Lost Your Job? It's the Best Thing That's Ever Happened to You

And why is that? Because you have been given the chance to build a life with less stress, more time for family and friends and more fun while doing something you like to do. That's the opportunity you've been given, if you take advantage of it.

How do you do that? You become self-employed.

As an employee, you've been renting out your main assets, your knowledge, experience and your labour. Once you've received your salary, that's it. Your work has increased the value of your employer's company but you don't share in that or only to a very limited extent. By becoming self-employed, you are taking ownership of your assets and, when you do work, it increases the value of your own business. You are getting paid when you do work and you are building something of value. This alone will make your work more fulfilling and the absence of superiors and people reporting to you will reduce your stress level. But, by planning this change properly, you can make the conditions even more favourable.

First, as in any business, take an inventory of your assets. Make a list of what you can do and another list of what you enjoy doing. Scoring the items with numbers indicating how well you can do something and how much you enjoy doing things is also useful.

Now, define your accessible markets. Accessible markets are groups of people to whom you have easy access. Typically these are friends, acquaintances, neighbours, your community but also, importantly, your contacts from the job you have just left. Write down what these different groups need doing. Assigning numbers to indicate the value of each market group is also a good idea. If you can access a thousand people who absolutely have to purchase an expensive item, that's a large number; a hundred people who may, perhaps, buy something inexpensive is a small number.

Finally, you correlate. You're looking for something you like doing which you can do well and which has a good, accessible market waiting for it. What you'll find is the two or three best business opportunities for your situation. Make your decision, with input from friends and family, and you're off. After a couple of years of hard work, you'll agree with the title of this article.

FIRST PUBLISHED AT SUITE101.COM