Reading - John Elliott - Stephenie Meyers

I read not only books but stories online, which is the almost norm these days. I came across this story of John Elliott, Australian CEO and millionaire who made a life changing decision to walk around Australian with a few camels.

I started following John Elliotts trek across Australia with 5 Camels, amazed at what he has been through on this trek.

One step at a time

Fear - Its all about to start

Videos

An except from his blog MY STORY

A life by design

• Ever since I was a young boy, where other dreamed of being a pilot, or a fireman, I wanted to have my own business.  I bred pigeons as a 12 year old to sell to a guy down the road and I kept writing down ideas and concepts that could one day be the thing that I was meant to do. I always had reasons or simply procrastinated even starting my own serious business. I had been in the insurance industry now for about 2 years, and at 26 I decided that I needed to start my own Insurance Broking company.   It now was not just a case that I wanted success, it was something which I knew was a key part to my happiness. I set rules for myself:
  1. Don’t get out of bed until you have slept as much as you feel you need to
  2. Don’t get out of the office until you have worked as much as you feel you need to
• I needed to start respecting and valuing myself as much as I did my work. This gave me a renewed passion and over the first few years the business exploded.  The average age of an insurance brokerage owner was 61 and had 40 years experience and a large cash pool behind them to start.  My other competitors were the insurance companies, with thousands of employees and multi million dollar budgets.
• And then there was me, 26 with 2 years doing low level broking, and a couple of grand in a one man office and a few ideas. Now that I was happy and doing what I wanted, and this was my biggest tool that always set me ahead of many of those around me.  I could work longer, network more, I got to again spend time with a massive range of people which as I said earlier, I loved.   I started to do what I loved and the results came through.
• Over the next 9 years the company and the other businesses I became involved in won several awards including Top Ten Australia Insurance Brokerage for over 6 years and BRW Fast 100 awards 2 years running putting us in the fastest growing businesses in Australia. I had the pleasure of at one stage working every single role in my company that exists today.

Life by my own Design V2 ??

• Everything was going well again humming along, I had a beautiful girlfriend and things were looking as if I could finally settle down get a house, start a family, the job was quite easy and the company was running itself. It scared the shit out of me.  At one stage I spent three days in a room, unsure where to go with this. It felt like that moment I had 10 years earlier, and we all know how that nearly ended.
• From outside in you would see someone who had worked hard and had it all.  But I realised more and more that I enjoyed the pursuit of these things more than the things themselves.  For some reason I had again gravitated or been pushed into a work of conformity, fitting in and measuring my own success as was determined by others not by myself. I knew this period of my life was done.  I was ready to go and redefine my own success happiness and the journey to it once again. To do this I wanted this time to share the journey to share the story as it unfolded. During this year Bitcoin came back on my radar, a few years after I had put a little in there in 2014 and 2015.  I started to learn more and more about it as I spent time traveling, thinking about what the next phase of my life would be. I started the process with a big clearing of my life.
• Over 12 months I was able to donate my Audi R8 to One Heart Foundation, move on from a relationship I felt trapped in, move out of a house that felt like an anchor keeping my here, resign as CEO of the company I started, walk away from the high end wage I had built up, and pretty much all of the creature comforts I had built up around me. This time coincided with my “playing” with crypto currency, which I have to say has been exciting and scary at the same time with my shares of wins and loses. But it was a catalyst for me to have something to do whilst on the road, to learn and to be the nucleus to get out again to see the world, and try a more nomadic life style. This is why this is called bitcoin made me do it.
• I wanted to finally start sharing my journey and see if in sharing my journey I could help others “find their bitcoin”. So join me as I share the journey as it continues, finding new and continued happiness in my life and still striving for success defined on my own terms.  A life with a lot less stuff, a whole lot of new and old friends and some experiences and places that I hope you will enjoy as much as I do.

And one of my favourite authors Stephenie Meyers of Twilight fame is releasing her 12 year old book Midnight Sun from Edward Cullen's perspective