LongCut logo

How I Work: $22K/Month Solopreneur

By Starter Story

Summary

Topics Covered

  • Base yourself 2-3 months to actually ship
  • Reverse the guru schedule and work at night
  • The boring work is what moves the business
  • Business is surfing, just get in the water
  • Productivity follows happiness, not discipline

Full Transcript

I live kind of the reverse typical guru advice lifestyle. There's so much

advice lifestyle. There's so much self-help stuff online, but ever since I was a kid I was never like this and I felt like it was wrong. And so now I wake up 11:00 a.m. 12:00 p.m. I'll go to the gym. I'll lift some weights. And

the gym. I'll lift some weights. And

then when everything goes quiet at night and nobody's texting [music] you, I just love going fully in on my work and I that's how I get into flow state and there's nothing else. There's nobody

talking to me. That's all I'm doing.

I travel all the time and the reason I love traveling so much is because for me it's like living life on full. And

that's why I dropped everything and I went traveling. Going somewhere else to

went traveling. Going somewhere else to see how other people live is the best thing I've ever done in my life.

So hey, I'm Rob Hallam. I make $22,000 a month and I run the entire thing myself while I travel the world.

A lot of people have asked me how I do this while I travel on the move. So

today I'm excited to tell you about how I work.

1 2 My typical morning would look something like I wake up around 11:00 a.m. to

12:00 p.m. because I go to bed so late.

And then when I wake up, I'm a night owl. I'm the opposite of a morning

owl. I'm the opposite of a morning person. So I wake up and I'm like in a

person. So I wake up and I'm like in a total blur. Everything is

total blur. Everything is discombobulated and I have to slowly pull myself together during the day. I

live kind of the reverse typical guru advice lifestyle. There's so much

advice lifestyle. There's so much self-help stuff online, right? You

scroll on Instagram long enough and you'll see wake up 5:00 a.m. get to

work. But ever since I was a kid I was never like this. I would just feel horrible. And so now I wake up 11:00

horrible. And so now I wake up 11:00 a.m. 12:00 p.m. There was a period of

a.m. 12:00 p.m. There was a period of time where I I felt guilt about that, but for me it works.

So I started traveling when I was a backpacker and I was trying to build startups. It was like I was trying to

startups. It was like I was trying to get in the water and and figure out things out. I had no idea what I was

things out. I had no idea what I was doing so I made loads of mistakes. I had

loads of failures. I didn't make money for like a year. I was moving basically every few days, every week. And then it slowed down, and then it became every 2 weeks, and then it became every month.

The reality is when you travel, when you travel so often, it's really really it is really really hard to focus on one thing. So, and I realized this. I had to

thing. So, and I realized this. I had to realize this the hard way. When I

started working on SuperX, I was moving non-stop. I got bits and bobs done, but

non-stop. I got bits and bobs done, but it wasn't until I actually settled in Colombia for 3 months straight in July of 2025 that I actually got stuff done.

Nowadays, as of probably the last 6 months, I've fallen into this routine of I set up base somewhere for 2 to 3 months, ideally 3 months. And then I'll move on to the the next place. For me,

this is the I've found to be the perfect balance. It gives me the routine [music]

balance. It gives me the routine [music] that I need to work on like, you know, deep things, but at the same time I get the travel. I think that philosophy of

the travel. I think that philosophy of going somewhere else to see how other people live, to see how money moves in other places, to see what the opportunities are is the best thing anyone can do. Just getting out and moving is the best thing I've ever done

in my life.

Hey, it's guest producer here at Starter Story. Real quick, if you're enjoying

Story. Real quick, if you're enjoying Rob's story and thinking to yourself, how can I start my own solopreneur journey or my own solopreneur business?

Well, we partnered with the team over at HubSpot to put together this free million-dollar solopreneur MVP guide.

Inside, we walk through a bunch of different strategies to help you think about how to build your MVP and start getting your first customers as fast as possible. Just head to the link in the

possible. Just head to the link in the description and download it 100% for free. All right, let's get back to Rob's

free. All right, let's get back to Rob's story.

After I have breakfast and I and I get out and get some sun, I might, you know, respond to a couple of customer support emails. I might do little bits and bobs,

emails. I might do little bits and bobs, but then around 2 to 3 p.m. usually, if

it's training day, I'll go to the gym. I

like to work lift weights and then do some cardio. I'll have a shower. I

some cardio. I'll have a shower. I

usually make another coffee. I love

coffee. I'll sit down. I'll pull up my desk. I'll sit in front of my laptop.

desk. I'll sit in front of my laptop.

And then when everything goes quiet at night and nobody's texting you and you've eaten all the food you're going to eat for the day, you've gone to the gym, you've done all the little chores and things that you needed to do, I just love going fully in on my work and I

that's how I get into flow state. I just

like to front-load the the chores and hard stuff and then make it so that when I go to work later in the evening, that is all I'm doing. So, I can go fully a full 8-hour solid work block and there's nothing else. There's nobody talking to

nothing else. There's nobody talking to me. That's all I'm doing.

me. That's all I'm doing.

I usually have like this monthly or maybe bi-monthly, you know, every 2 months I have a big list of things that I'm just as they're coming I'll note them down. They're like usually the top

them down. They're like usually the top three or four features that I want to build out and then there's usually sort of things I want to improve and then bugs. And when I sit down on my desk,

bugs. And when I sit down on my desk, either I know what I'm working on because [music] I'm picking up some work that I did on the day before or I'll just pick something from the list of how I feel.

I'll just go with how I feel. I'm very

privileged to be able to to work on what I want now.

What I try to focus on are the things that move the business forward the most.

And it's been a learning process through building my startup to figure out what exactly it is that moves the business forward the most because often times I just want to work on the fun stuff. I

want to work on the stuff that's visual or or flashy. But I think 99% of the time the stuff [music] that moves the business forward the most is the boring stuff. I have this belief system where

stuff. I have this belief system where I'll create new notes every single time when when one of the lists gets too long, I'll copy off the important stuff over the new new note. If a customer doesn't raise it again or I forget about

it, then it just wasn't important enough to begin with. That's that's my my thought process. If customers are really

thought process. If customers are really raising an issue, if there's a critical bug, you know, you'll get five emails, you'll know it's important to work on and you'll get it done. But if it's someone says, you know, there's this little thing that I want to tweak or there's this little feature that I I

want you to add an extra setting [music] to and no one else asks for that and I don't have the time to get around to it, then they weren't that important to begin with. Maybe it's not the most

begin with. Maybe it's not the most optimal way of working, but focusing on the things that actually move the business forward the most is is how it's worked for me and it's worked well so far.

There's this analogy that I love, which is building a business is like surfing.

In other words, you have to spend a lot of time in the water looking at the waves and then understanding what a wave that's going to break properly actually looks like before it breaks, but you only get that from spending loads of time in the water. Your job, especially

as a as a solopreneur or as someone who's building their startup on their own or maybe in a small team, is to pick these big waves, see them coming, and then get on them and ride them. I think

this is why you see people who win once, win again and again and again. Because

the hardest thing as a surfer, as an entrepreneur, as a business person, is to get into the water for the first time. The surfboard is new. You have to

time. The surfboard is new. You have to figure out how to how to attach the leash to your leg. You have to figure out, you know, everything is so new and it's overstimulating. We're we're human

it's overstimulating. We're we're human beings, we have one brain. So, getting

into the water is the hardest thing, but the best thing you can do is get into the water. And then when you've been in

the water. And then when you've been in the water for a long enough time and you learn how to read the waves, then you will just keep catching [music] waves.

And then catching a wave isn't a problem, riding waves isn't a problem.

If you want to get off the wave and pick another wave, that's on you. But you

just got to get in the water.

So, about an hour before bed I switch everything off. You know, I'll either

everything off. You know, I'll either pick up a book or I'll watch something on YouTube. Maybe I'll doomscroll for a

on YouTube. Maybe I'll doomscroll for a little bit and then switch my phone off for 30 minutes. You know, it's not perfect, but it works for me. And then

the most important thing for me is getting my 9 hours of sleep. I tried for ages to, you know, get 8 hours of sleep and be fine on it, but it doesn't work for me. I need my 9 hours of sleep. So,

for me. I need my 9 hours of sleep. So,

I'll spend usually 9 and 1/2 hours in bed. I'll set my alarm for whatever time

bed. I'll set my alarm for whatever time it is plus 9 and 1/2 hours, and this is the thing that I protect above everything else. Because if I don't have

everything else. Because if I don't have my sleep, I can't think creatively, I can't be motivated to do anything. I

don't want to go to the gym.

Everything is downstream of sleep for me.

For the longest amount of time I thought the gap between what I had and what I wanted was discipline [music] because all the self-help stuff online tells you that. I thought I had to wake up

that. I thought I had to wake up earlier, I had to plan better, lock in harder, and then I'd ship the same everywhere. If I was in the UK or if I

everywhere. If I was in the UK or if I was in Colombia or if I was in Southeast Asia. Through traveling so much I have

Asia. Through traveling so much I have realized that the places where I shipped the most were the places that I was happiest every single time. There's been

no exception. One of the mottos or principles, if you want to call it, that I live by is that productivity follows happiness. Like the [music] best things

happiness. Like the [music] best things that you will ever create come from being in a good place. So, find whatever it is, environment, that puts you in the best place. Figure out what it is that

best place. Figure out what it is that you enjoy. For me it was like doing a

you enjoy. For me it was like doing a lot of the stuff that I enjoy doing as a kid, which is why I said the kid line.

Like when I was a kid, I wanted to travel the world. Now I have like my Rubik's Cube between prompts. I'll I'll

mix up my Rubik's Cube. That puts me in a state of play. And then when I approach my work with a state of play, uh life is so good and my work is so good. I've lived [music] in more than 13

good. I've lived [music] in more than 13 countries in the last few years and in some of them I barely touched my laptop at all. In some of them I shipped more

at all. In some of them I shipped more than I have done in in months. The

variable was never discipline. It was

how I felt in that place. So, that's one of the mottos and principles that I live by. Productivity follows happiness.

by. Productivity follows happiness.

Loading...

Loading video analysis...