person. So I, what my plan is is to run the blog, but also do my freelance projects that I do, do the consulting and the coaching that I do, work with the several different publications that I do. And some of those do have like passive income streams, like the blog brings in at income every month. We have affiliate income, some digital products that, you know, planned around those launches will have passive income come in. And we're also trying to work to build up systems to make sure that I can kind of automate a little bit more of that and guarantee a little bit more of recurring income as we continue to save more and prepare for me to make the switch.

Is it possible? Like, does your job offer decent vacation benefits or is it possible to do a sabbatical? Because, you know, like in the military, you could take like 30 days paid vacation and you could take a full month off and go at the end of the month. You're like, wow. Yep, I'm ready. Or, nope, all right. I'll give it a little bit longer. So like if that's an option, I would definitely recommend doing that. Oh, sabbatical. I don't know if they have sabbatical as a benefit. I haven't seen that on their benefits, but we have 30 days of vacation. I've already been using vacation this year like crazy because I know that I want to use them all up. We still get paid out, though, for any that we don't use. But I've been using them way more this year, like in the

beginning of the year, because usually I have it from like the summer offloaded to like the end of the year. This year, everything's been offloaded to the beginning of the year because I'm, I want to leave. But I've been taking a little bit too much vacation lately, which actually there is no such thing as too much vacation. I know. I mean, that was exactly what I was suggest is take as much as you have like if you have 30 days on the book take 30 days and don't think about work at all and pretend you're retired and then by the end of that time period you'll probably know if you're actually ready or not yeah so that's what i did that kind of a month my mom and i went to napa california and i you know i was like that i haven't talked to her about it because my parents

were the number one like not the number one but one of those people in the back of my head being like the real bad you can't leave it what about your 401k match blah blah blah so we even talked about And she's like, you look so, because I was talking, I was showing her this project I was working on with another publication. And she was like, this is really cool. And she was like really engaged. And she's never been engaged in like the stuff that I do because it's tech. And she was in nursing and administration, hospital administration for a while.

So she didn't, you know, she doesn't really like vibe with all the tech stuff. So I was like talking about it. She's like, you look so excited when you talk about this stuff. Like, I've never seen you talk about your work like that. And just like, I keep hearing this from other people. And I was like, yes, I love it. I was like, and I want to do this full time. I know, you know, and she was like, she's like, right away, you want to quit or you want to quit, like, down the road.

And I was like, well, I kind of want to quit like this year. And she's like, well, I mean, you enjoy it. So I was like, well, I didn't expect you to say that, but okay. I mean, my dad is the one that you have to convince though. But either way, I don't need to convince them anymore. It's not like I live with him. No, you just got to convince yourself. I know, right?

That's the real one I have to convince. I'm not saying that, like, you have to convince yourself and make the leap. I'm just saying, like, that's the hardest. part of the decision is coming to terms with, okay, yeah, I feel like this is the right move now. And I wrestled with it for like six months. Oh, yeah. I've been wrestling with it now for about a year. It's wrestling with it mostly because of just the way I was raised and like the way work is in my family. Like my dad was an immigrant from Venezuela.

So when he came over here, he worked, you know, several different jobs. He got into IT and he worked up from help desk to like elite architect position. He, you know, he's a union worker and he's like very much like work, work, this is the way to work in America. Like, this is how you become successful and get what you want. And he's so, like, when I was a kid, he's like, America's the greatest country in the world. Where he came from and the tradition over there was to send the males to America to get an education. If you were in a well-off, like not a well-off family, but a family that was able to do that for the male children. I don't know why that's a tradition per se.

They weren't really technically well-off. My grandma was a teacher and they had like eight kids. But he was eventually, you know, able to come to America. And that was like ingrained in my head as a kid of like that culture of work is this is what you're going to do. And I even, I didn't want to technically, I don't want to go for tech for school originally. But I was good at it and I was interested in it and I knew it made money. I really wanted to go for fine art.

But I did not have the money to pay for a fine art degree. I wanted to take out loans, but I didn't want to take that many loans out. And my parents wouldn't help me pay if I did fine art. So I had to meet somewhere in the middle. So I kind of did both. I did tech and graphic design. And yeah, yeah, yeah. So you can take your tech salary and now you can finance your fine art love and do whatever

you want because you have set yourself up to be in this position. And I'm kind of glad your parents didn't let you take fine art because my parents did. And for a long time, I stayed at that $30,000 level that you said. started out at. I didn't, I didn't get up to $200,000 because I was working in, like, what can you do with a fine arts degree? Would you like fries with that? Like, I didn't have, I studied fashion design. David's laughing at me because he's like, I'm not a fashion person at all. So it was like a stupid thing to study for me to study. It's not my passion. I really don't even know why I did it. I would have been better off studying business or I don't

that tech is my friend. When I was in college, it really wasn't a thing. And I just, I'm glad that you were on that path. Now you can continue making money in tech things. Like you can, can you freelance in your tech job? Do they, are, are there freelance opportunities or, um, contract work? So I started out, you know, in my tech role, like after that startup, I worked as a freelancer for a while and that was on the side and even after I got a quote quote real job like my parents would say I stayed on with that freelance client for a while doing doing like one-off work for them because it was a nice extra extra income so I can freelance but like I I did freelance web development for a long time on the side of my job and I basically attributed to me burning out with tech in the long run I would

never actually work freelance in like coding or programming or anything like that again um It's just like I've been in tech for 11 years now. So I've rode this way for a while and I've tried a lot of different things and I'm just ready to move on. Okay. I'm just trying to gather up some ideas before I give you some advice. I love David's idea for a sabbatical. Oh, sabbatical, yeah, it's great if it's available. If it's available.

Right, yeah. But I mean, I've been building up the income with my business for a while now that I've gotten it to at least. what is to match like my pre-tax income to my job. However, I have expenses. Like, you know, everything that makes the blog run, I have people to pay that help me with the blog. I have to pay taxes with that money. I have to pay my own health insurance with that money.

I won't be able to get a match anymore. You know, like all those things go into this whole decision. That's what's really holding me back is because it's like, okay, these expenses are going to increase a lot. Okay. So can you get health insurance through your wife? Yes, health insurance through my wife is more than our mortgage. Oh, awesome.

Welcome to America, the greatest country in the world. We have amazing health insurance. Right. So then maybe not that one. So we're somebody, we're a family that use, like, we use our health insurance a lot. There are certain health care needs that we have to see a doctor like every month. And there's a lot of prescriptions that we get. So we have to opt for her private health health care.

health care that's through her employer because there's nothing on the marketplace that meets our needs. It'll, we don't want to buy health insurance that's like not going to cover anything. So this is the only option that we have, you know, people have gone back and forth trying to give me all these options for health insurance. And I was like, can someone give me an option that makes sense? Jeez. Move to another country. Exactly, right? That's part of why I stayed in the reserves was because, you know, six months, I still get TRICARE. And then after that, after this month, I guess, I go to paying for TRICARE out of pocket, but on the reserve side, it's like $270 for the family.

And when I was looking at health insurance, and I wouldn't say that we have any kind of crazy medical stuff. I mean, I'm crazy, but, you know, otherwise. I mean, it was still, there was a comma in there. And I was like, are you kidding me? Like, I live in Missouri. And we live, like, we believe in like, oh, butterfly stitch. That'll do.

Like, out on a farm. Like, what do you mean? I need to pay this much money. So, yeah, it's kind of, it was definitely eye-opening for me to see that. So I can, that was, that was one of my biggest concerns getting out was that expense. And I ultimately, I had an option that I took. But, yeah, I get that one. Yeah, it was one that I did not see coming.

Because I, there, the, the cost for was last year was different. It was still high, but it wasn't that high. And we went back and looked at it again during open enrollment period for them. Because I was like, okay, this is the time. I'm ready to do this. Let's see what your insurance is. And we brought it up and we called the lady from like, because we looked at the form and we're like, that can't be right. So we call them and they're like, yeah, that's right. And we're like, okay, never mind.

So does your company provide you with health insurance, with good health insurance? Yeah. So currently we pay about a little under $300 a month for both of us. It is pretty good insurance. You know, it's still high deductible, like $300,000 deductible, but it's, um, 80, 20 after that, which is about the same as this insurance that's under her, but with a way larger price tag on the premiums. Okay. So looking at your options, there's, you know, and this is more of like a research opportunity for you, but what is your job?

What do you excel at at your job? Like your day-to-day job. You mentioned tickets and you're doing IT stuff. And I know already that's way over my head. You could tell me exactly what your job is. And I'd be like, uh-huh, uh-huh, that's not my job. What do you do better than anyone else? What do you enjoy doing about your job?

What would you spend your part-time time doing? So just like you went to your boss and said, you know, here's all of the data about how I used to be a remote person and this is all the stuff I did. how can you present to your boss a good pitch for allowing you to be part-time? Look, I do all the stuff that everybody else hates, or look at all the stuff that I'm so good at that nobody else knows how to do, or like, whatever it is that you're doing, how can you pitch it that it's in their best interest to let you stay on part-time with these amazing benefits so that you can work on your side stuff, but you still have the benefits.

So you take that equation out, that like, what am I going to do for health care equation out for a while, while still being able to do the stuff that you enjoy doing at work? Because you don't want to be like, hey, I'll take all the garbage work that everybody hates. And then you're working there 20 hours a week that really suck, 20 sucky hours. Like, or can you load up two 40-hour weeks and then two weeks off? or, you know, there's a part time is whatever you make it. They just have to say yes. They, you know, you can like cobble together, whatever it is that you can do.

It's like, what is it that you're great at that you can solve a problem for them? Do you know what I mean? Yeah, no, this is a great, yeah, this is like an angle I've never thought of before with asking for part time. What I thought about kind of, it's like, I thought originally, like, if I was going to this to my manager is, okay, I do this currently. If I take X, Y, and Z out of this equation, I could still do all of this currently, you know, at 20 hours a week rather than 40 hours a week. So I originally was thinking of ways like, okay, we spend a lot of time handholding people that are higher up at the company through like, so we also like support, like our team supports

this like reporting council and stuff that they, they used to like retrieve a lot of their data metrics that they use for their things. A lot of times, a lot of times. And we have trainings for all this. And all this stuff is out there like, you know, automated where they can go and grab that training themselves and all these things. But we spend a lot of time handholding them for things that they don't really want to take that extra step to go find it themselves. I mean, I take a lot of time every week to do this. And I was thinking about kind of pitching that angle a little bit where it's like,

all right, here's all this work that I'm doing that isn't really valuable, that is already actually out there and available for people to actually retrieve themselves. You know, this is a lot of manual work that isn't necessary. I can still do my job in 20 hours a week, maybe give up one project that I could, you know, I don't know how to do with that yet, but you know, give up one project. And then also we can try to, I guess, increase communications about the resources that are out there. So our time isn't wasted. That could be. And I mean, just because you're asking for part time doesn't mean, okay, I want to start part time tomorrow.

Hey, I'd like to start part time in June. and see what happens. Or I'd like to start part-time and test it for six months and see how it goes. And here's the suggestions that I'm going to make. And leading up to that, and June is a great time because that's summer. So leading up to June, any one of these handholding requests that comes in, instead, like, send them to me. And I'm going to say, here's that resource.

You can just click right here and find that information. and then when they come back and say, oh, can you show me how to do this? It's right here. And then train them to do this. I am very guilty of that because my thought is, well, why should I go have to figure this out? Danielle knows how to do it? I'll just ask her. Now, if Danielle, if I asked Danielle, how do I do this?

And you, hey, it's right here. Oh, okay, I'll go get that link. And you will become very familiar with all those links and where they are. and then they can, then they will become familiar with where those links are as well. A lot of times they don't know where to look. Probably they do know where to look and they're unwilling to look. They would rather you just tell them, oh, click here, click there, whatever. But if you continually push them over there, I'm, I know, I'm hopeful that they will

actually continue to go over there. But, you know, you can start to train them into that. Once they stop getting their hand held, maybe they'll take the initiative. Right. Yeah. And that's kind of already been in place, you know, those little practices that we put in place to reiterate things to people. Yeah, we've been doing that for a while.

But yeah, I mean, that's a great point that you kind of put to maybe look at part-time and ways that I could, you know, talk to my manager about ways that we could do that, which I need to put more thought into kind of figuring how that would look like. Yeah. her big pain point? Right. Does she have a big pain point? What problem can you solve for her?

Does nobody ever do tickets on Friday afternoons? Then you can make sure you're working on Friday afternoons. Oh, no. Everyone's always doing tickets, unfortunately, because it's global. It's like the worst thing about working at a global company is that there's no nine to five office hours. It's 24-7. Okay.

Well, that's not a helpful hint then. Yeah, but it does highlight a pain point of hers is that she, she is, she doesn't want to be available on the other time zones. Neither do I really, though. The only one that I would maybe be available for is like, or Australia, which is like this, like right now, would probably be when they were getting online. But, you know, like stuff like that.

I could probably think of stuff like that. We're like, okay, what are her pain points with our partner teams that we work with? Maybe I can take off some of that from her plate. But I don't know how to structure that with the work that I'm already doing. Like who, how would she receive with like, okay, if you want to move to part-time, what things you need to move off your plate? And I can't give that to anyone else. Like, would I have to hire somebody else?

I don't know how that part of the conversation would go. If you're not holding somebody's hand, you can do your 20 hours and still get it all done. Then she takes the hand holding off of your plate. Who's going to do that? That could be more evenly distributed throughout the team. Yeah, it could be. Right now they're in the, the way that they resource stuff, they try to, whatever they can is like try to like not hire

anybody new. They want to, you know, they try to like maximize productivity. Like I guess a lot of companies do obviously. But there are things that I do. There's like projects that I could be doing but I can't do because I can't, I don't have room for them on my plate. And I've said like, oh, I can't do that. They don't have like the capacity for that. So there's actually projects out there that I can't do because I'm already doing too much though. So I don't know how that I can transfer that to 20 hours and have her be like, oh, that's a good idea, you know. Okay, so research opportunity. But yeah, yeah, I can definitely, yeah.

I'm going to research it, though, and see, like, how maybe other people have approached this conversation in a similar environment. So, yeah, that gives me a good idea. And then if she says, no, you can't go part-time at all, you would leave. Would that change her mind? Sometimes, sometimes that changes minds when you're like, hey, I would really like to go part time. No.

Well, here's what I'm proposing. No. Okay. Well, here's my two week notice. Oh, wait. Let's talk. But sometimes that doesn't happen. And sometimes here's my two week notice.

Oh, well, we'll miss you. And then that's, you know, I worked at one place and this girl said, I can't work here anymore. I have to quit. And the boss was like, no, no, no, let's keep you. You know, tell me what's going on. And then a couple of weeks later she was having a bad day. She's like, I can't work here anymore.

I have to quit. And they're like, okay, bye. And she was like, you can tell she was really ready to quit the first time and she was really not ready to quit the second time and was like, oh, well, I guess I'm going to leave then. Yeah. Well, yeah, I mean, and that could happen too, which I've, I've already thought about it. It's like, I'm good to go.

It's like, if this health insurance wrench did not come up, I'd be gone already. I already had the meeting set up. and I had to cancel it. I was like, oh. Like, is everything okay? I'm like, it's totally fine. Everything's fine.

I would say if you're that close, the one thing you, I don't know, maybe you are factoring this in, but how much additional revenue can you bring through your platform by being full time? Because I would be willing to bet

that whatever that health insurance costs, you'll cover that gap very quickly. So I'm not going to tell you to make the leap because that is for you to decide, But I will tell you that I am paying more in salary right now than I was earning when I left a year ago. And it has grown very quickly with me being able to make those decisions and have all that time. Right. And that's what I've been thinking about a lot lately is that, okay, I've only been working on this platform like 10 hours a week.

If I had 40 hours a week to dedicate to this and even with the income I'm bringing now, like we would be able to do the health insurance costs still. We wouldn't feel comfortable about it. You know, the scrimp and stuff. And that's doable, of course. But it's like, okay, yeah, this is the income now, though, with how much I can work on it. If I can work on it, you know, four times as much, which is what would it be. It's like, that's huge then. And I don't know what that looks like yet, but I know it looks better than what it does now.

So that's a great point, too. And as you think about things from like the marketing standpoint or the brand standpoint or whatever, right, the tagline of I'm side hustling to, earn extra income and leave my job is one thing. The tagline of, I left my job because of this and I will never have to work again, that will also help drive your, I mean, again,

it's, you know, I'm not going to predict the future and tell you what to do, but I'm just saying, you will be surprised. When you do make the leap, whenever that is, you will be surprised,

hopefully pleasantly, by what happens with the revenue at your, your side hustle, when you're able to focus on it full time, not have things throwing off your creative flow and distractions. You're able to use that tagline. Like one of my buddies says a Ferrari, right? He sells coaching programs.

And one of the things he said when he was looking at way in the cost of the car was one of his coaches was like, well, do you think if people see that you have a Ferrari, they're going to buy into your course more? And he was like, well, tangibly he's paid for the Ferrari in course sales. And so it's like,

oh, and that's something people don't often think about. So like I think that even just being able to say, hey, I've already made it and here's why will help everything grow that much quicker. Oh, yeah. I've thought about that as well. It's like, part of my brand, though, is it's always been like, okay, you don't have to quit your job.

You can use your job, you know, to help you. Then, you know, build your side of else and all the stuff to like eventually move away from it. And yeah, that's, that's tracked until I got into this point now where it's like, I don't see myself still going in this direction. And I know how it looks, how it actually would look if I do. It's so funny because I can actually visualize all of it. I'm ready for it.

But it's like my. own and limiting beliefs, obviously, still blocking me. But now it's like, okay, now I'm, I finally figured out like all these, these things that I thought were roadblocks. But now I get to plan around them. Now I don't have, like, I won't have any more surprises. So it's, yeah. You said that your side hustle, your, your blog is bringing in the same pre-tax income as your W-2, but then you have all these expenses to pay. What, what is your side hustle? What is your. blog income after all of your expenses in terms of your spending. Oh, for like our spending, like our family spending. Yeah. So that would be fine. Like we were looking at, I was like,

you know, looking at the numbers now. Like right now, after tax for my paychecks and after like all the other stuff, I get about a little bit above $5,000 a month. There's a lot of stuff that gets taken out of my paycheck. But I get about like $5,000 a month. With my blog, of course, it fluctuates month to month, depending on projects and, you know, launches that are going on and seasonality. Like, it's been fluctuating this year before tax and before expenses, like six, eight, 10, the last three months. So I haven't like, it's still kind of like, okay, it's kind of all over the place still. But after that, I was like, okay, after all that, though, I still think I can put in after tax at least three a month with my wife's, you know, we just will

be able to like contribute as much to retirement, which is, it's fine. You know, I, for a while, it took me get around that because of my retirement benefits at my work. I'll be missing out on that 10% match, which is like, okay, that's fine. I won't be able to contribute that much more extra outside of my 401k and it's like, okay, that's fine. Like, it's going to be fine. Right now. Right now, yeah, exactly, right now. When you are self-employed and you have no, no full-time employees other than your spouse, and you have a self-directed solo 401K, you get a 25% company match. What do you mean?

I have a 25% company match. When you're self-employed, if you open up a self-directed solo 401K, your company can match up to 25% of your salary into your 401k. So you're up to $52,000 or $54,000 contributing to your 401K? It might actually be 56 now. 56. I don't, but how does that work if I'm the company? Like, I'm an LLC.

Yeah, that's a self-directed solo 401K is for self-employed people. Yes. You open up your 401K. You personally can contribute this year. It's 20,500. And your company can match your salary as contributions to your 401K, up to 25% of your salary. So your personal LLC can match in there. And I'm not a CPA.

I'm just telling you this is another research opportunity. My company matches. So 20,000, first 20,500 automatically goes into my 401K. And then 25% of that is $5,000. So now I have $25,000 in my 401K, all legally because that, or 26,000. And then I'm over, I'll be over 50 this year. So I'll get the over 50 bonus. And then any money that I make, my company matches 25% of my salary.

So right now you have a 10% match. And of course, you have bills to pay and all of that. But once you get over that where you are making a lot of money, then your company can throw 25% of your salary in up to a total of 54 or 56,000. So instead of your measly little $20,000 a year in your 401k, you could be getting up to 54,000 in your 401k. But where does that money come from? Is it expenses over my business then?

No, it's the income for your business. Let's say your business makes $100,000 this year and you pay yourself $50,000. Your company can match your salary up to 25%. So 25% of 50,000 can go into your 401k. Okay. I understand that. And I understand how it works like with when I work for a company and they match it, I thought it comes out of their pocket. But it's my company that I have and it's my LLC and I'm contributing to the solo 401k, you know.

It's like an expense for the company. So it's like there's what I was asking. Yeah. So it's an expense. Yes. It would it would basically be like you paying yourself $50,000 to take a salary from your company and then paying your solo 401k 125 as the 25% match. And then the company, the LLC, that. 12-5 is not income because it's, you know, whatever or however that all plays out.

But, but like you're basically paying yourself an extra 12-5. It's just going into the 401k instead of your pocket. Yes. Okay, yeah. Okay. I did kind of know this. I just never knew. Like, I've just never looked into how that would match.

But now I get it. I get it. So it's never going to be income because it's going into that solo 401K. Yeah. So definitely talk to a CPA. Neither of us are CPAs. Obviously, yeah, I'll talk to my CPA. somebody who knows what they're talking about. But yeah, there are ways for self-employed people to save for

retirement. You're just not able to save for retirement right this minute, like as soon as you quit your job. But as soon as you quit your job, you can dabble a little bit more in these side hustles that you enjoy and make money and bring you more joy. Yeah, and have the time to look into these things to set up like a solo 401K and talk to my accountant about how to do that because that actually changes my mindset a little bit around all of this. I think the bottom line is you don't have to make a decision right now. What are you going to do? Like, you can take the time. You have a job that you like. It sounds like you enjoy what you're doing. You're just ready for the next step. So take the time to really explore the options that you're going to go to, the options that you have and the, you know,

choices that you have and really choose the right adventure for you. Talk to your wife. Look at what she's got. Look at what you've got. Look at like her insurance is terrible. Does she want to quit her job? How will? No, she doesn't want to quit her job. She has a really good job. That's a good job. That's a good job and she enjoys it. That's a, that's a, I don't like the word stable, but that's like a stable position that can help support you while you are doing this side job, which can, you know, be the reason, you know, the stability that you need to take the leap. And like, what's the worst that can happen? Right. I mean, the worst that there's nothing really that bad that could happen. I just, it doesn't mean that I can, you know,

like, at first when I was like, okay, I'm going to quit my job. It's like, quit your job. I never thought it's like, okay, when you quit your job, you can always go back and do something else if you want to. It's not like you're stuck doing this thing. It's like I could do whatever I want with my life. I'm not tied to this job. Yeah, you've been in tech for 11 years. Given that you're in the IT field, going back and saying, well, yeah, hey, it's not that I've been unemployed. I've just been working on this project. Right.

Yeah, I was employed at this company, and now I'm going to this company. Yeah, and there's, it wouldn't be a gap on my resume anyway, because I include my business on my resume. There you go. Perfect. If I ever create a resume, I'll do that. That's cool. Never thought of that.

I don't think I'll ever have a resume, but, you know. Yeah, you don't need one, but if you ever do create one. Hopefully, you will never need a resume. need one either. You'll be, you'll be fine, Daniela. Yeah, I'll be fine. I'll be fine. I mean, I've got a good, we had a good plan. We still have a good plan. It's just, you know, I'm on, I'm not on anyone else's timeline but my own, which is kind of like, sometimes I feel the pressure where it's like, who's making me, like, who's urging me to do this stuff so quickly? Nobody just me in my head. It's like, I could, you know, take a, take some time.

That, yeah, but your head can be so, it's such a bad place to be because you just get these thoughts and they cycle back and forth and you're like, I can't, I can't see outside of this. I get it. I hear you. Okay, Danielle, is there anything else you want to share with our listeners before we let you go today? Nothing besides. Don't let anyone tell you your job isn't a real job.

Yes. Yes, yes, yes. If it makes you money, it's a real job. If you enjoy it, what is that if you enjoy it? You'll never work a day in your life. Whatever. Get paid too. Okay.

She is Danielle from I like to dabble. dot com. Danielle, where can people find out more about you? You can find out more about me on my website. I like to dabble.com. You can take the free side hustle quiz or anywhere online on social media as I like to dabble and I like to dabble blog on Instagram. Awesome.

Thank you so much for your time today, Daniela, and we'll talk to you soon. Thank you. Talk to you soon. All right, David, that was Danielle from I Like to Dabble. What did you think of the show today? That was good. I think they're absolutely prepped to leave the corporate world and, you know, eventually when they realize it, it's all going to work out for them.

I really liked your suggestion of the sabbatical. I liked some of the ideas we had for maybe stepping down to part-time or maybe, you know, cobbling together something that could really work out. I really like the idea that you had that, you know, once you separate from full-time employment, you are going to see your side job, your side hustle, your dabble money increase because you have more time to focus on it. You have more time to, to spend on it. And you're like, what was, what did you say? Your creative flow isn't broken up halfway through the day. And, oh, I got to go fix this ticket, you know. So I'm super excited for everything in Danielle's

future. And I really know that they're going to just crush it. Yeah. Absolutely. going to be totally successful. It's not a comfortable leap, but if you're financially ready, which it feels like they are, then once you make the leap, you know, it's just a matter of overcoming that, that fear, that doubt, the imposter syndrome, and making it happen. I completely agree. And I have firsthand experience with that, and it's absolutely right. Now my husband's like, oh, I have too much stuff to do. I can't believe I ever had time to work. and he's happier than he ever was working. So I am very excited for Danielle's possibilities.

And the future is wide open. Okay, David, should we get out of here? Absolutely. From episode 305 of the Bigger Pockets Money podcast, he is David Perret and I am Mindy Jensen saying, Can't say, Blue Jay.