Side Hustle to Full-Time Business: The Truth Behind Transitioning

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In the social media world, it is idolized to quit your full-time career and start working as an entrepreneur. You can work five hours in one day and make thousands of dollars, where everyone’s hitting 50 K months and everything’s all good and jolly and holly, right?

That is wrong. I want to be truthful.

I actually quit my job in 2021. Working as a full-time NICU nurse, and I ended up quitting because I had to decide whether I wanted to be half in, half out in my life in Germany. I had what they call a per diem position, so I could have flown back and forth every six weeks to go and work.

Robin and I had a hard conversation and I was like, you know what? I don’t want to be half in this life. Because then I would be half in the US, half in Germany, trying to figure it out. So, I actually had no plan of quitting my job…It just happened. It was something that was spontaneous and looking back on it, I have zero regrets.

It was something that hit home because I was in this place of knowing that my business is growing and I have all of these things that are going well, and now I am going to quit this job? With that job I was making over $200,000 a year!

I had very stable income, owned a home, and we had all of these good things going. When you make that switch from your side hustle being your full-time business, you start to feel that pressure. You have a little bit of pressure of, can I do this? Is this the right thing for me? Was this something that I should have done?

Because of that, it led me to question, what can I do? What kind of things can I do to make myself feel safe, prior to quitting my job? If you’re somebody that’s looking to quit your full-time position, make sure you have that money saved! You want to have that cushion, because in entrepreneurship, it’s not typically stable starting out.

You don’t know that every two weeks you’re getting a check, right? One day you can make $5,000, another day you can make $0. Having money saved up really makes a huge difference in the whole outlook of everything.

Lessons that I learned from quitting my job before I was ready:

1. You have to be all in.

You’re going to stop treating your business as a hobby, right? You’re going to want people to pay you for what you’re worth!

If you’re reading this and you’re currently doing a lot of things for free, I want you to stop and reflect on that and think to yourself, if this was how I fed my family, would I be doing this campaign for free? Would I be coaching this client for free? Would I be doing these 30 minute free consultations?

Time is money and you have to reevaluate and see that when you have a side hustle, you want to treat it like a full-time business. When you do quit that position, you’re going to be ready to go.

2. Mourn your own old life.

Like as I said before, I had a consistent paycheck. We were doing all different types of stuff, like traveling. Luckily my business has grown and I still am able to travel like I did before, but it’s okay to mourn that old life! It’s okay to mourn the things that you used to do and the things that you used to have, in that same way, it gives you the fire to continue to work towards those big scary goals that you have.

3. Pivot! You’re allowed to pivot!

I have pivoted in my business multiple times. I started blogging about travel, then I moved on to being a social media manager, then I was a creator, solely creating with brand partnerships, and then I moved on to business coaching, and now I do most of all of those things except Social Media Management.

4. Create multiple streams of income.

You want to create different ways that you can monetize your business so that you aren’t stuck, and when those brands aren’t reaching out or you’re having trouble signing clients, you have a different way that you can still monetize.

5. You don’t have to do it alone.

You can have online friends, you can join a community, you can have people that are like-minded that are around you. When I was very first starting out and I was thinking about quitting my job, I had actually been asked by my manager (when I was not ready at that point), and so in the morning I was like, omg should I just quit?

I actually had a friend ask me, if you quit, what are you going to do for money? It makes you feel like, oh, maybe I can’t do this…maybe this isn’t something that I can do. But when you have those like-minded individuals, those are going to be the people that push you towards your goals and that are going to be like, yeah, you can totally quit. You’ve got all of these goods things going for you. You’re capable of this and that and that.

It’s nothing against those friends that don’t get it, because they’re not in that position. They just don’t get it, and because they don’t get it, you want to surround yourself with other people that do get it so that they can push you to your highest potential!

6. Closed mouths don’t get fed.

I know I talk about monetization quite a bit, but it’s because you, as a creator, as a business coach, you deserve to get paid! Opportunities are not just going to show up to your doorstep. You have to be actively chasing them.

You have to look out and find those different opportunities – those speaking engagements if you’re wanting to do more speaking engagements. If you’re wanting to work with brands, then taking time to get the right equipment and to show what you can create, and then reaching out to those brands and being like, oh my gosh, here’s what I created. Here’s what I’m up to. You have to find those opportunities because for some people, they do just show up on their doorstep, but that’s not for everyone.

For those of you that those opportunities are not showing up on your doorstep, then it’s time to go and find them! Search for them in online communities, getting involved, researching, reaching out, or sending 50 pitches a day. Whatever it is, look for those opportunities and move forward from there.

7. Rest is fuel

Hustle culture is real. At one point I had a paycheck where I had 122 hours on my paycheck in a two week span. I was working towards paying off debt and saving a hundred thousand dollars to be able to move to Europe.

I remember working 27 days in a row and then going to Mexico and like sleeping the whole time because I was so exhausted. But that is just a reminder that rest is fuel. When you’re resting, you aren’t losing time, you’re just preparing yourself for the next step. Having a consistent constant hustle isn’t going to get you somewhere.

If you need time away from Instagram, take that time because when you come back, you’re going to be 10 times better. I promise you.

8. Invest in yourself

Learn from someone who is exactly where you want to be. When you’re thinking about investing in someone, you want to make sure that they are exactly where you want to be.

If you’re investing in someone and you are not wanting to be on social media all the time, then maybe you don’t want to invest in somebody that posts seven days a week, and spends every minute of their day on Instagram stories, right? You want to invest in somebody that aligns with the goals that you have.

Last year, I invested in a business coach – $15,000 into my business! Which is insane when I look back on it. I’m grateful I made the investment, but it’s scary to invest in yourself because you think to yourself like, oh my God, I’m investing in this person, but I want this to be a reminder to you that you’re not investing in that person.

you’re investing in yourself..

You are going to be the one that’s going to take the action. You are going to be the one that’s going to make the steps. That person is a guide to you. That person is there to help you get to where you want to be, but they aren’t the end all be all. No one person is a solution. The work is the solution. Actually sitting there and doing the work!

If you’re reading this and you’re like, I want to be an entrepreneur because I saw so-and-so who made a hundred thousand dollars while sitting on the beach and sipping on pina coladas…It’s possible, yes, but it takes time. It’s not an overnight.

If you have an overnight success, then it is going to be really difficult to sustain an overnight success. You see people in the music industry that come in and come out. They have songs that are really good, but they just had that one song and then you never heard from them again.

You don’t want that to be who you are in business. I’ve actually seen multiple entrepreneurs lately quit. They quit their business even if they are full-time because they don’t build their business based on the things that they want to do. They build their business based on things that they should be doing.

If it takes you a little bit longer to grow or make more money, but you’re doing the things that you love to do and you’re giving yourself time, you’re going on vacation, you’re having private time, you’re just living your life, then that’s fine.

We don’t all want these 50 K months because 50 K months come with a lot of work. Those people that are coming online and saying that they hit whatever amount of money, that is work that they need to do.

Hitting my first $10,000 month.

In September 2022, I hit my first 10K month and I thought that things were going to drastically change. I hit 10 K months, like everything’s going to change in my life, and nothing changed. Honestly nothing. Everything was still the same.

The amount of money that you make is not going to be the changer in your life. What’s going to really change things is what you do with your income and how you continue to invest in yourself in different ways and start to build up that life that you want.

Yes, having more money allows you more accessibility to different things. Hitting that 10K month, I was very grateful, of course. But as I hit 10K and continued to hit 10K, it wasn’t something that I thought when I hit 10K, it was something that would really change or alter my life, didn’t alter my life.

It was just like, okay, I hit 10K. Like that’s amazing and I celebrated that day. Then the next day it was like, okay, what am I up to next month? And that is when I heavily decided that I needed to create a lot of reoccurring revenue because I didn’t want to continue to think about the next month or how I’m living the next month or how the next month is going.

Creating Reoccurring Revenue

That brings me to my bonus lesson of creating reoccurring revenue, making sure that every month you’re not starting from zero.

You have $2,000 to $5,000 or $10,000 that you know that is going to come in every month, no matter rain or shine. That is what creates more stability for you and helps you reach the next level as you’re making this income.

Do something with it. Y’all, do something with the income that you are making!

Buy property, invest in stocks, learn how to manage your money, because I do know a lot of these large business owners that make thousands and thousands of dollars, but have nothing to show for it, and are constantly seeking the next dollar because of their spending habits.

Be mindful of your spending habits and understand what it is that you want to do financially and building that support system.

The transition from side hustle to full-time business isn’t always an easy one, but I am so grateful that I made the leap. I hope this gives you more of a perspective of what it’s like to go from side hustle to full-time business and of course, my DMs are always open on Instagram @attaliahstrubel.

Remember, you are not alone because you have joined the ranks of the $ocially Paid.