I've heard a lot about people wanting to take the leap. We get tired of our job. We get tired of being unappreciated. We want to do our own thing, make our own money, and be in charge of our own schedule. It's fair to feel that way. I've been there. I want to share some insight with you just in case you're thinking of making the leap of faith. I know you've heard that if you're unhappy doing what you're doing, then stop doing it. You've heard that if you don't like your job, then quit your job. Those things are correct, but you can't take them so literally. You're where you are for a reason. Your life experiences and your knowledge got you to that place. Now, if you want to be somewhere else, you have to make sure you have the knowledge to get there. It's a process, and it doesn't just happen overnight. Don't just wake up tomorrow and quit your job without a solid plan. You may have a plan of action, and you may even have savings or an investor. Those things are great to have, but they don't guarantee success. You have to have more than just what's on paper. You have to have favor. You have to have a calling. Some people are called, and some people just came. You have to make sure that you're not one of the people who just came. Don't just do it because you want to be like the other entrepreneurs you see online. It's going to be a sad journey for you. Do it because there is something tugging on your spirit every day, and you can't shake it no matter how hard you try. Do it because the thought of your calling keeps you up at night. You can't stop thinking about it. You can't stop talking about it. You're drawn to it in every free moment you get. The calling has to be bigger than you. The calling has to scare you a little bit. The calling doesn't have to be religious. It could be something that will just solve a problem or boost self-esteem like the lady who created the Spanx line. That's not an earth-shattering idea or going to rid the world of disease, but it does solve a problem, boost self-esteem, and help millions of women get dressed with a little more ease. It changed her life, and it's touching the lives of many others. It could be something like that, but even with that you have to be strategic.

You have to make sure that you've worked out the kinks in your armor. You can't make this leap if you're not spiritually and mentally ready. You have to train yourself, teach yourself, test yourself, and trust yourself. I didn't do that. I've kind of purposely forgotten exactly what I did because what I did was very stupid of me. I made the leap, but I didn't leap very far. I had the wind knocked out of my parachute rather early. When I left my job, I believe I spent my $35,000 in about three months. I used like $10,000 of it to pay the first and last month's rent on a three-bedroom, two-bath house in a gated community on a lake. I bought new furniture for the house and all. I used $2,000 of the $35,000 to pay for a book proposal to be written up for me to submit to a publisher. The book never got picked up, because the agent I had didn't have many connections to the publishers I needed, or maybe she didn't submit it at all because she didn't really like the book herself. I think she was the opposite of what I was writing about. There was $12,000 gone already. I can't really remember what I did with the rest of the money, but I know some shopping was done, probably upgrading my wardrobe a little so I'd look like a successful entrepreneur. It wasn't long before I was back at my investor's door needing a “hold me over.” Fortunately, I was connected to the right people, so I was able to borrow when I needed to, but it built a mountain of debt for me. Now just imagine if I had made the leap without strong backing and did it on my $35,000 savings? I would have had to go crawling back to a job in only three to six months. That's what I watched so many people do.

You see my leap was favored. My leap was covered by grace and mercy. There were provisions in place even for my shortcomings. Not everyone is as fortunate, so you have to make sure your plan is solid. I'd hate to see you leave your job because the idea sounds good, and then you're right back where you started in a few months. The truth of the matter is that a lot of people who do what I do will lie to you. It's so easy to say “leave your job and take a leap of faith.” It's so easy to say “if you don't like what you're doing, then quit.” I've heard people say that they were sleeping on a couch with a few dollars in their account and now they're millionaires. Something in that story is being left out. You heard Donald Trump say his father gave him a small loan of a million dollars. Wouldn't you like to have that small loan as a starting point? You see there's always something that happens in a person's story that they leave out because they don't want their success to be discounted or taken for granted. They leave out the financial help they received along the way. You have to look deeper.

I watched a guy with a couch story who appears to be a millionaire now. I heard the couch part with a few dollars in the account, but then the story went from there to investing in some companies and making some money and becoming rich to now wanting to teach others. Umm, how did your money go from $100 in your account and you're on a couch to enough money to invest in some companies? I think maybe someone died and left him some money and then he invested it. Or did he spend it strategically to look like enough of a success to implement his plan and sell you on his strategies for sale? Something happened in the story that isn't being told, and that's what you have to take into account. Did someone die? Or did he meet a billionaire with a few hundred thousand to blow? Or was it dirty money? Don't just look at someone like myself or someone on YouTube or TV and not get the full story.

If you had an investor who could float you a million dollars, I'm sure you could make some things happen. If you had an investor who could even give you $100,000, I'm sure you could make some things happen. You may not get that and you may not need that, but you have to be smart before making a leap that you could regret. People are waking up and quitting their jobs today and will be begging for their job back next month. Don't make the same mistake. What I suggest is that you ask for a vacation instead. Use all of your vacation days and take that time to dream and plan. Map out your plan. Look at how you'll generate income as an entrepreneur. Look into who you could ask for an investment or a small loan like Donald. If you won't be asking anyone and you're going to do it on your own, then look into what bills you can cut back on. Map out how you'll pay yourself from your savings. Account for emergencies by looking at the emergencies you've had over the last five years. What were they, and how much did they cost? You can never predict everything, but you can come close. It's very important that you count the cost of your decision before you make it.

After you have the plan in place, now implement it while you're on your job. Let your dream job checks go to an account that you don't touch. Live without the things that you decided to cut back on. Create a mock emergency and put $2,000 away into an account like you had to give it away. Make money from your business the way you plan to. If you say you need to be off of your job to make money in your business, then use your days off from work as your workdays in your business. That may mean you only work two days a week, but that's good practice for the life you want to have anyway. You don't want to become an entrepreneur to work like a slave, do you? So work two days a week on your dream job and make something happen. Do that for three to six months and see how it works. At the end of the six months you'll have saved a lot more money, gotten some simulation of entrepreneurship, and had a better idea of what it will feel like. You have to build while you dream. You can't just dream and then jump. You have to plan. I worked my butt off for four years before I took the leap. Had it not been for my investor, I still may not have taken the leap. I could have left my job and probably could have done it on my own, but I would have been very afraid. I had mouths to feed, so I had to be smart. I was earning $40,000/year in my company, and some people can live off of that. We could have lived off of it, but I still wanted to make sure.

When I made the leap in 2011, I didn't count my income that year. I can't remember what my taxes said. The next year I made $147,000 as an entrepreneur. That was the launching pad. It started tripling from there. My guess was that if I could work on my dream every day all day, I could be a six-figure earner. That's what I told myself. That's what I told my wife. That's what I told my investor. I was right. My estimation was because I saw what I made while balancing the dream and the job, and then I figured in having 40 extra hours a week to build and to brand. I did simple math and that's what I came up with. I was hitting my stride after my leap, so my income was climbing fast. A couple years after my leap I had built a seven-figure brand. It looked like to some that I was shot out of a cannon and became an overnight success, but I had been working for half a decade behind the scenes. I had a couple flashes of greatness early on, but I still had to put in the work.

I urge you to count the cost. It felt so good giving my two weeks' notice. I worked with a smile those last two weeks. I was coaching my coworkers on their dreams. I was treating my clients extra special. I was so happy. I looked at my bosses with a look of satisfaction. They thought I would work a job like that all my life. They had said, “Oh, he must not be making any money if he's still here.” They tried to block my progress by not approving my time off. They did whatever they could do. Some people don't want to see you do better for yourself because you doing better for yourself may mean that you'll be doing better than them. You have to understand that fact and use it as motivation. Don't let it make you angry or resentful. Let it make you hungry. Let it drive you to work harder and to get better at whatever it is you want to do.

Never forget the underlying stories that aren't told, and try to identify yours. Somewhere in your story there is a hidden blessing that is waiting to be activated. As a life coach, I've coached the wives of many successful men. Hearing the stories of some of these successful men, I realize that we have some similarities. Remember it was my wife who gave me $1,600 to publish my book, get some business cards, and a website. Had she not given me that money, who knows when the book would have seen the light of day? In hearing the stories of some other successful entrepreneurs, it was their other half who supported them when they had nothing. I've heard stories of men chasing their dream to be a comedian, a film producer, or an athlete. These men were working regular jobs and then got to a point where the job wouldn't support their time off, so they had to quit. They quit the job, and then the gigs and opportunities weren't flowing in and they were flat broke. In those times it was their women who worked 40-plus hours a week to pay all their bills, pay for their flights or rental cars, take care of the kids, and be the backbone for them. A lot of those men make it and then try to inspire you and let you know you can make it, but they never put their women on a pedestal and say, “If it wasn't for her, I wouldn't be here today.”

I see men today who get married and then quit their job to pursue their dreams while their wives are working to pay the bills. If you're a single mom and you're looking at a male entrepreneur without any kids, you can't listen to everything he says. If you're a single parent and you don't have a spouse who can help pay your bills, then you can't just take a plan from anyone. You have mouths to feed, and who is going to help you when your kids are about to miss a meal? Count the cost!

There is another side to the leap that we often don't take into consideration. There are many female entrepreneurs. We see them living this dream life and building their company. It may seem as if they are entrepreneurs, but many of them still work full-time jobs. Some of them don't work full-time jobs, but they may have a rich father who pays all their bills because she's daddy's little girl. Then some of them may have a rich husband who pays all the bills, funds her company completely, and lets her spend whatever she makes on new purses and clothes. I know this because I'm in the playing field with them while you may be in the stands watching. My wife doesn't have to work, so she could blog every day and post products on her blog and have ads on the blog and look like she's making great money on her blog. But I could be taking full care of her, and she may not be making anything from the blog. There are always pieces to the story that you don't know. You may not need a team, but most likely you will need some form of help from somewhere; and if that help is going to be your savings account, then you need to be extra careful.

Never forget the part of the story that isn't told. What part of your story are you trying to gloss over? What missing piece to the puzzle do you need to find before you make the leap? You see the finished product, but you need to understand the process.

After you've done all of that, then you're ready. When it's time to leap, know that it's a beautiful thing. Don't get stuck pondering on the leap for too many years. No matter how much information you get or how much planning you do, there will always be an element of faith that's needed to make the leap. When I finally took the leap and left my job, I didn't know what to do with myself for the first month. It felt so weird to wake up every day and not have to go in to work. I was smiling all day. I was pinching myself. Fear also set in because I thought to myself, this can't be life. I found a way to make a living from home and only fly out a few days a month. So I was home every day with my wife. I could go to all the school functions for my son. I could go to breakfast every day with my wife. Then I got to vacation whenever I had to work because I would be flying to a new city to speak. It didn't feel like work at all. It's still not work. Don't go from a job to a job. Go from a job to a dream job. If you're going to do it, then do it right. Moving from one plantation to another to do a different type of slave work isn't freedom. I knew I had to create a new life. It's still in the making, but it feels a whole lot better than what I was doing before. I can make my schedule, and I can break my schedule. That's what the leap is all about. Don't go from stress to stress. Go from stress to bliss. I remember just lounging around some days. Work felt like a vacation. After being on vacation for about a month, then I said it was time to get back to work. Then I realized my work was fun. I could sit down and work for eight hours straight and not remember to eat or drink. That was fun work. I was blown away that you could make the leap of faith and then not have to work anymore. I believe in taking that next step because I believe this is how life is supposed to be. We go through phases, and working for someone else is necessary. There is a lot of growth in the climb, just as there is growth in the valley. It all works hand in hand, but life is meant to be lived through, not suffered through.

Get excited for your leap. Don't overthink it and don't stress about it. Make the transition as smooth as possible by patiently going through all the necessary steps. Listen to your heart, not me or anyone else. I said take three to six months, but your heart may say to take 12 months of planning. Follow your heart because it's your path. Don't believe everything you see online. Look at your reality because that's your truth and that's the truth you have to plan and prepare for. You can't plan for someone else's reality because you don't know their full truth. You only know what they show you, so look at your behind-the-scenes and work to make them look like a highlight reel. Today my behind-the-scenes look like a highlight reel. I've been able to create a dream. When I have a nightmare, it's because I brought it upon myself by the decisions I've made.

It's almost that time for you, so embrace your dream and get ready for what's to come. I wouldn't lie to you. Life can feel like a dream. You can go from favor to favor. You can wake up and do what you truly love. You don't have to be a scam artist to be an entrepreneur. You don't have to be a snake to make it on your own. You can live a purpose-driven, fulfilling lifestyle, and earn a great living while doing so. Get ready for the leap.