If You Don’t Have a Dream

Posted on December 6, 2012 by Will Edwards — No Comments ↓

Today, I was reading a forum post that asked the question: what shall I do over the Christmas break? It immediately started me thinking because I remember it was over the Christmas break, back in 2003, that I decided to start this site.

After the first week of seeing people, scoffing food and general partying, I still had another week remaining of my holiday and I was wondering what to do with the few days I had spare. Well, I guess many people might have decided to do something useful around the house or perhaps just blob-out watching the rubbish they put on telly these days. After all, in a few days, it would be back to the old grindstone.

But I decided to start my new website. I’d created a site previously and my motivation for the first site had been to create an online business. I started a kind of yellow pages for my local area, but it floundered when the real Yellow Pages wrote to me about the use of their trademark. Lesson learned – I am now very careful about such things.

For the new site, I had no thoughts, at first, about making money. I wanted to create something that would allow me to showcase my writing and also provide a useful resource for people who attended my personal development workshops – that was all – and that was how White Dove Books began. After a few months, I had a nice little site that was worth visiting.

Like so many people, I chucked a few banners around the site promoting affiliate products – Adsense had not even been conceived back then. And something happened, right at the end of that first year, that changed my whole view of what might be possible for my new site. What happened was that someone actually clicked on one of those banners, bought a piece of software and I got paid $29 – you could have knocked me down with a feather!

That sale changed everything. I remember thinking that there would be no reason I would not be able to ramp things up. Surely, it was just a matter of traffic. Anyway, I devoted myself to creating an online income from my website. I remember actually saying to my wife that I thought it would take me about a year – how naive I was back then. It actually took me seven years!

But nevertheless, just over one year ago, I handed in my notice to begin to work on my online business full time. It was a real pleasure for me when I finally realised that big goal. Today, White Dove Books is very well respected within the personal development space and I proved to myself that it is possible to earn a living, working on the internet, doing what I enjoy.

Yes, that forum question took me right back there to when I started. This year, over the Christmas break, I will be reworking my vision for the five years ahead. What will you be doing? You know … after you have got the relaxation and partying out of the way? If you would like to think about starting your own online business, I would certainly encourage you to go for it - watch my video about what might be possible for you.

You can build your online business in your own time and eventually, like me, you may get to quit your day job too. Those few days back in 2003 completely changed the direction of my life. I now live by the seaside where I do all my writing. It was the realisation of my dream. Do you remember what Captain Sensible said?

“If you don’t have a dream, how you going to have a dream come true?”

So this year, forget New Year’s resolutions. They don’t work. Instead, get yourself into goal-setting and may next year be your year!

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