The following post originally appeared, in slightly modified form, on Lazy Man and Money. He’s all about alternative income, of course, which is the subject of this post, so his blog is a great place to brainstorm.

Spend less than you earn is the wrong way to think! Your time will be much better spent thinking of more ways to make money than it will be thinking of ways to save money. Chances are good if you read this blog that you’ve already given some thought to alternative income, but let’s back up. Everyone has a primary source of income. Usually it is a traditional job - an employer who asks them to show up from 9 am to 5 pm, file a TPS report and pay an ungodly amount of taxes for the privilege of being laid off in a restructuring when the company misses earnings estimates by $0.01. Income can also come from self-employment, a small business, unemployment checks, a pension, or hundreds of other primary sources. Alternative income - which is sometimes referred to, incorrectly, as passive income - can come from rental properties, royalties, investments or other sources. All of these sources could also be primary income to someone but usually these are income streams that people receive in addition to their primary income. To be truly rich one thing is certain: for every ’stream’ of income you have, you should have an alternative. Alternative income is the key to wealth.

Most people have a single source of income. They work for employer Megacorp or Wal-Market and receive a paycheck. Some people may have a trickle of investment income, or occasionally sell something on eBay and then give up after a few sales, but a large number of people consider catching up on the final season of NBC’s beloved quirky comedy “The Office” a better use of their time than trying to earn more money after a tiring day in the office. Their goal is to get by on minimum work, minimum income and maximum “down-time.” Alternative income seems like a lot of extra work to these people, and extra work isn’t what anyone wants.

However, there are many advantages to finding alternative income, not the least of which is being able to get rid of your primary income stream. Having alternative streams of income means that no one stream can direct your life. Do you think you could tell your boss you were going to quit at the end of the month if your wage is your only source of income? Not unless you had an offer letter from your next ex-boss ready. But what if you had 15 streams of income? What if no single stream accounted for more than 10% of your total income? You could do a constant analysis and drop underperformers. You could drop streams that were inefficient, or frankly just made you blue. This is why being a consultant is better than being an employee, and why owning a business is better than being a consultant, and why creating content is better than owning a business - ease of adding and dropping income sources. Consultants and businesses and especially content creators can have more than one ‘employer’ at a time. No one ‘employer’ becomes critical for putting Domino’s on the table.

There are two more advantages to alternative income besides diversification of income sources. First of all is the expansion of skills. Creating an income stream from a website you create or eBay sales or a small business is a completely different skill set than being a financial analyst, for example. Not better, not worse, but different. Even blogging about financial analysis is a different skill set than being a financial analyst. Every time you create a new revenue stream, you are expanding your skill set. You are learning something new, and making it that much more likely that you’ll be able to add further income streams.

This leads to the greatest advantage of alternative income streams of all. This is the viral nature of alternative income. For the first 10-12 years of my working life, I never thought there was any point in worrying about income past my wages and a quarterly trickle of dividends from my stock holdings. The truth is that when you start thinking about creating alternative income you’ll find out that something funny happens. Your ideas will snowball. That first idea will spawn two more, and they’ll each create two more. You’ll get excited the first time you make a few dollars that didn’t come from your employer. You’ll see opportunities everywhere and even though many won’t work out, some will. The one that does will give you a lead to another stream. That stream will inspire you to create another. You won’t be content to sit back and wait for your corporate payroll department to mail you that never-changing check every two weeks. You’ll want more, and by wanting more you’ll find more. Once you understand that alternative income is the only way to real, long-lasting wealth every idea you have could be the start of something amazing.

So even if you come up with an idea for generating an extra $10 a month, don’t sneer at it. That $10 a month idea may someday serve as the basis for a $100 per month idea. That $100 stream may help you gain the skills and experience you need to have for a whole new stream that generates $1000 per month. If you see where this is going, you see the possibilities. Keep an eye out - you never know when you’ll come up with the next small idea that could turn out big!

Money Writers! Bring it!

Personal Finance Across Borders I - Retirement Accounts

I read a lot of Canadian personal finance blogs. The Canadian language has some broad similiarities to American so they aren’t too hard to read. They also have some cultural similarities to America - they play football (albeit with 3 downs and 110 yard fields, I think). Their retirement systems are similar but not exactly the same as ours - and if you’ve ever wondered about the diifferences, this is a VERY good gap analysis (that’s consultantese for “stuff that’s different”). Only one question remains - what do they call Canadian bacon in Canada? Bacon?

Plan Ahead: 6 Steps to Secure Your Financial Future

I completely agree with five of these steps. Saving for college for the kids? Oh boy. I’ve staked out my contrarian position on that one before. I’ve told Little Buddy that playtime’s almost over, anyway - this summer he’s manning the lemonade stand and I’m looking for an ROIC of 10%, at least.

Get a Jump on Summer With These Warm Weather Money Saving Tips

I highlighted these tips on warm weather money saving tips earlier in the week when we were having amazing, summer-like days in the Northeast. Today, it’s 50-something, rainy and gusting wind like it’s November. Whee. Well, here are the tips for those of you who don’t live in New Drearia like I do.

The Power of The Dream

Lazy Man has a dream - he has a business idea that can’t fail. Want to know what it is? Well, read the article and you still won’t know, because he’s not sharing yet, but it’s a great example of someone just getting thwapped (yes, I said “thwapped”) with that ‘big idea’ out of nowhere.

Plan Ahead to Maintain Your Health and Avoid Medical Debt

I’m sure everyone has their own morbid terrors. You have a lot of these as a parent, for example. I am a shivering wreck when it comes to choking, for example - I dread it in myself and others. Nothing freezes me up like choking. Little Buddy is nervous around ladybugs, because he saw one once as he was bitten by another bug, so he thinks they bite. My brother was wearing a Superman cape as a kid that was grabbed and shaken by a dog so he’s nervous around even the littlest dogs. All of these fears pale in comparison to what is - in my opinion - the great American nightmare - a medical debt catastrophe. It’s the only Western country - the only one - where you can lose your home for the crime of getting cancer. Yay capitalism.

Don’t Want To Work Forever? Retire On Time With These 10 Tips!

Who does want to work forever? Do we WANT people to work forever? Has the federal government been improved by having a bunch of 75 year olds represent us in the legislative and judicial branches? Isn’t it time for Larry King to settle down and enjoy his 80s and his toddlers? Seriously - these are all simple tips, but many of them, like not letting life ‘take over’ (a big one for me) - are critical.

Time to Stock up on Rice?

I hate these articles. Not because you shouldn’t pay attention, but just because once in a while I have to shake my head and say “is this surprising to anyone?” My brother’s stockpiling rice already. Rice. Think about it. After wheat/bread and water, that’s about as much of a staple food as there is. The US is the heart of overconsumptionworld, too, so imagine what kind of shortages are occuring out there. This is just a cyclical drought-induced shortage, I think, but get ready for climate change, people. Food is not limitless. This little blob of water and rock hurtling through the void is a closed system - at some point we won’t be able to find new arable soil. Just saying…

Other good articles around the Internet! You bring it, too!

Why You Should Stay Invested in the Market

I agree that you should stay invested in the market, with a caveat.  If you’re an index fund investor, you have to consider this:  if you look at the market from 2000 to 2005, you’d see that it’s gone from 10,650.92 to 10,717.50.  Even today it’s just over 12,000; that’s a 20% return in 8 years.   Not per year - total.  If you’re going to stay in, and you are a mutual fund index investor, you’d better have nerves of steel and be ready to have year after year of 0% returns.  That means returns worse than your 0.5% interest checking account.  So if you’re comfortable that your investment horizon is distant enough to weather those kind of returns (and they very well may be) stay in!

Work? I Don’t Need No Stinking Work!

As a fellow new-parent-non-worker, I found this amusing. I could have written this post - it mirrors my past week (except that I had the flu, too). It is a weird feeling to have no work - you find that your days stay full, full, full. Your personal chores expand to fill the gap. I agree that I don’t need no stinkin’ work. If someone will pay me a mere six figures per year to play dinosaurs, go grocery shopping and wash bottles I’ll stay home for good, too. Anyone? Anyone?

The Financial Realities Of Having A New Baby

…and more on new babydom. Sorry, people, I’m in new baby brain mode. A good point is that you tend to spend more in some areas and less than in others, but in our case the kicker - so far - is the difference between foods. Little Buddy had to go on a hypoallergenic diet (Alimentum) and that stuff is expensive and then some. Pumpkin (yes, I think I’m going with that nickname) is still breastfeeding and shows no signs of the allergies Little Buddy had - meaning her total food cost so far is practically $0. We have also benefited hugely from my two nieces, who have provided a gargantuan amount of hand-me-down clothes and a crib.

You Made Yourself Into Who You Are

Yes. You did. It’s not your teachers’ fault, or your parents, or the US governments’ fault. Only you can change you. Too many people are looking for something to help them change. It took a lot of fat years for me to suddenly start losing weight, and trust me, people tried to help - but I decided to do it, I did it, and nobody else did it for me. If you have bad habits, only YOU can change them. Great, straightforward post. Didn’t hurt to have a link to The Bourne Ultimatum movie, either (spoiler, though)!

Why I No Longer Support The Sierra Club

Once in a while you read an article and think “awww, dammit, wish I didn’t know that, I was happier ignorant.” This was one such article. Scratch another group that I formerly held in high regards - and it just goes to show that the only person you can count on to fight climate change is YOU.

43 Amazing Resources For Writers

This is a cool list if you’re a writer. And you probably are, you just haven’t tried to be one yet.

Retirement sucks!

And after I mentioned not wanting to work forever above, here’s an article about why retirement isn’t all it is cracked up to be. Looking for perfection is foolish, but settling for mediocrity is even more foolish…

photo credit: littlerottenrobin

I realize this is a bit late for a roundup on the April stats, but I’m just finally getting my sea legs back after a hectic (and for me, quite sickly) week and a half. I still want to make sure I thank everyone who deserves to be thanked for their contributions to this site - even though I write the articles, without all of you (readers, commentators, bloggers who link to me or include me in their blogrolls) I would just be keeping a very fancy online journal!

You’ll also notice that I’ve added a few little doodads in the third column towards the bottom - StumbleUpon, twitter and del.icio.us “friend” buttons, as well as a poll. I’m trying to concentrate on those three social media sites, since I like them the most, so if you use them, add me as a friend or network or whatever and I will return the favor 99.99% of the time (the other .01% I might not - a good example is that if you twitter and 99 out of 100 twitters are “read my latest blog post” I might not). And complete the poll, if you like polls; they help me know where my writing should be headed.

Top Referring Sites

(the people who sent the most visitors over to brip blap)

• Million Dollar Journey
• The Digerati Life
• The Simple Dollar
• MSN Smart Spending
• Free Money Finance
• Lazy Man and Money
• Generation X Finance
• I’ve Paid For That Twice Already
• Moolanomy
• Millionaire Mommy Next Door

Top Commentators

(the people who make the comments even more fun to read than my posts!)

• Curmudgeon
• Mrs. Micah
• Solar Yard Lights
• Dividend Growth Investor
• Bubelah
• deepali
• Ron@TheWisdomJournal
• FFB
• SavingDiva
• Four Pillars

Most Visited Posts for March

• are American kids stupid about personal finance?
• the charity customer
• a quick and easy way to control spending
• 15 reasons why you might want to be a consultant
• brip blap getting zen things done

A quick note on the last post - on Leo’s site a commentator asked Leo if he felt that I was ripping him off, and Leo very graciously said he didn’t think so (since I did mention his site and e-book {affiliate link} - and I’m doing so again) and even if I was he didn’t mind.

Since he could have let the comment go without response, it was a nice move on his part. I’ll say again that there was no intention to ‘rip him off’, and I sure hope it didn’t come off that way to most people. Let’s face it, there aren’t many ‘new’ ideas in productivity (or personal finance). For my own personal productivity, I take some things from Zen Habits, some from GTD, some from my dad, some from my wife and even some from observing how kids do things. It’s all a process of reflection. But thanks again, Leo.

As always, I deeply appreciate everyone who reads, comments, subscribes, stumbles and even lurks! Especially over the last month, while I was busy preparing for the birth of my daughter, I really appreciated all the comments during times when I wasn’t able to respond. There are some great comments - I don’t publicize the comments feed as much as I ought but you can subscribe here. Honestly, the comments could often be a whole separate blog in and of themselves!

photo credit: a DELL

As the effects of the mortgage meltdown ripple through the entire lending community, the result is higher interest rates and stricter guidelines on who qualifies for credit. In the wake of what could be termed as one of the most devastating credit meltdowns in the history of the United States, many empty-handed investors are searching for someone to pin the blame on. And it seems that they’ve fixed their sights upon the lofty, mysterious citadel of Fair Isaac Credit Organization.

Mortgage lenders are crying foul play on Fair Isaac, citing major flaws in the company’s popular FICO Classic credit scoring model as being the underlying cause for the economic disaster that has taken the United States by storm. What do these allegations mean for the credit industry, and more specifically, the credit card industry? Let’s take a look at a relatively new phenomenon in the world of credit scores: the so called “emerging credit” scoring models.

Emerging Credit scores are largely the result of a shrinking market in terms of the number of consumers who are considered creditworthy. As the mortgage crises escalates, people who used to be considered an acceptable risk to creditors are no longer eligible for even the most basic of credit cards; but these companies still need to make money somehow, so where do they turn to market their credit products if the old crowd just isn’t going to “make the cut” anymore? The answer is found in the large clumps
of consumers referred to as the “unbanked”.

Unbanked consumers are those individuals who have little or no credit history, either by deliberately avoiding all forms of credit, or simply because they haven’t yet had the opportunity to establish credit for themselves. Either way, extending substantial amounts of credit to the unbanked has long been considered taboo by lending organizations, as the FICO Classic scoring model relied on so heavily in credit industries flagged such individuals as being unacceptable risks for investors. Now, however, companies such as Pay Rent, Build Credit, are bridging the gap between the unbanked and prime lending candidates.

For a long period of time, banks and other companies had little use for organizations such as PRBC. Now, however, in an eager, if not altogether desperate, search for qualified prospects, lenders are turning to information brokers such as LexisNexis, PRBC, and credit bureau TransUnion to dig up all the information they can find on an individual’s “unbanked” payment history, such as cell phone bills, rent deposits, tuition, magazine subscriptions, and so forth. Some agencies have gone ahead and begun to utilize this information in new credit scoring models, dubbed as “emerging credit scores”.

In all likelihood, it looks as if these new emerging credit scoring systems may become mainstream in a few years, which would have a dramatic impact on what credit card options are available to the average consumer as a result of creditors having a more complete picture of that person’s financial behavior. What does this mean for you and me? It simply means that more prudence needs to be exercised with traditionally unreported expenditures, particularly those expenditures which occur on a regular and continual basis, such as subscriptions or rent payments. As always, the new systems invariably favor those who are financially responsible and live well within their means.

photo credit: SqueakyMarmot

1. Learn to cook. You will be healthier (fewer health-related bills if you eat homemade healthy food than if you stop for takout every evening) and you will save money (unless you shop exclusively at Whole Paycheck, and even then it’s probably cheaper). Learn to cook healthy food, though. If you don’t cook, learning to cook will change your life for the better: it’s cheaper, healthier and better for your social life.
2. Consolidate accounts. I used to spend a lot of time worrying about ten different credit cards and five different brokerages and a half-dozen retirement accounts and three checking accounts… you get the picture. It got worse when I got married - but then we saw the light and consolidated our accounts. Now I can go to Yodlee (easily the best account consolidation site out there, bar none, which I get through our bank) and tell you my net worth within seconds, pay all of my outstanding bills in minutes (those that aren’t autopaid) and check up on all of my accounts immediately. Our financial “basics” take less than an hour each month to maintain, freeing us up to concentrate on other things.
3. Get married (and the corollary, don’t get divorced) or at least keep a stable monogamous relationship. If you get married, you’ll inevitably spend more money and save more money, have more time and less time - but I believe on balance being married means you have two brains to assault money problems (and opportunities) and we all know two brains are better than one.
4. Stop trading, start investing. One of the worst time-wasters in my life used to be trading. Trying to keep up with the markets was a losing battle. Sure, I won some and lost some but the amount of time I spent and the tiny net improvement over passive investing was not worth it. Make targeted investments in things you understand. If you understand real estate, invest in real estate. If you understand hedge funds, invest in hedge funds. If you don’t understand anything, invest in some books about finance.
5. Take public transportation if it’s available. I know you love your car, and I know the bus is a half mile away and crowded and doesn’t run on your schedule and blah blah blah blah. Public transportation is cheaper, better for the environment, better for your health (lots of walking and stairs). You don’t have to get train insurance, or fill up the subway with gas. You don’t have to take the bus in for repairs or buy new wipers for it. The bus is destroying the planet at a slightly smaller rate.
6. Don’t buy stuff. I’ve already written about this, but I am a firm believer that you should buy stuff you need and don’t buy stuff you don’t. That’s a simple concept but hard to execute for a lot of people.
7. Adapt to change. Trying to fight change in your life can waste money and make life more complicated than it needs to be. At every stage in my life I’ve found instances where I fought changing my habits - I didn’t want to cook at home (too lazy), to consolidate accounts (too much work), to get married (too busy with career), to invest instead of trading (I was smarter than the market, oh yeah), take the bus (I’m a busy international jet-setter, I have to take taxis!), or make do with what I’ve already got (this recipe calls for peppercorns ground by hand in a mortar and pestle, I couldn’t possibly find anything around the house to duplicate that action). Be willing to change your thinking and you’ll be ahead of 90% of the population of Planet Earth.

photo credit: southtyrolean

I was at a street fair last summer when Little Buddy was first toddling along and knew how to dance just by wobbling back and forth and waving his arms. We were walking with my parents and came across one of the booths playing some music.

If you haven’t ever been to a New York street fair, they are tremendous fun. One of the North-South avenues is blocked off for 30 or 40 blocks and a variety of vendors fill up the streets and pedestrian traffic fills it up quickly. Everything is sold: sheets and bamboo mats, CDs and funnel cakes, high end purses and knockoffs of high end purses. Music blares from every corner, the smell of fried foods and kebabs and onions fill the air, and a good time is had by all.

So in the midst of this street fair Little Buddy tottered along with a protective father hovering over him. We came by a booth selling reggae CDs and blasting out reggae music (or faux reggae - UB40’s “Red Red Wine” - but it’s all good). He stopped and listened, entranced. Two guys who were either rastafarians or very accurate imitators of rastafari style were leaning against the booth, smoking. I am no expert (although I am not a complete naïf) but the smell of their smoke was not exactly cigarette smoke. Eh, no matter, it’s all-natural, after all. I was ready to pass on by with a wry smile, as I do.

But Little Buddy marched up to them and started to dance, beaming like the sun. He turned around in front of the two of them and danced. Everyone walking by laughed. He swayed and popped to the music. One of the two guys turned to me and said, “He is irie, mon, he is irie an’ he don’ care who know.” (That’s my poor written imitation of a Jamaican accent, and it sounds - to me, a fan of reggae music, the most positive, happy music I know - almost unbearably cool). It was a nice comment to make to a still-relatively-new father.

But that’s not the point - the point was that Little Buddy saw his happiness and grabbed it. Children have a way of doing this. They don’t think of consequence and they don’t think of fear or embarrassment. It’s not always a good thing - sometimes caution is necessary - but adults have definitely had this ability to seize happiness beaten out of us. We feel the need to be self-deniers, to SAVE forever for a retirement that may not come or a dream house that will have an empty room because we can’t afford furniture after making the mortgage payments.

If you read a lot about money on the internet, stop once in a while. Buy a latte. Eat lunch in the park. Live your life a bit. I know you need to scrimp and save and deny, deny, deny, but the moments when you can grab your happiness and wring it dry are few and far between. Your money problems will be there tomorrow. Today, be irie.

photo credit: happysnappr

Just in case anyone has noticed that I have been somewhat quiet in regards to comments and emails, I beg your forgiveness and I hope to catch up soon.  Something I never could have predicted - out of all of the things I was nervous about - happened over the last few days after my daughter was born.  I got very sick the day after she was born with what I guess was a flu.  I’ve been staggering around with a 103 fever, unable to eat anything, coughing through the mask I had to wear for fear of infecting everyone else and generally struggling just to keep moving.  Just to put it in context, I am very seldom sick.  After losing so much weight and starting to eat a healthier, natural diet (and washing my hands and using Purell a lot) I’ve found I get maybe one cold per winter and it’s usually over in 48 hours.  I haven’t had anything more serious than a cold except once in the last 10 years (I had a bout with strepthroat about 4 winters ago).

I do count my blessings, though.  My parents and my wife’s parents and sister were supremely helpful, my daughter and son are both doing well, and my wife is recovering very well from the delivery, too.  So there is much to be grateful for.  If the worst that happened was me getting sick, so be it.  Probably the worst of it for me has been that other than the first day - before I realized I was sick - I haven’t been allowed to hold my daughter, which has been a real emotional downer.  But tomorrow I think I will be ‘healthy’ with a small ‘h’ and getting back on board with the fun stuff of parenting and problogging and enjoying summer at home.

So bear with me!  I appreciate all the comments and emails and just felt bad that I had fallen so far behind, and I will get caught up!

This post originally ran as a guest post on plonkee money. Not only the author of a great personal finance site, plonkee’s also got a great second blog over here. I’m about 90% in agreement with her…

photo credit: bogers

American Express - don’t leave home without it! That may be one of the most famous phrases in advertising history, but it tapped into a deep fear for most travelers: the fear of being stranded in the distant unknown parts of the world without ready access to their money. What are some simple methods to safeguard access to your money when traveling?

1. If you are traveling to very remote areas, make sure you have plenty of cash, not just credit cards. The parts of the world that don’t accept credit cards or debit cards are dwindling, but there are still places. Keep plenty of cash, but keep it spread amongst your wallet, your luggage and even a bit hidden somewhere else. I used to prefer to keep some spare money hidden in my toiletry bag on the theory that nobody is going to check there.

2. Carry dollars (or euros). Despite the fact that the dollar is terribly weak right now, it is still the most accepted currency in the world. Carry $100 bills; these are far easier to exchange, ironically enough, overseas than in the US. If you are coming from another country (you’re a European traveler, etc.) I would still recommend carrying US dollars. Don’t count on your drachmas or forints being accepted everywhere.

3. Keep a list of your credit card numbers and customer service - and give a copy to someone at home. There is nothing like having your wallet stolen overseas. However, you want to be able to quickly cancel them if you do lose them or have them stolen, and the easiest way is to have a separate “panic card” ready. Give one to a friend at home in case your panic card is stolen, too.

4. Debit cards are convenient, but pricey - and see point #1, too. When I started traveling in the early 90s, debit cards were almost worthless when traveling. As time has passed, though, they have become far more useful. Be careful when changing money, though - you may pay a fee to your bank and the local bank. In addition, you may get hit with an exceptionally unfriendly exchange rate.

5. Go gray, but be careful. I can’t emphasize enough that you should stay in compliance with the laws of the countries you visit, which often prohibit individual currency exchanges. Depending on the country you visit, though, you may find significantly better exchange rates dealing with individuals than with banks or exchanges. In developing countries with high inflation rates local people will often be willing to give you better rates simply to protect their earnings by converting them to dollars. I would not recommend exchanging with locals, however, unless laws (and safety) permit.

6. Get rid of change. Spend your change as fast as you get it, and small bills, too. These are often difficult - if not impossible - to exchange on your return. Try to spend all of your local currency before you leave the country. Exchanging your money to local money and then back to your money is a terrible waste. Try to spend down to 0 before you leave; put your last few expenses on a credit card.

7. The most important money tip when traveling, of course, is to keep it and yourself safe. Never flash large sums, never discuss how much you have, keep it well hidden and ensure you know how you could get ‘emergency money’ if you needed it (for example, where ATMs are that accept your bank’s ATM network).

Fun (and safe) travels!

When my post on wealth ideas lost to I’ve Paid For This Twice Already in FMF’s March Madness Tournament, I started thinking about snowflaking. Snowflaking is a spinoff of the “snowball” debt elimination concept invented by Dave Ramsey but the snowflaking version of this concept has really been popularized by Paid Twice. In a nutshell, it’s making every attempt to generate income, however small, to apply to your consumer debt. The idea is that even tiny payments on principal make a disproportionate difference to the overall total amount paid when you consider interest.

But since I have no non-mortgage debt, and my mortgage is at a very low rate of interest, I’m not focused on debt repayment. Yet the concept can be tweaked and twisted and all of the sudden it makes great sense in my life and for my (multi-)million dollar journey. I’ll call this concept, for lack of a better word, wealthstreaming. And yes, I know it doesn’t make much sense, but I like the way it sounds.

I had one big stream of income until recently - my consulting work. I have other streams, too - interest, dividends, some web-based income, some (very minor) income from miscellaneous sources like commissions for landing new business. I like to think of all of these as faucets pouring into the same sink - the water’s coming through different sources but ending up going through the same drain (my family’s expenses) and the goal is to make the water pour through in such quantities that the drain can’t process it all and the sink overflows. Neat, huh?

So until recently the consulting income was a heavy stream. Now that I’m problogging for a while, that stream will trickle off (residual income comes in after the work’s completed). Some other income will hopefully pick up a bit - web-based income, referral income (bonuses from new work or recruiting other consultants) and even some other side businesses that I might work on (an e-book is in the works)! I have been doing quite a bit of studying of the coaching profession as well. My goal is to have the streams get heavier and heavier until they match the force of the consulting income stream, because then I can turn that faucet off, and not just for a trial run - for good.

The beauty of some of the streams is that I tapped someone else’s water line. Those dividends? No more work goes into generating those. I made the money, invested it, and now those companies just give me a check once a quarter. I like those streams. A lot. In fact, I want as many of those streams as possible.

Other faucets need to be kept open by my effort. The web income won’t flow unless I keep working on it. Referrals take a lot of work. Those streams are nice; not as nice as the streams from someone else’s line, but more fun and easier to generate than the one-hour-of-work-for-one-hour-of-pay consulting stream.

I try to learn new skills so I can widen the faucets or clean them up - or best of all, I can add another faucet to the sink. I’m picking up web design, slowly - hey, there’s a potential future stream! I am learning about investing in non-stock-market investments - ah, maybe rental income in the future? It’s hard work to develop the skills to add new faucets, but if you have 50 faucets all giving you a trickle it’s easier to maintain than one overstressed faucet creating a bottleneck because there are only so many hours in a day.

So that’s my idea - wealthstreaming, for lack of a better moniker. Adding tiny stream of income after tiny stream and seeing which one flows fastest. Not just concentrating on the big streams, but looking for the little streams that take no effort to maintain. What’s nice about the idea is that since I don’t have a grand idea - I’m still brainstorming the next Facebook or the next Digg - I can work on increasing my income today and not worrying about hitting a million dollar jackpot. I’ll just keep opening faucets until the sink spills over and I have more water than I need - because then I can share the water with my extended family, my friends and others.

So again, forgive me for a lack of response to comments/emails/etc., but I’ll get back to it soon. The posts will keep coming!

And thanks so much to everyone who has sent good wishes!