My side-hustle pays 40% of my monthly expenses with 100% satisfaction

Last Updated on October 2, 2021 at 8:10 am

In this episode of how I increased my income,  we meet a marketing associate who runs a dance school. Eager to try new things, she efficiently balances home, office, friends, family, and passion.

About this series: We all appreciate the importance of a higher income but increasing our income is not easy. It requires time, effort, sacrifice, dedication and opportunities. In these articles, we showcase inspirational stories about people who have increased their income, their station in life via self-improvement, upskilling or side-hustles.

This idea started when I had asked members of Facebook, Asan Ideas for Wealth, to share real-life stories of how they or someone they knew increased their income by upskilling, self-growth (personal development), or side-hustles.

Many of the accounts were quite extraordinary. These are the stories published earlier:

• How my mother moved up the corporate ladder with constant self-growth.
• How I started a side hustle at 16 by blogging and web development
• How I learned new skills with side hustles and advanced my career
• Side-hustle journey: How I started a children’s book club following my passion
• From ration rice and torn shoes to top performer in the oil and gas industry

We have similar stories lined in the coming weeks. If you have increased your income and changed your station in life, please share it with our community. It will inspire and motivate many. Contact us at freefincal {AT} Gmail {DOT} com with a short outline to take it forward. It can be published anonymously if you prefer.

My side hustle journey: When you are a teenager, your dreams, wishes and energy for things are altogether different from what you at long last wind up doing in your work. I will recount to you my side of the story. I am from Nainital. A large portion of you may have been to the spot or possibly would have caught wind of it.

It is a highly delightful spot to spend your summers or winters and simultaneously awesome in the educational field. I did my college too from there, not an extremely extravagant college but good for me to complete my higher education. 

I always thought of becoming a dancer but unfortunately what we often hear from parents is: “Things like dance and singing can be your hobby not your career, study do some preparation and take a job”. Thus, I did what I was told, picked up a course and began my graduation. I had a lot of time that was wasted separate from college hours, so I started giving tuition to kids for all their subjects. Starting from one kid in 2-month time had 20 -25 kids, but in all this, I was missing dance. 

One day I went with my mom to her music learning class, and a thought clicked, this is a decent space, and on the off chance that I can get it for an hour and start my dance class. Before long, my thought came to fruition; with all running to different places, individuals, and my mom’s help, I got the space for 60 minutes to start with. I began my class with only two people, my mother and her friend, with charges of just 500 INR. It required some investment, some marketing, showcasing, and I was prepared to fly. In a matter of no time, I had 80+ students in various batches.

Some women joined the class when children were in school, children that came after school hours and some retired aunts who needed to keep themselves engaged, active and dynamic. Every different batch taught me countless things; investing energy with every age was a blessing, and above all, my pocket was filling. I used my hard-earned money in purchasing my first phone and saved all that I got for my future plans. 

I finished my studies and went to Delhi; there I took salsa dance class for which the charges were 15000 INR for one month’s class, visited many places, tried and tasted different kinds of cuisines and enjoyed to the fullest from the money I had saved (Appx 1 L). In 2018, I got hitched and realized now the dance is gone perpetually, as I needed to oversee family stuff and the office. Leaving my dance caused me to feel something was absent in me.

I was dancing and keeping my enthusiasm alive in me. One month, two or three, now I could not keep myself far from dance. I decided to manage my time and at least give it a try. I advanced the kick-off of dance class with the promotional activities in our society, and with just one kid, I started the class again. 

Today by god’s grace, I am a Marketing Associate, handling marketing activities for the APAC region. I have 14 kids in my dance class (I am not expanding the number of students because of room size and coronavirus limitation). I can begin more batches, yet managing home, office, friends, family, and passion too is important. I believe I am progressing admirably. One hour seeing adorable, mischievous faces and my love for dance makes my day. This is the link to my YouTube channel: Vishaka Dance Class.

All these are reasons why I love my side hustle. It covers 40% of my month to month costs and gives me genuine feelings of serenity. 

I’m somewhat restless, so I continue to attempt new things. In my last organization, I started the company’s newsletter with a distribution of 20000 printed versions and approximately 20000 soft copies. It was an incredible achievement, so I guess I can give a try to content writing. Maybe it’s just a start; perhaps I am not good but attempting is my job. I am exploring my writing ability in my free time without monetizing it. Who knows, someday, I can even earn handsomely from it.