Life is all about hustling. It’s about selling yourself and your skills. About producing value for yourself and for others. One of the keys to being happy is being in control of the productivity in your life. The problem is many of us do things that put us out of the driver’s seat. Whether it is school or a corporate job, activities that we have to do (or feel like we have to do) can make us lose touch with our inner hustler.
I thought about writing this piece today when I saw a commerical for Uber. It was an advertisement trying to attract drivers. It featured an Uber driver switching effortlessly between working, chilling, and driving for Uber on the side. It opens with the line, “these days everyone needs a side hustle” and ends with the tagline, “get your side hustle on.”
It was a great commercial. Great because it made me want to become an Uber driver and because its message is so true. Uber is an awesome company because it taps into that innate human want to be in control of their life–to work when you want, where you want, how you want. And it makes it incredibly easy to do that.
So as I was watching the ad I couldn’t help but thinking how right it was. People don’t all need to drive for Uber but everyone does need a side hustle. Everyone needs to be the master of their action in at least one realm of their life. Everyone needs to be in the position to create their own system instead of only always working within the systems of others. I feel this a key to happiness.
If you have a job where you are in control of what you are doing, where you can create value on your own terms, and you are excited and passionate about what you are doing, then you probably don’t need a side hustle. In that situation your job is your hustle. And that’s great because at the end of day the goal would be for your side hustle to become the center of your professional life.
But for most people this is not the case. They spend their days working within a pre-established system with little control over the direction or methods of their company. They have little ability to palpably improve their company and leave it better than they found it. Very few set their own terms. This is largely what school and college train us for–to have a traditional job where you are working for someone else instead of yourself and to follow the guidelines others set for us.
This serves to kill creativity. Between school and traditional jobs that entrepreneurial spirit that we are all born with. To combat this you need to find a way to hustle. Find a way to always keep that productive, creative, entrepreneurial spirit alive. And if your job doesn’t allow you to do that you need to find something that does.
Build a blog, start a podcast, do freelance consulting for your field, design a program–build yourself as a business. Wherever your skills, passions, and interests lie find a way to monetize it. Go into business for yourself. If your circumstances prevent you from going full hustle, then start something on the side. Figure out how to use your skills to directly produce value for other people. Find your side hustle.