I know but one freedom and that is the freedom of the mind.

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Postscript

I spoke again with Melissa a couple of years after she sold her business.

She had trained her replacement, and eventually sold the business to her in several instalments, with a period of overlap where Melissa continued to do the marketing for her, providing Melissa with not only a lump sum, but a small income stream during the transition.

Having ‘retired’ so young I was curious to see what Melissa was up to.

Was financial freedom sitting on the beach every day, while everyone else was at work?

Well, that was definitely part of it, she informed me happily. But something else had happened when Melissa had finally gotten free of the Income Trap entirely.

Like a lot of people discover (sometimes almost too late in life once they retire the more traditional way), freedom from the nine to five, freedom to choose what to do during the best hours of each day, and every day, freedom to think and to create is incredibly liberating.

It looked like Melissa’s freedom, rather than cause her to waste away in idle pursuits, had instead only begun to unleash her creative juices.

In her first job Melissa had been dependent; after starting to save and value her freedom her new job offered her more independence, but it wasn’t until she’d started her own business that she’d become truly independent. But like we saw in chapter 7, there are levels higher than just independence, and freedom doesn’t mean being alone.

Having escaped the Dependence Trap and achieved independence, she was now free to seek out opportunities at the highest levels: interdependence.

‘I sold my list of agents with the business, but I didn’t sell my list of people who contacted me to learn how to edit real estate photos or people who bought my course,’ Melissa informed me, with a light in her eyes.

‘There’s a young guy down the coast who’s looking to create an app that allows agents to upload their photos to a website and have professional photo editors process them for them — it’s a great idea! I wish I’d thought of it,’ she continued.

‘But I can tell you exactly why I didn’t: I found it really hard to outsource editing because it was a high-skill task, maybe even more so than taking the photos. My experience was that contractors weren’t consistently producing to my standard, but that was my standard.

‘Perhaps what I want, and what others are prepared to pay for are two different things. That’s for the customer to place a value on–not me. It was really hard to see that, while I was busy working “in” the business,’ Melissa confided.

‘But I can understand how seeing things from my perspective stopped me thinking of this idea myself. While the agents who hired me had pretty high standards too, agents who take their own photos to save money might really value a service like this. And if it’s set up with an editor rating system, or a sliding pay scale, who knows? It could actually create competition and drive the quality of the editing up too,’ Melissa concluded, the idea clearly forming as she spoke.

‘Regardless, the idea of a real estate photography editing app is definitely an example of virtualising or “productising” a service — and it takes advantage of a resource I’d already built: a list of contractors who can edit real estate photos.

‘I’m even convinced it wouldn’t eat into the business of actual real estate photographers either: I’ve seen the photos agents take by themselves!

‘Like you taught me, you can do something that seems like it might cut into your business, but if it reaches people who were never going to pay for your service in the first place, and introduces others to your service for the first time, then even giving away stuff for free can end up growing your business.

‘The more that there is an expectation that the standard of photography has to increase in the industry, the more people will end up using professional photographers too: even if some end up trying to make do with taking the photos themselves.

‘So I might contact the guy developing the app and see if there is a way we can do a joint venture. As soon as he starts hiring contractors with Photoshop skills, he’s going to realise there is a difference between “doing Photoshop” and using Photoshop to professionally edit real estate photos. The training that I recorded for my Photoshop editors and turned into a course could be of real value,’ Melissa enthused.

‘Also, since selling the business, drone photography has become a real thing. I used to love playing with remote controlled cars as a girl, so that sounds like a fun skill I could learn in my “retirement”. I could hire myself out to several photography businesses at once. Who knows? After the flood-affected houses, my confidence in property investing has increased and now that I’ve bought back several years’ worth of my time with the sale of the business I’m definitely free enough of the Income Trap to be able to work for growth instead.

‘While I’m enjoying my freedom for now, whatever I end up doing next, I know one thing: I won’t be doing it because I need money for the bills that week. And I won’t be looking for someone to be my boss either.

‘I’ll be doing something that I’m interested in, something that I can get passionate about that can help other people too. And I’ve got the confidence and experience now to know I can do that for myself.’

I was so glad to hear that, and I knew exactly what Melissa meant. It was how I chose to live my life: following my interests and satisfying my curiosities. Over the years my interests had changed, but if you can become passionate about something, and you have the time to pursue it, sometimes you’ll find that your expertise and passion can lead you to see a solution that has been overlooked by everyone else. Having been a lifter for most of my life, and trained as a physiotherapist it always surprised me when I’d visit commercial gyms and their bench press stations would have no safety equipment to stop users from dropping the bar on themselves. Once upon a time there was no such thing as safeties for the bench press exercise, but over the years first elite level football gyms, then even well-kitted-out home gym users began doing the bench press exercise inside of what is known as safety racks. But commercial gyms around the world hadn’t caught on. It was like every car on the street had seatbelts, except for taxis. It was bizarre. But I hadn’t given it much thought for years until I read an article about a young man in Queensland, not far from where I used to live, who died in a tragic bench press accident. I set to work combining my knowledge of lifting and my experience with building equipment for my own home gym, to come up with a solution that was affordable for commercial gyms to implement, without having to replace all their existing benches.

I shared my idea with Melissa and we talked about how it could not only save lives, but countless serious injuries each year.

‘Well if you are going to patent that, do you need someone who can draw up 3D designs?’ Melissa asked. ‘And you’re probably going to want a website too, right?’ she added.

I smiled.

It looks like Melissa’s retirement may not last that long after all.