That's me pictured at the right in 1991 having a good time with friends in the California Mountains while on leave from the Air Force. I had just come back from a tour in the Middle East during the first Desert Storm and really needed the down time.

I'd like to think that this picture accurately captures my personality.

I'm not particularly athletic (although I wish I was), not real outdoorsy (I hate bugs), and obviously not a good fisherman (see how proud I am of that tiny fish)...

But I am a real person, which is something that most online entrepreneurs try to hide from the public.

For me, having a business where I get to do exactly what I want, when I want, and how I want is the only way to go. I've tried a lot of different jobs, and none of them ever added up to the adventure that I've had being my own boss.

Did I mention that I'm prior Air Force Enlisted? Talk about adventure! Check out one of the only pictures I have of myself below. That's me inside the red circle sitting on a captured Iraqi tank.

Looking back, I really enjoyed "seeing the world" on Uncle Sam. Unfortunately, I hurt my back during Desert Storm and my military career was cut short. My real career search began as a disabled veteran.

The VA sent me to college in Northern Maine to become a social worker and I worked as a secretary to make ends meet. That's where I met and married my husband. He was career military, so we were transferred to Illinois a few months after we were married. Unfortunately, I lost most of my college credits when I transferred them to the college there... totally frustrating!

The VA didn't want to pay for the additional credits that I had to re-take, so I took some time off of school and embarked on new things...

I became a real estate agent. My husband was TDY a lot then (meaning he went on business trips for the Air Force). Invariably, whenever he was in town I would get called away to show a house or have to sit all day for an open house on the only Saturday he would be home in a month.

I sold one house to pay for my expenses and then quit.

Then my husband thought I should get into the note business. That means that you buy and sell promissory notes. We got a nice trip to San Diego out of it for a convention, but I wasn't very good at talking people into letting me buy their notes at a discount. I guess it's hard to sell someone on something that you really don't believe is in their best interest.

Then I became a bartender and worked a few places before landing a pretty good job on a casino boat. I think I was looking for a job to be around people because I was alone so much with hubby gone all the time. Being a bartender means you're around drunk people all the time... that gets old fast!

Keep in mind that all these job changes happened in a three year time span. By this time I felt like a total loser. I was frustrated, lonely, and miserable.

Then I got pregnant and we were transfered again... This time to North Carolina.

I was about six months pregnant when we moved, so I didn't bother trying to find a job. After all, who would hire a woman who was that pregnant anyway?

That's when I started piddling around with the internet and got my own website. I was really just trying to figure out how to build a site and what to put on it. The idea of starting an internet business never occured to me. I wan't really very good at computers, so it was a lot of trial and error... but it did keep me occupied at a time when I really needed it.

The internet was really just starting to pick up steam and I was very intrigued by it.

That lasted a couple of months until my husband got a major kidney stone which landed him in the hospital. The stress of that situation, caused me to go into premature labor a week later.

I was flat on my back for a few weeks and came home with a 4 pound 7 ounce baby girl. She was perfect, except that she had to be fed hourly for four months... I was very tired.

I came out of that situation with a whole new perspective. Instead of focusing on what wasn't working for me, I decided to take stock of my situation and work out a plan. Here's what I decided:

I wanted to stay at home with my daughter (and future children). I wanted to see all the "firsts," be there after school, attend assemblies and sports practices, and be involved in my children's lives.
I knew that my husband would be transferred several more times before he retired. Having a traditional career of any kind would be difficult, if not impossible, because of moving so frequently.
I had to have a job that would allow me to take time off whenever I needed to. My husband traveled frequently, so that left me to be available for the kids whenever they needed me.
I needed to contribute to our household finances because I had earned my own way through my entire adult life and I didn't want to give that up.

Any of that sound familiar to you?

If that sounds like a tall order, believe me it was in 1997. It meant that I had to design my own future... Come up with a completely unique plan that was different than anything I had ever heard of. After a lot of thought, I decided that I would have to have my own business... but what would I do?

So I began searching for business opportunities. What I found were a whole lot of people willing to take my money, a ton of disappointment, and a lot of frustration... But I was determined.

I tried several different websites that just didn't work including the "internet malls," selling on eBay, turnkey businesses in a box, and several of my own ideas. I even tried two different MLM opportunities that cost me thousands of dollars.

After a couple of years of self-education, I finally figured out how to turn the things that I'm good at and the things I like to do into a full time income. You know the old addage,

"Find what you like to do and figure out a way to get paid doing it."

So, after years of floundering, I figured out that I like learning new things, doing something different everyday, and writing. Once I put that together, it was pretty simple to morph that into an internet business. Today, my business produces and sells information products.

I'm also a huge advocate for the work at home mom and I love helping women find a work at home opportunity that really works for them.

Most of all, I enjoy helping people find their dream of having their own home business and helping them to avoid all the pitfalls. I guess you'd call it mentoring.

After all, I've been there, done that, bought the T-shirt, and wore it out. I know first hand how hard it is to get started and it makes me mad to see how many people who can't afford it are taken to the cleaners by those "bizop sharks."

It makes me feel good to help people get on the right path... It's a fulfillment thing -- I leave it at that.

You know the most fulfilling thing about having my own business? Listening to my children talk about what their Mommy does to friends and relatives. My oldest (who's almost nine now) can't wait until she's old enough to work with me and my six year old is convinced that he's going to inherit my business when he grows up.

It's totally awesome being my kids' hero!

My aim with this website is provide a lot of good information for anyone who's trying to get started with an online business and begin living their own dream of independence, without spending a lot of time or money learning how to get started.

Hopefully that's what I've done.

Chris Yates
Internet Marketing Tutor

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