Yash Chandra: Post

I have been meaning to write this post for a while now. I started a bootstrapped business as a part time venture but I finally made the call to quit my full time job in January 2015. The reasons I wanted to do this :

I always had that itch to do something of my own. The idea of creating something of real value excited me. Corporate job was not going anywhere (good money, horrible feeling that life is sinking away)
Location Independence (even though I recently got a small office close to home but I still have the freedom to decide when to go, when to not go to office)
Ability to take time off whenever the heck I want. I don’t need no paid vacations. Note that this is possible with bootstrapped business where I have full control. For venture backed, I understand it may be a bit different. Funny thing is that I hardly take time off now because of my passion for the business but man I love it. However, with corporate jobs where I had tons of vacation, it felt empty.
I wanted to create something of real value which impacts people’s lives. Sounds flashy but the feeling that my business is directly impacting people’s lives even if in a small way is so satisfying.
I want to make shit load of money. Notice that this is listed after the previous items because money is not everything but I sure will be lying if I said I wanted to not make money. But money not at the cost of freedom of how I want to m ake that money (Am I still making sense lol). In a job, you start getting maxed out at 250K tops unless you are talking about the big guns like Google etc and even at those companies, making over 250K salary is not that common even though possible. Yes, bankers can make a lot too but god I hate their life. A reasonably successful business of your own and you could make that cash. Of course, I make shit money right now for myself because I re-invest back in business. Irony I guess of being an entrepreneur. More than money as income, I want to create wealth for myself and my family. With a good business that is setup, it won’t go to zero if I decide not to work in it actively after a while when I have setup a good team. With a high paying job, you are back to 0 the moment you quit.
I LOVE the feeling of waking up and going to do my own thing every day. Yes, some days are low as crap and some days I feel like I am on top of the world. Rollercoaster baby. But I love that.
Why have 1 boss when you can have many a.k.a. customers. Haha ok joking about the boss part but what I really mean is that if you have a bad customer, you can always fire them and move on. Your business ideally should not depend on one customer. With a job, you depend on your boss. I started the business so that I could diversify that risk of just depending on one boss/customer.
Did I mention I always had that itch ? The itch is not something you can learn to have. You have it in you. Yes, you can learn the skills that are needed to be successful in a business but the will and desire to put everything on the line is not something you learn. You either have that itch or you don’t. period.

I have to say that until I did this, I worked in the industry for 10+ years and I never really hated my job itself. I met some really smart people whom I still try to stay in touch with and I learned a lot working in my professional career. I never had a job that I truly hated. So what was the problem ?

I just had that itch to do something of my own. Really bad itch. It was itching for years before I could actually take action but I am so glad that I did this.

Downsides ? so far, my income has gone down dramatically (< 50%, ouch) and no more easy money (yes, I always felt that my jobs made easy money for me. secure paycheck and all). The wife does not like this but she totally understands why I am doing this and what the potential is.

If I fail, I will not be disappointed because I will have no regrets. I didn’t want to be on my death bed and cringe that I never tried to do something of my own. That part is taken care of.