1% Better
Posts
I Quit My Job. Here’s How You Can Too

I Quit My Job. Here’s How You Can Too

Alex Finn
April 20, 2023

This is the best week of my life. This isn’t hyperbole. I accomplished a dream I’ve been working towards forever. The dream of working for myself.

I’m going to walk you through my story (as concisely as I can as not to bore you) and give you all the tips I can. This isn’t a self serving story, I hope you’re able to take a couple nuggets out of it that will help you on your creative journey.

I’ve been doing a bunch of user interviews with you guys over the past couple of months and my biggest takeaway was 99% of people’s goals were to live a life of freedom. Where you do whatever you want whenever you want, and make a living off it.

I accomplished that this week and want to take you on this journey with me.

Let’s get into it…

I Quit My Job. Here’s How You Can Too

I’ve always hated authority. My parents can certainly attest to this. Sleeping through every class resulted in a 2.6 GPA in high school and 2.4 GPA in college.

At work, I detested being told what to do. I'm the type of person who, when given a directive, finds a way to do the opposite.

I knew from a real young age the standard 9-5 hamster wheel wasn’t for me. A life of answering to others and being bossed around wasn’t it. So I hustled.

Every day of my 10 year career (I’m 32 now) was spent working my 9-5, then coming home and building something. The laundry list of failed projects is absolutely immaculate:

Gym membership app
Social network
Messaging app
Ecommerce drop shipping store
Stock scanner
Crypto scanner
Sports blog
Sports Twitter account
Traditional finance blog
Stock portfolio app

Failure after failure after failure after failure. Then in March 2021 I discovered something new.

I found NFTs, a technology I absolutely fell in love with. Now listen, I get it. If you found me from outside my popular Twitter account, you’re probably rolling your eyes right now. NF f*cking T’s? The tech is cool and I was obsessed.

So I started writing. I started a Twitter account and chose the most obnoxious tag I could think of - NFT God (yes this was literally my entire decision making process for the name).

I loved NFTs and I love writing. Writing has been a hobby of mine since I was 5 when my parents bought me a typewriter.

I didn’t realize it at the time but I hit the jackpot. I had a hobby I was uniquely skilled at and combined it with a passion I was radical about. A once in a lifetime collision.

This is the combination you look for.. What are you crazy passionate about and what are you uniquely skilled at? Not passionate about anything? Put yourself out there until you find something you’re passionate about. Not uniquely skilled at anything? Well goddamn start learning some cool skills. There are NO excuses for why you can’t find this combo.

I started hitting post every day. I was sending 2 tweets a day, 2 threads a week, a newsletter a day for months. I was pumping out way more content than I am now, and I was sending it to significantly less people.

I wasn’t doing it for the likes or engagement. I was doing it because I just goddamn loved it. After 8-10 hours on the grind at work it felt good just to get my thoughts out in some content.

If you do it for likes and engagement you’re going to fail. Engagement isn’t predictable. You need to do it for the love. If you don’t love what you’re creating, you might want to try creating something else.

Writing about NFTs was just a casual hobby for me. It was my release after a stressful day at work.

It was right around the time I started writing about NFTs that I was promoted to a leadership position at my company, putting me in charge of 4 people and adding substantially more responsibility to my plate. I needed this release.

As my audience grew, my content evolved. I started learning about audience building and making better content. So my tweets and newsletters started talking way more about growth.

In June 2022, I went viral. It sent me from 5,000 followers to 15,000 over night. It was off a thread that showed people how to use a few analytics dashboards.

That was my ‘aha’ moment. People just want value. That’s it. They want to read your content and learn something. They want to read what you have to say then think differently.

So I leaned all the way in.

Your reader just wants value. Value could be giving them more knowledge, changing the way they think, or making them laugh (preferable all three.) Anything outside these parameters is self serving.

I did it over and over and over and over again. Every week I tried to put out 2 threads that presented novel ideas. I was a machine. I did the same thing repeatedly week in and week out and enjoyed the hell out of it. Come December and I was right around 100,000 followers and 20,000 subscribers.

Your odds of success are a reflection of your ability to do the same simple things over and over again over a very long period

I was working 8am-7pm at my job then working on NFT God content from 7pm-2am every single night, day in and day out. I wasn’t conscious of my workload. I was sacrificing every second of every day to pursue this dream. I was a runaway car on a highway.

Then in December I started my community- The 1% Club. My already way too full workload hit a tipping point. My mental, physical, and spiritual health started taking a massive toll.

I was sleep deprived, angry, burning out, overworked. Everything I was doing suffered because of it. I was on the ledge. Then on January 13 I lost it all.

Got tricked by Google. Clicked a sponsored link instead of the real one. Put malware on my computer and opened the backdoor for hackers. They stole 6 figures of digital assets, hijacked my Twitter, newsletter, and Gmail accounts. They took my money, started sending out tweets and newsletters with hacked links, and did whatever they wanted with my digital identity.

I didn’t think there was any more ledge left, but I certainly found it.

I had nothing left. I was at the psychological and physical low of my life. My cup was completely empty. I was as close to completely burning out as one can get.

If I kept going down my current path I was going to lose it all. I was going to lose my job and my media accounts. I had to make the impossible decision. Either my job or my passions had to go. Had to be the job.

Just as a note about my finances before I made this decision: I’ve known this might be a possibility since the day I went viral last June. I started saving everything at that moment. I have about a year of expenses saved. I also have three streams of income with NFT God: my newsletter sponsorships, my private community, and my social media/marketing consulting business. This took a ton of risk out of the decision.

That next Friday I scheduled a call with my boss. I didn’t sleep for three nights leading up to that day. Was I really about to torpedo the career I’ve been building for so long to tweet and write newsletters full time?

This is what I love. I imagined scenarios in which I leave my job. I couldn’t imagine a single scenario where I leave NFT God.

Here were the calculations in my head:

Worst case scenario- it doesn’t work out and I find a new job eventually. Back to square one with nothing lost. I had a years worth of expenses saved up and on top of that the money I was making from newsletter sponsorships gave me a little more runway.

Best case scenario- I achieve all my dreams and goals doing what I love.

It’s an asymmetrical bet on myself I had to take.

The older you get, the more responsibilities you accrue. The more responsibilities you accrue, the less risk you can take. Take the big risks and bet on yourself when you have the opportunity.

Which brings us to today. Week 1 of freedom. I have so many plans. I have so much more to give. I'll be building a YouTube channel, Instagram, eBooks, courses, and software products.

I’m going to turn the 1% Club into the best community of builders on the internet. I now can spend every second of the day building products that help others get to where I’ve gotten and so much further.

I’d be lying to you if I told you I’m 100% calm cool and collected about all of this. I still feel a weariness in me, but I think that’s natural. One thing I do know for sure though is that I’m wildly excited to show you what’s next.

AI Prompts I Used For This Newsletter

Begin Prompt

I wrote a newsletter today on how I quit my job recently to pursue my dreams. Please give me feedback on this newsletter. Is it concise enough? Is it readable?

{newsletter rough draft}

End Prompt

Begin Prompt

What spelling and grammatical mistakes do I have in this newsletter? What would be your recommendations for fixing them?

End Prompt

Begin Prompt

Please create an outline of the newsletter. Include any novel or interesting ideas I presented that would stand out to the reader and make them think. Also include ideas for tweets, threads, and follow up newsletters I can write.

End Prompt

1% Club Update

If you’re not in the 1% Club yet, you are missing out on the best private community for builders and creators on the internet.

Starting in May, all of my Saturday TTPQ (Tweet and thread template, AI Prompt, book quote) newsletters will become 1% Club exclusives.

I work every day to brainstorm the best templates in prompts in the space, so I deeply appreciate your support.

The Thursday 1% Better newsletter you’re reading now and all the other content you’re used to will remain free forever.

Alongside the Saturday TTPQ newsletter, you also get daily mastermind calls and direct access to me and top creators in the space.

The heart of the 1% Club lies in our work sessions – an all-day every-day, collaborative voice chat transforming the way entrepreneurs work together.

If you’re not in the Club yet, join 680 others by signing up below. I promise it’ll be an investment in yourself you won’t regret. If you find you’re not getting value from it, I’ll personally refund you the membership fee. Hit the button below to enter the club:

Take care and have an excellent weekend!

Join the conversation

or to participate.

I Quit My Job. Here’s How You Can Too

Contents:

SPONSORED: Disowned Gods

I Quit My Job. Here’s How You Can Too

AI Prompts I Used For This Newsletter

1% Club Update

Join the conversation