4 Steps You Can Take To Get Paid For Doing What You Love
1. Pursue a Hobby
Choose a hobby with tangible output that appeals to you. Pursue your hobby every day before or after work. Learn. Improve. Produce.
This is what I did when I started teaching myself Austrian economics and libertarian political philosophy. I read book after book. I wrote blog posts, participated in forum discussions, and, with pretty much zero graphic skills, created cut/paste comics about economics.
2. Convert your Hobby to Volunteer Work
Offer free services to others in the field of your hobby, utilizing your new skills. My first blog post on my Mises Community blog was selected by the Mises.org editor Jeffrey Tucker to publish on the main site. Soon I was regularly writing for the site for free.
Also soon after I began actively participating in the forums, the head moderator offered me a role as a volunteer mod. Jeffrey soon put me in charge of the forums, which I continued to work on for free.
3. Convert your Volunteer Work to Part-Time Work
If you keep providing good, targeted value for free and if you cultivate a good reputation, eventually you will likely be able to create opportunities for paid work.
In the moderator discussion board, Jeffrey posted about needing someone to help launch the Mises Institute’s new online course platform, the Mises Academy. I wrote a reply explaining why I would be great for the job and immediately got it. As a contractor being paid for 2 hours per day, I taught myself the CMS (course management system) Moodle, created the basic structure for the Academy’s program, figured out which video conferencing platform we’d use, and coordinated and helped design the pilot course, which was very successful. I continued to run the Mises Academy as a part-time contractor for two years while still working my day job.
4. Convert your Part-time Work to Full-Time Work
If you excel in your part-time work, eventually you will likely be able to parlay that into full-time work.
After two years of contract work, and opportunity arose for me to bid for a full-time staff position at the Mises Institute, which I immediately did. Very soon, I got a job offer from Lew Rockwell.
In a matter of 3 years, I turned a hobby into a career.
This is not to say that everyone who loves liberty will be able to earn a living in the “movement,” or would even be happiest doing so. I’ve always been a natural writer and scholar, so I was particularly suited for it.
And any given hobby you pursue might not be viable as a future career. Still, it is definitely worth it to carve out time in your life for the playful pursuit of a passion on the side.
Pay attention to the reception you get for your output in that hobby. Adapt accordingly: both in terms of which hobby you pursue and how you pursue it. At the very least, it will inform and invigorate your day job and your life in general. But if you’re persistent in striving for skill-acquisition, output, and value-creation, you may very likely be able to convert your hobby into the career of your dreams.
