Hello, fellow Steemians!

I have been on the platform for a couple of months now, and I have noticed that many people here wish to become financially independent of a day job and get some direct control over their own life. For some, it's about extra income, for other self-reliance, or even to shake off The Man. No matter the reason, I applaud this kind of ambition.

I am 42, and over the years I have owned businesses, work as an independent consultant, made money out of my passions, switched careers repeatedly out of a love of adventure and curiosity to see where the new road would take me.  I had amazing successes and abysmal failures. Nowadays I'm earning the lower end of a six-figures income while devoting more time to family life than ever before. 

I now want to share the insights resulting from a life of hands-on experimentations. I'm creating this series of posts to help you make your own choices and find your own way. 

I'll keep each post on the smaller side and try to write regularly. At the end of each post, I'll give you a short assignment, some questions you need to ask yourself or some action to take. The idea is to help propel you toward, one step at a time. 

Ready?

What is financial freedom?

Ever lost a job through no fault of your own? A bad year for the business, poor planning from management, a new VP who need to shine by cutting costs and other such situation might very well result in a "business decision" that involve you losing your job for reasons beyond your control. 

Financial freedom is about freeing yourself from dependence on a source of income you don't control and can't influence. It means earning income on your terms rather than someone else's. 

You can achieve it through many means, from multiple income streams, passive revenue, high pay contractual work, your own business and more. 

While financial freedom is often equated to becoming rich, it doesn't necessarily mean so. Sufficiently well-off, yes, but many people will prefer to prioritize enjoying their lives over making a real fortune. That's fine. We all have different goals. 

Is financial freedom for you?

Some of you are considering making the jump now, other fear that their current situation makes it impossible. 

It doesn't matter if you plan to launch a new business, start a side hustle while keeping your day job, start earning income from one of your passion or even to plan to design an antifragile income strategy (more on that in a future post). No matter your situation you can improve it.

What you need to understand is that achieving financial freedom requires both planning and work. The exact amount of each will depend on the goals you set for yourself, and the strategy you adopt. Luck plays a role too, but that role should be relegated to the surprising absence of a difficulty you had planned for rather than basing your strategy on the odd chance a random event will occur in your favor. In other words, if winning the lottery is your strategy, you are putting way too much faith in blind luck. 

You will need to learn new concepts, ask yourself questions you always avoided, have to put words and numbers to things you always left vague. This effort is necessary for any real success and autonomy. 

While there are learning and effort involved, keep in mind that anyone regardless of their level of occupation or their current station in life can aim for financial freedom as long as you are ready to put the time and energy. There is nothing overly complicated about it, but it does require evolving the way we look at things. 

Is it safe?

Remember what I said about luck? As long as you don't bet on luck, you will be safe enough. Of course, there is an inherent risk in everything we do in life, like with breathing and eating for example. 

The idea is not to avoid risk to give ourselves the illusion of safety. It is to understand what risk is and how to mitigate it. Understanding your capacity for risk (financial and psychological capacity, that is) is a key factor here, but we'll get to that too. 

Hiding in a stable job with no contingency plan and without trying anything out of risk aversion is actually far more risky than running small, controlled experiments that are within your personal capacity. It gives you the illusion of safety, making sure that when disaster strike, you are woefully unprepared. 

Fringe benefits

In addition to money and some non-illusionary security, achieving financial freedom through your efforts will be very rewarding. 

Pride in your newfound independence is nothing to scoff at. We tend to accumulate slaps to the face much faster than reasons to pat ourselves on the back. Knowing you have options is powerful, knowing that these options are of your own making is priceless. 

You will become familiar with concepts such as basic risk analysis and the ability to decorticate complex subjects into manageable chunks. Some people build their whole career on these two concepts! They will give you a more critical understanding of the world around you, and a nose for opportunity. 

Last but not least, that critical understanding will also apply to yourself. Understanding oneself is a great gift, being able to ask yourself powerful questions and know that the answers are true is pure gold. 

Assignment time!

All right! Your first assignment is pretty simple: 

Ask yourself why you, personally, want to attain financial freedom. How come you are starting this journey now rather than a year ago, or next year? 

The goal is trying to identify what has changed in you, as well as pinpoint the pain that makes you ready to undertake that change now. 

You don't have to share your answer. 

NEXT POST: GOALS

My name is Maurice Lefebvre, and I'm a trainer and business coach at Quantum Monkeys, with a more business-oriented blog on Medium. If you like what I wrote here, don't forget to upvote and if you think it can help others, help spread the love by resteeming!

Header image: Picture by Jarmoluk, via Pixabay. CC0 Public Domain.