Why I Write "Path to Freedom"

My train of life has stopped at the university station.

I take a look at where the train’s heading, and I do not like what I see: at least 5 years of studies, then 50 years of work as an engineer, and then I don’t know, if I live long enough, maybe 10-20 years of retirement...

For most of my life, this path seemed fine to me, that’s how everyone I know lives. But after some introspection and journaling, now, it seems inacceptable to me.

Because this path lacks freedom.

It can’t possibly be that the only years of freedom I got in life are the childhood years I left behind and some years of retirement when I’m a senile old man. It can’t be that during the rest, I need to work hard on things I don’t care much about in order to survive.

No, this isn’t the right way.

Because to me, life without freedom lacks purpose, and having a purpose is what gives life meaning.

Now, there’s a lot of talk around what “freedom” is, but let’s leave the task of debating whether we have free will or not to philosophers and redditors. Here, in this newsletter, we cut through all the fluff and go straight to what matters.

And freedom, for all it matters to us, means two things:

Financial Freedom

If you want to live a free life, you need to build businesses that give you the necessary means to pursue what you want to pursue in life.

Think of it this way, Financial Freedom unlocks:

• Location Freedom — you can live anywhere you want (except maybe North Korea)

• Time Freedom — you don’t have to be at the office 9-5, you can create your own schedule. Take it a step further, and by building the right automations for your business, you can work for as little as you want, and have the rest of your days for yourself

• Freedom to Choose — you can choose to live the remaining of your life practicing horseback archery in Japan and chilling in your villa, or you can use your wealth to actualize your full potential by doing work you enjoy, or by bringing about the positive changes you want to see in the world. Either way, with enough money, you have the choice. Without it, your choices are limited.

Freedom of the Mind

Some people think of money a superficial pursuit.

That’s not true, but they still got a point: if the only reason why you are making money is to buy a lambo to impress others and fill your ego, then yes, that’s a superficial pursuit.

Because even though you can make your choices, your choices are not free. You are still a slave to your instinctive desires and the judgment of others.

This is why the search of material wealth MUST go hand in hand with self-improvement and spiritual development.

There are many ways of achieving financial freedom, and some of the lessons you will learn in this newsletter will be applicable for all businesses.

But, I will also be sharing insights specifically for the business path I am taking in order to attain freedom while I am studying at the university — building a one-person creator business. This is the path I recommend to you as well, especially if you want to do purposeful work where you help others.

This is a very big topic, and there’s a lot of nuance to it, but briefly, here’s how this business model works:

• You publish free educational content on social media (as an example, I publish shortform advice on X, Substack Notes and Quora)

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• You educate those who want to learn more with in depth content and free courses (this newsletter you are reading right now is doing exactly that. Maybe one of my short form posts resonated with you and you checked my newsletter to discover more)

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• You then offer those who want to go deeper your paid products and/or services (books, online courses, one-on-one coaching sessions all fall under this category. People find so much value in your free material that they naturally want to go deeper or get personal assistance from you)

You see, the beauty of this business model is that, you are effectively giving away most of your value for free, for anyone who needs it, and because you are giving so much value for free, you do not need to “sell to” anyone. They just come to you because they are interested in learning at a deeper level from you.

It’s all good but… building a creator business (or any other business) ain’t easy. It takes work.

I am not going to sugarcoat it like some other creators, “oh it’s not that difficult… just go buy my course, I’ll make it easy for you,” because I know that it is not easy. Reaching financial freedom is not easy. It takes a lot of work to get there. A LOT OF work. And not just a lot of work, but a lot of deep, focused, high quality work.

The problem is…

No one taught us how to do this kind of work.

The school certainly didn’t teach you, to the contrary, we are taught so much bullshit at the school that in order to perform at our best, we need to unlearn a good chunk of it.

Back then, what we learned was to do homework we didn’t care about simply out of fear. Since it didn’t matter to us, we worked unwillingly, distracting ourselves at every occasion (I used to play Clash of Clans when I took a ‘break’ from my homework). And with this kind of shallow work, it is now obvious to me why my homework took me all day long to finish! Had I known what I know now, should I have just sat down and worked with concentration, I could have completed all of my homework in less than an hour, but like a toddler playing with his food, I played with my tasks all day long.

Unfortunately, most people stop learning after school, and that’s why most adults work like this as well — working a lot, but getting little done in that time.

Discipline, work ethic, integrity, focus, escaping digital distractions, building healthy habits, planning, prioritization, avoiding procrastination… these are all skills you need learn if you want to get high quality work done in today’s world.

And it doesn’t end with the work you do in front of your laptop; success also requires a lot of emotional and mindset work. Upkeep of your physical health and mental sanity are also part of the journey.

That’s what I am here to help you achieve.

This newsletter will be your companion in your path to freedom.

My name is Nihad, I am studying engineering in France, and alongside my studies, I am working on improving myself and scaling my online creator business to $10k in monthly revenue. I learn from the best authors, podcasters, creators, then I experiment on myself and my businesses to see what works and what doesn't, and finally, I share my learnings with you.

As a subscriber, you will receive an in-depth letter that will help you master key skills like discipline, work ethic and avoiding modern-world distractions. You can check your inbox every Saturday at 15:00 UTC (click to learn what this means for you) to read my new letters as soon as they come out.

I also post daily short form lessons on X (good old twitter), so if you want to stay updated, don’t forget to follow me on twitter as well @nihadaliyev777.

Hoping to see you again here, thank you for reading!