Tammy Strobel from RowdyKittens.com

Meet Tammy Strobel, writer, author, photographer, tiny home enthusiast, and Online Rockstar.

Tammy runs a solopreneur business at RowdyKittens.com. I’ve followed her work for a number of years and became a fan after I read Smalltopia: A Practical Guide for Working for Yourself.  She’s also the author of You Can Buy Happiness (and It’s Cheap), and Go Small & Be Happy: A Little Book of Essays.

Tammy’s message is right up my street: Go small, think big, & be happy. It pretty much sums up her philosophy that she included in Smalltopia which states:

1. Live Small. Think Big. Do Something
2. Focus and don’t engage in stupid work
3. Build a strong community by helping people improve their lives

Because she’s a former corporate cube dweller, Tammy gets what frustrates people like you and me and offers hope for the walking wounded by acting on this philosophy. I’ve watched Tammy write poignantly about losing her step-dad (here and here), transitioning into a tiny home, and bringing her business offers to the world.

Confession: When I read Tammy’s work, I can’t help but feel I’ll never be the writer she is…and since I’m a male and 55, that’s an impossibility anyway. But in terms of openness and honesty, she provides an example to which I can aspire. She’s right up there with Chris Guillebeau in straightforward communication and shares an equally high rating in the ‘telling-it-like-it-is’ category of influential online writers.

Why Tammy Inspires Me

Tammy’s example inspires me in a umber of ways. She and her husband, Logan, have made life choices to reduce their footprint/impact on the earth, alter their own career trajectories to be closer to family. As her life evolves, Tammy’s business offerings do as well. She seems to adapt to the changes life presents and continues to move forward. The honesty in her writer’s voice in unmistakable as is her straightforward writing style, and openness.

Why I Count Tammy as an Online Rockstar

Being an Online Rockstar isn’t about glitzy, glamorous hoopla. Instead, it’s about being yourself, maintaining and open communication with your readers/followers/clients, and serving others. Tammy qualifies on all fronts.

Note: I’ve never met Tammy, spoken to her on the phone. Our only interactions has been via social media a few years back. But it’s her work that continually speak to me and I hope will continue to do so for years to come.

What I Take Away from Tammy’s Example

For me, the biggest takeaway from RowdyKittens is that enjoying a rewarding online business can be congruent with your values, your personal interests, and your ambitions. You don’t have to be in the business of dominating a market, eliminating competition, or designing and marketing the next big thing. You can be yourself and still impact others with your contributions to the world.

Live Small. Think Big. Do Something.

(Immediately after publishing this, I saw a  Tweet about Tammy and Logan’s Tiny Home feature on HGTV, Click this link to watch a brief video tour of their tiny home.

This is the beginning of a new series of posts dedicated to introducing readers to those men and women who continue to inspire me with their independence and entrepreneurial spirit. I’m calling it Profiles in Freedom because that what each has achieved in their own way. Each have blazed a trail that allows them the freedom to choose their vocational pursuits and express their creativity in the process.

For writers, photographers, painters, and dozens of other creatives, sitting in an office all day is torture. It’s cruel and unusual punishment, but many of us do it until we’re brave enough to draw a line in the sand and say, “No more.” Getting the that point is a solitary journey at best often surrounded by coworkers , friends, and family members who don’t understand why we’re unhappy.

Why would someone earning $80k per year be unhappy? That’s more than most people in the world earn and yet, if it’s $80k earned in a job or profession that isn’t right for you, trust me, there is little contentment experienced in the process. In fact, I maintain that the more a person earns in a job she doesn’t like, the harder it is to draw a line in the sand and walk away. But walking away is a must for creatives to experience freedom and contentment.

Contentment, Freedom, and Choice

In each of the profiles I have planned, we’ll see a person who deliberately chose to walk an unknown path. They traded in a regular paycheck, benefit packages, and for some even stock options, for the uncertainty of entrepreneurship on a scale-of-one. They looked at where they’d come made the choice to veer off into a lesser-known path.

It reminds me of the Robert Frost poem, The Road Not Taken:

 The Road Less Traveled

Solo-entrepreneurship is definitely the road less traveled; but increasing numbers of adults have come to the place where they know a change in necessary not only to experience peace of mind and to provide an outlet for creative expression, but for reasons related to living a simpler, more deliberate life. The subjects of the Profiles in Freedom came to this same place and made a decision – to take the road not traveled.

What’s Next?

Are you in this place? Do you feel yourself getting closer to the point of making a similar decision? If so, take heart, friend. You are not alone.

You simply begin.

You’ve got to start somewhere

That’s it. Of course we could point to adages like the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, but if we break it down to its irreducible element, you simply have to start.

Much like being faced with a new blog without any posts, you simply have to sit and write one. You can’t wait for perfection. You have to just sit your ass in the chair and get some work done.

That’s what I’m doing here on BarryMorris.net. The focus is not to spend years talking about it but to do it (whatever ‘it’ happens to be for you).

Here are my four steps for getting started in digital entrepreneurship…

1. Decide what you can spend the next five to ten years doing
2. Discover where your thirsty crowd resides
3. Plan a logical sequence for your tribe to follow
4. Get busy creating the first step

Let’s talk about each of these…

Decide what you can spend the next five to ten years doing

What is it that really gets your motor humming? For me it’s writing and teaching. For you it could be running and weight lifting, knitting and dressmaking, or muscle cars and motorcycles. Whatever it is, it’s something you can see yourself being involved in for a decade and still remaining excited.

Jonathan Mead over at PaidToExist.com puts it this way:

Whatever it is, it’s what comes natural and easy for you.

What is it you that you could write about, talk about, teach people about, share with someone over coffee or dinner, of come to the rescue by rolling up your sleeves and helping someone through? When you answer those questions, you’re very close to knowing where your tribe is also.

Discover where your thirsty crowd resides

For every goal you’ve ever achieved, there are hundreds of thousand of people who also want to reach. Ask yourself where you hang out online and off? Where do your friends who share your interests hang out? Make a a list of the websites you visit over and over, blogs you subscribe to, or online stores you visit online.

Begin to think how you can become visible to these same people who also visit these sites and read the same blogs. We’ll cover that more in later posts, but for now just start making a list.

Plan a logical sequence for your tribe to follow

How do you ascend a staircase? How do you climb a ladder or a tree? The answer for most of us is one step at a time. Your tribe that will assemble around your website, newsletter, forum, podcast, conference, etc. will be looking for a logical sequence or process to follow.

In cas you haven’t noticed, I’ve given you one in this post. Because each step is a logical sequence, chances are good that you’ll follow through. If I only gave you some vague ideas without a sequence, you might follow through, right? It’s like telling my 17 year-old son to do his chores. Unless I give him a logical sequence on a written list, they won’t get done.

Humans love logic and order. You’ll create a loyal following if you keep that in mind in all that you do online.

Get busy creating the first step

I’ve given you a four-step process in this post. The first requires you simply think. There is no resource to access save that of your mind and heart. You don;t have to expend a lot of physical energy or purchase anything. That makes the first step easy to take.

• If your first step is to create a blog, then the easiest place to start is securing a domain name
• If you first step is to write a blog post, then maybe a mind map on a pad of paper is the easiest step to determine its content
• If it’s to write an eBook, then sit at your computer in front of a word processor and type

For example, my area of focus (writing and teaching) will determine where I find my tribe (blogs I read and subscribe to), the logical sequence of actions, or products (free eBook, Free podcast, paid books, paid eCourses) , and where to begin (this blog post).

What to do now

Get busy pursuing the four steps I’ve outlined:

1. Decide what you can spend the next five to ten years doing
2. Discover where your thirsty crowd resides
3. Plan a logical sequence for your tribe to follow
4. Get busy creating the first step

Please let me know if I can be of service by leaving a comment.