Maybe We Shouldn’t Have a Side Hustle?

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As you may know from reading this blog, I absolutely love working side hustles. Not only do they provide me with a little bit of extra money that I can use to pay down large amounts of debt, but I also just enjoy doing them. I love taking side jobs that allow me to learn something new or share my knowledge and experience with others.

I also enjoy that I can usually do them from the comforts of my home while the kids are over at a friend’s house, my wife is out running, or even early in the morning. It’s really cool to be able to say that I made $100 before anyone else woke up!

I love side hustles so much that I have been doing them for almost 15 years. My side hustle “jobs” have ranged from jobs that have lost me money (buying and renovating a rental house) to jobs that have paid me well and even allowed me to travel for free (writing a standardized math test).

For me, working a side hustle is something that I plan to continue doing for a really long time. However, sometimes working extra jobs as side hustles is not the best way that we could spend our free time. Here are just a few reasons why we shouldn’t have a side hustle.

1. They take too much time away from our families.

One thing that I have always tried to ensure is that my side hustles do not take away from family time. Sometimes, this may cause me to get up really early in the morning, stay up late, or work when I would rather be relaxing. This may also make me do less work on a side hustle than I want to or cause me to be annoyed with the extra work that I am doing.

However, my family is the most important thing in my life. If a side hustle causes me to miss too much family time, then it is probably something that I shouldn’t do.

Of course, there are many times when working extra will cause us to miss family events. This can be OK as long as missing one or two family events doesn’t turn into missing every family event and only focusing on making extra money. Side hustles should add to our life, help us get rid of some of our debt, and allow us to help others. They shouldn’t be the only thing that we focus on!

2. They cause our health to suffer.

Even if a side hustle is fun and makes us some extra money, we shouldn’t do one and sacrifice our health because of it. You and I know that we probably aren’t going to get 8 hours of sleep per night, especially if have a family and are working a side hustle. But we also shouldn’t only get 4 hours of sleep per night!

Besides sleep, we should also continue working out while we do our side hustle. Although it may seem counterintuitive, working out can cause us to be more productive and actually get more done than if we just tried to work all of the time.

Even just 20 minutes of working out can cause us to be more productive with our side hustle, while not sacrificing our health.

3. They don’t pay much money.

Sometimes, we may take an extra job just because of the money that it provides. That isn’t my favorite reason to do a side hustle, but it is a legitimate reason, especially if we are working to pay off debt or just need the extra money to live.

If this is the case, we definitely want to be sure that our side hustle provides the amount of money that we think it does. For some jobs, it may be real easy to calculate the hourly rate. For instance, if my side hustle is working in a bookstore that is located 2 blocks from my house, my hourly rate will be the $10 or $12 that I make per hour.

However, if my side hustle is doing something like driving for Uber, then I also need to take into account gas and vehicle costs of my car. Maybe I am making $20 per hour or more doing this side hustle … or maybe I am only making $4 per hour after I factor in all of my costs. Even if I am just making a few dollars per hour, my side hustle may still be worth it if I love doing it, but it’s good to know how much money I actually make from it. 

4. They take away from other goals in life.

Sometimes we do things that really help us with goals that we have in our lives. For instance, perhaps we love to travel, so we sign up for reward credit cards to allow us to travel for less. Maybe we are trying to become a real estate agent, so we follow a mentor along as they go to house showings. Or perhaps we read a lot of books on marriage if our goal is to have the best marriage possible.

No matter what, the way that we spend our time should be congruent with some of the big goals in our lives. I can’t say that my goal is to have a great relationship with my daughter and then never play with her when she wants to play. I also shouldn’t do side hustles that don’t help me with any of my goals.

5. They are impacting our full-time job.

Maybe our side hustles are so lucrative that they can actually replace the money that we make from our full-time job. If this is the case, then we might be trying to pare back the hours from our main job to focus more on our side hustle.

However, if this is not true, then we need to realize that our main job is more important than our side hustle. This means that we need to maintain our level of excellence at our main job. We can’t be getting up early or staying up late to do our side hustle if it impacts our day-to-day performance at our current job.

Even if we hate our main job because of a bad boss, crappy commute, or just the sheer misery of the work that we do, we still have to do a good job with it if we want to keep it. However, we should probably try to get rid of any work that that is seriously awful!

6. They hurt the relationship with our significant other.

I think that the biggest regret I would ever have is building a successful business and then seeing my marriage suffer or even go away because of the time that I spend on my business.

My marriage and my relationship with my wife is too important for it to suffer because of a business or a side hustle.

Therefore, if I found that my side hustle was causing me to skip dates with my wife or if it made our relationship suffer, then it would be time to give it up. I couldn’t be content with making a few extra dollars while the most important person in my life is upset at me.

7. They just suck!

Maybe your side hustle is great! Maybe it:

1. Doesn’t take too much time away from your family or spouse.
2. Doesn’t cause your health to suffer.
3. Makes you a lot of extra money.
4. Helps you accomplish some of your goals in life.
5. Helps instead of hinders you with your full-time job.

If each of these things are true, then a side hustle might be awesome to have!

But what if we dread the physical act of doing it? What if we dread actually having to turn the computer on and begin working on our side hustle in the morning? What if our part-time job makes us more anxious than our full-time job does?

If this is the case, then we need to seriously evaluate our side hustle! We probably shouldn’t do anything that is awful to do, but this is especially true if it is only a side business. This little bit of hilariousness shouldn’t be the feeling that you have when you think about your side hustle!

So is your side hustle worth it? Well, only you can answer this question, but hopefully these guidelines have helped you to determine when you should or shouldn’t have a side hustle. Also, check out this website or Chris Guillebeau’s book to find out some great side hustle ideas.

Let’s compare side hustles! Tell us about the good, bad, and ugly of your side hustle experience in the comments below. Also, subscribe to get more great content sent directly to your email : )

And thanks for reading!

~Nathan

Let’s keep living a great life … with the help of money. So what’s next?

• You can travel for free by using rewards credit cards.
• You can get motivated and get out of debt.
• You can check out the next post or the previous post and continue to learn.

But no matter what you decide to do, let’s leave the ordinary behind and take action today!

Just so you know: Life Before Budget has partnered with CardRatings for our coverage of credit card products. Life Before Budget and CardRatings may receive a commission from card issuers. The content of this article as well as comments from users are not meant to be professional financial advice and have not been reviewed by the advertisers. Please read our disclosures page for more details.