350. 24 hours ago asked a friend to tag along their side hustle, just finished my 2nd shift lol

When life's financial stresses mount, sometimes the most unexpected paths lead to the light at the end of the tunnel. Picture this: a casual chat at the studio turns into a side hustle adventure that balances late-night shifts at photo booths with the real-world challenges of credit counseling and budgeting during bankruptcy. This is a story of resilience, where the pursuit of opportunity amid financial hardship transforms into a rewarding journey. Through this personal tale, we uncover the unpredictable nature of side gigs and how they can become a beacon of hope during daunting times.

Tune in as I share how an impromptu call led me to vibrant events and late-night drives, juggling responsibilities with a day job and family life. This episode isn't just about finding new income streams; it's about the shift in mindset from despair to possibility. Join me as I navigate the world of spontaneous shift work, with the unwavering support of family, and explore the surprising benefits of staying open to unanticipated opportunities. Whether you're facing financial challenges or simply curious about the twists and turns of side hustles, this episode offers a candid glimpse into the power of perseverance.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:31

All right. Well, this is kind of an odd thing to add to a Business Buyer Diaries podcast. But I was talking to someone at the studio and they do some side hustle work and I'm like okay, cool, awesome, I'll have fun doing that, have a good weekend. And it just hit me like afterwards, like wait a minute. Right now, as I'm going through credit counseling, and like having to make a budget and talk about increasing income or lowering expenses, because you have to do that if you declare bankruptcy, like you're obligated as part of the, the department of justices bankruptcy process, you have to go through financial counseling, credit counseling on how it all works, and so increasing income, decreasing expenses. And so I drove away from the studio. I'm like wait a minute, this person is doing side hustle money. Let me give him a call. So I called and said wait a minute, do you need help? Like are you good? So he's like no man. Like we're always looking for people to do it. Do you want to do it? Yeah, I want to do it. Like let's talk about doing it. So, okay, well, let me call the, the owner of the company, and calls under the company and he calls me back like 10 minutes later he's like all right, man, I went to bat for you, um, be at this address at this time. We're gonna work the we're gonna do this event together. Uh, you know, you're not hired on per se, but like you'll get paid for it. But we're gonna chain you in, uh, and it's basically like working at a photo booth, like weddings and corporate events and bar mitzvahs and anytime there's a party and there's a photo booth, rent it out. So we'll chain you in, we'll get you going. The owner has to, like you get to know you and if you're in, then you're in, if not, then you'll just get paid for the stuff you do. Cool, I said, yeah, totally.

Speaker 1: 2:14

So I went home and worked my day job the rest of the day and then at the end was like alright, babe, I'm working a night shift tonight. I'm driving 45 minutes away from kind of like an hour away from home to go. Basically I drive to a warehouse, pick up the equipment and then driving with this person to now go set up this photo booth in. In a city that's an hour away from home, kind of in the boonies, we run a photo booth for three, four or five hours. We set it up and then afterwards we take it all down and then I mean I would take it back to this warehouse and then drive home.

Speaker 1: 2:51

And I don't get home until like one o'clock in the morning and it just hit me like how fast, like hey, when you're looking for something, you you can find something, but if you're not looking for it, like you can't find it. And it's that classic like what are you looking for? And right now, like I can be looking for despair and stress and anxiety and feelings of hopelessness, like our life is over, like this is the end of all good things, and like no, like I'm not gonna, I don't want to look for that, so I don't want to think about that, I'm not gonna bury my head in the sand and pretend like this is my dream day-to-day, but like all right, if there's opportunity, let's go find some opportunity. And here's an opportunity. And so I don't have to look at like the tally of hours but yesterday it was a solid, I don't know like five to one am shift, so that's an eight hour shift or like eight hours from home, but that's a good chunk of time and I mean that adds up like I won't say what I'm, what they're paying me, but like it's more than target, more than home depot more, more than more than uber, more than whatever like this is, like this is money that like it's it's crazy like, and it's very like very spontaneous shift work. So that's why it's going to be higher, because it's it's comp for like an unpredictable life.

Speaker 1: 4:12

And then so went to bed. My wife was great. I went to bed like 1, 45, 2 o'clock in the morning, which which is not me. I'm a nine, 30, 10, 30 PM at night person. That's my jam. Um, so my wife let me sleep in, which is great. Uh, woke up at like eight, 30, nine o'clock this morning and there's a text from the owner said hey, sounds like last night went well, nice work. Uh, someone bailed on their two shifts today.

Speaker 1: 4:36

Do you want to do the? What was it like? The 12 to 3, a 3, 12 to 3.30 shift, or even like a 5.30 to 11.30, and get trained in Until? I'm like oh, dude, thanks for the invite. I can do that first one. I can't do the second one. But no, I appreciate it. Definitely. Count me in, I'm on, tell me where to go and when to be there, and I, and so just now finished up working in a bar mitzvah, went to a brewery they have a really cool upper private room and a lot of really cool people celebrating someone turning 12, 13 years old and ran a photo booth with somebody else. And so how to set the equipment, how to run it, how to have fun and all that good stuff.

Speaker 1: 5:17

And so all that to say, like 24 hours ago I was like I don't know what I'm going to do, like should I apply at Home Depot? Should I get a second corporate job? Like my big thing, my goals out of all this is have something that is decently flexible, with family schedule, pays, above average comp, because I just don't want to do like I don't want to do, to do like basic work at Target or Cup Foods or a grocery. If I can find something that's a little more entrepreneurial, a little higher pay for a more atypical shift, unpredictableness, like let's be a little creative here, and like higher uncertainty, higher compensation. And so here we are. So 24 hours later, we're two work shifts. And so here we are.

Speaker 1: 6:03

So, 24 hours later, we're two work shifts and we're now going to get things ironed out and confirmed that this can be something I can do long term now in terms of like, how many hours, how many shifts, I don't know? Um, my goal number one is provide for the family and that's keeping my day job strong. Goal number two figure figure out how to keep the gym afloat or add some cushion to our home. And if I can't keep the gym afloat I'll have to let that dream go. I've been working on that dream for 10 months. I still haven't cracked the code. So if I were a betting person, I would not be betting on that one. But all of a sudden, to have some momentum, some fun, to be light hearted about something, just engaged on it, like we're going to roll with it. So right now it's four 30.

Speaker 1: 6:52

We're going to drop off the equipment, um, keep building and trust to show I can put in the sweat equity and um, go home and enjoy the rest of the Saturday. It wasn't my dream Saturday. I basically had two hours with my kids and my wife at home and I was gone from like 12 to 5 in the middle of the day. I mean they slept for two of those hours. But it's not my dream Saturday. But it's a Saturday I need to be doing right now.

Speaker 1: 7:16

So I'm going to go drop off the equipment head home. Make the rest of today special. And go drop off the equipment head home, make the rest of the day special. And for the lack of quantity of hours, I'm gonna be extra intentional and have high quality hours with them. Six hours of distracted time is now gonna be replaced with three hours of highly focused, highly intentional no phone, no notification, distraction making, memory kind of things. So I'm going to keep looking for opportunity. I'm going to put in that, that time and that that engagement. I'm going to be a focused parent and I'm a person who can figure things out. I'm going to figure things out one at a time and for right now it's working my day job like a rock star, working photo booth events like a rock star and then being a parent like a rock star. That's where we're going. Let's rock and roll.