Val Selby [00:00:06]:
Hey, this is Val Selby and after over 20 years online, I can track where my mindset has blocked me. If procrastination, impostor syndrome and a lack of focus have been blocking your biz, then Val Full Volume is here to help you see choices you are making. Get ready to use your expertise to collaborate like a pro as you create the business of your dreams. Now is the time to make changes and live your best life. Let's get to it!   

Val Selby [00:00:36]:
Hello. Welcome to Val Full Volume. I'm Val. Thank you so much for being here. I might have a ranty pants, but I'm not sure. So my last solo episode, you might remember, and I say last solo episode because I have some recordings and I'm not sure if they're gonna get done in time. I have some guest recordings. I'm not sure if they're getting done in time. So coordination. The last solo episode.

Val Selby [00:01:06]:
I know my assistant will get the link down in there, but I told you that I might get ranty pants. I know I am ranty pants about this term and what this term has become. And the, oh, I'll use big words. It's not a big word. I'll use funky words. The misnomer. I'm gonna call it like it is. The fucking lie of passive income.

Val Selby [00:01:35]:
This terminology that it's somehow 2005, I was gonna say 2010, but no, no, no, somehow it's 2005, and you can just throw shit up and all of a sudden make money, and it's passive. Wouldn't that be wonderful? Actually, wouldn't it be as boring as fuck, but the term passive income is just blown up into this giant lie, and it is pissing me off. So I was saying in that solo episode that I would see if I was gonna record or not today, because I had some reschedules today. So I'm like, alright.

Val Selby [00:02:14]:
I already got, well, a little bit of makeup on, brushed my hair, got a nice shirt on, may as well record. Right? Don't wanna waste those 5 minutes that I put into looking good. Don't wanna waste those 5 minutes. But I was not sure if I was going to record today because I've been, you know, switched my diet around, switched my food around. So I wasn't sure if my brain would be able to record today or if I was gonna just be so, so detoxing angry that I didn't wanna do anything. And guess what? I'm just feeling like I wanna have a chat, so that's pretty amazing. Not how I was expecting. And so here we are.

Val Selby [00:02:56]:
We are going to talk about this fucking lie that is being built and sold and sold and sold and sold, and grabbing a hold of people's emotions and their lack and their poverty mindset, and so many things. And twisting what passive income is and selling it as a goddamn lie. And the selling it is the big thing. This is why I'm ranting pants. Okay. So passive income. Let me look. My Gemini says the definition of passive income is money that comes from a source other than a traditional job and requires little to no ongoing effort.

Val Selby [00:03:48]:
So side hustle kind of thing, except for it's a side hustle that requires little to no ongoing effort. Now I am not even going to dig into where this little to no ongoing effort came from because that is the fucking lie right there. And even in the definition that AI is pulling up, it is a fucking lie. There's no such thing as income that you're not going to put some kind of effort into. And if you're only putting a little bit, tiny bit of effort in, then you're only going to see a little tiny bit of income because social media doesn't work on its own. And if that's what you're using to sell, it's not gonna work on its own. There are programs that are gonna come up with stuff, but you still have to talk to that program to tell it what you want to be focused on, what you wanna be working on. There's gonna be some effort.

Val Selby [00:04:41]:
Emails, email platforms, we still have to put the email stuff in there. Yes, we can go to AI and we can have everything written out for us. Technically, you can do that if that's what you want. If you want your brand to be AI, start that from the beginning because Lord knows that if you start with your personality, everybody's gonna be able to figure out when you're using AI. Believe me. Believe me. I use AI for a lot of stuff, but I can go in there and take a look and go, oh, that's really gonna be obvious.

Val Selby [00:05:13]:
I better edit the heck out of that. So, yes, there's plenty of ways that we can make the marketing all easier and quicker, but you will never ever, ever be running a business, and I don't care if it's side hustle. Passive income is gonna be a side hustle. Right? It's going to be a business. You need to be paying taxes on that shit. You need to be doing it legally. You need to be doing it ethically. There's never going to be a time that you don't have to do work.

Val Selby [00:05:48]:
So little to no ongoing effort is a huge what the fuck. Little effort. Okay, I can see little effort. But you know what? That little effort means? That you already have put things in place. So it took a lot of effort to get to that point of where you can do little effort. And the whole no ongoing effort, what the hell is that? That is literally the 2005s when we could put up websites and the search engines sent traffic to those sites. We did not have to do anything but SEO, and that SEO was so damn basic.

Val Selby [00:06:35]:
That was amazing. I'm not gonna even say it. I'm not gonna lie about it. It was amazing. Yeah. It was field of dreams, build it and they will come because everything was getting created. I mean, all of the search engines were getting created, so they were pulling in all of that information. They were doing the marketing and the traffic for us.

Val Selby [00:06:56]:
We didn't have social media. But now, I mean, I hope that you are already listening to my podcast and in my communities realizing that that is just a freaking lie. I'm like working through my head right now because I'm hoping that I don't ever use the word passive income. I'm trying to think if there is even a time, even within the last, like, 10 years where I've used that idea of passive income. It's just - it's such a trigger for me because it's setting you up for failure. Because here you're coming into this, oh, I'm gonna make passive income. It's gonna be amazing. Little to no effort.

Val Selby [00:07:37]:
Oh, I can do that. And it's like, well, if you are just coming in little to no effort, if it's gonna be a side hustle and you're gonna build it up, yes. But if it's gonna be I'm going to just keep this to little or no effort forever, then why the hell are you even bothering? You know, what is the point? So take a look at, okay, if passive income is something that is attracting you, why is that? What about the term passive income is attractive? Now I am not gonna lie, it pops into my head, I get suckered in because I'm like, well, I'll just add this. And this is why I get pissed off because it's like bright shiny object. Right? It's like, oh my gosh, well, maybe they are actually doing it. Yet to come across anybody the last 15 plus years that is actually doing anything passive. No. No. And again, like I said, if they are doing it, it's because they did set it something up 15, 20 years ago, and it's still getting traffic randomly.

Val Selby [00:08:47]:
Randomly. It's not getting steady sales by any means. It's just getting random sales. And that's what little to no effort will do. It will get you random sales here and there. So think about that. If you are doing some little $9 products, not belittling those, I have plenty of $9 products. But if you are doing this passive income with $9 products and all of a sudden you're just getting some trickling of stuff in, that's super cool.

Val Selby [00:09:18]:
That's super extra. But if you're making a $9 sale, how much did you pay for all of your platforms? And what were your service fees for the payment processors and any other fees? So how are you going to run a passive income with very little income coming in and pay for your platforms? Just that alone, let alone make money on top of it. You're not. The fees are gonna eat up what you make because you're not doing any ongoing effort. It's simple. You're gonna have to email your list, you're gonna have to post to social media, you're going to have to make posts on Pinterest. There is things involved if you actually want it to make money. So think about passive income. Think about that term.

Val Selby [00:10:11]:
Think about why you might be attracted to it. Why is it pinging you, and just sit and analyze that. Like, what about passive income draws me? And for me, I know it's because I want the stuff set up. So for me, knowing and especially right now, I mean, absolutely right now, this is probably why the term is triggering me. Right now, I'm revamping both memberships, the website. I mean, we're coming into the new year, so I want the vibe that I've got to just be, like, even bigger. Right? So there's a lot going on behind the scenes. And to me, I'm like looking at it going, I wish the membership area was already set up the way I want it, which is exactly why I'm starting it right now and not on January 1st.

Val Selby [00:11:03]:
I want to kick it January 1st with the revamped back end. You know, for the revamped membership, with the new workshops and the new classes in there. Putting all of that work in there is going to feel like it's going to be more passive income down the road because once I get the membership stuff in there, then I can work on marketing. I can just really focus on marketing. Right? And that will feel like little less ongoing effort because I'm not gonna have to build it up. I know for me, that's part of the pull. It's the, okay, it's because I want all this stuff in place.

Val Selby [00:11:40]:
I want all this stuff in place. And there's just - there's no shortcuts. You either want to be in business or you don't. And if you're going to want to be in business and you're still listening to this right now, then I know you realize you are gonna have to put work into it and that work's going to be worth it, but you're going to have to put work into it. There's no way around it. I don't want you coming into your business with this idea that you're going to put everything into place and then just be able to walk away and go live on the beach. Just be able to go walk away and collect your money and sit in Mexico for weeks on end at the resort. That vision is a lie and that is why Internet marketing is really, really exploding right now and why people are having problems with the coaches And, I mean, just everything is changing.

Val Selby [00:12:39]:
It's because finally, really, we're not stupid. Right? So everybody knew. I mean, they had to have known. Right? I know they had to have known. I know you had to have known because you're not coming into this as an idiot if you're following me. I mean, this is what I do. I talk about all this BS that's getting force fed to us, but it would be great to have that, wouldn't it? I mean, it would be fabulous. And who's to say it might not happen down the road after you can bring your team on that's taking care of everything and you're a corporation, you know? It's like, sure, it could happen way down the road, but things have to be put in place and major things and it's going to take work and it is worth it to create your business, to be helping the people that you want to, but ditch this idea of passive income as it stands right now, as it is defined right now.

Val Selby [00:13:38]:
You will not be able to do a business with little to no ongoing effort. It is a pipe dream. It is a lie and I don't want you coming into this with false hope. Okay. I know. I didn't even get really ranty, but, no, that feels so negative to be landing on. Again, the work is gonna be worth it and you can spread the workout. And one of the great things is you don't need to do all of the things.

Val Selby [00:14:07]:
So we have these two battle and we have this passive income and then we have this culture, the hustle culture. Right? And we all know that that one's a lie, and we don't want hustle culture anymore. We are not here to be like, oh my god. I just worked 400 hours this week, blah blah blah blah blah. It's like, that's cool, but what did you actually get done? You know, because I could work a million hours as well, but what did I actually get done? So it's that balance of having that mentality of, no, I am definitely not here to tell you to work nonstop, but I don't want you to carry in the lie in that you're not going to put work in. You are gonna put work in. And you're gonna put work in and it's gonna feel great because this is what you wanna do. I mean, if you're in my community here, you know we're doing what we want to be doing.

Val Selby [00:15:01]:
So it feels a little bit different. Alright. I didn't get ranty pants. I'm sorry. Maybe next time? Maybe something else will come up that'll make me ranty pants. Alright. I will chat at you later.