After 5 years in corporate america as a commercial banker, I hit the eject button. My wife and I both quit our corporate jobs and traveled around the world for a year, sharing our adventures at LandingStanding.com.

Since our year of travel ended at the end of 2012, we kept blogging and built up a small audience of 20,000 visitors per month. With no ideas (or passion) about how to really monetize the site, we started up other businesses to make sure we didn’t go back to corporate life now that our big year of adventure was over.

So while I have been writing on the travel blog for 3 years with my wife, I never blogged by myself.

But that’s changing today, and I’m not totally sure where to start.

An odd confession to make in my first post, but I want to be honest. In fact, that’s priority #1 for this site: unwavering and brutal honesty. About my entrepreneurial journey, my frustrations, my failures, and ultimately (definitely… maybe… hopefully) my successes.

So that’s what this site is about. Creating a sustainable business. One that is not built solely on me trading my time for money (consulting), but one that allows for some scale.

By “creating a business,” I mean the struggle to find a problem that I can solve and that people will pay to have a solution.

I have started more than a few types of businesses in the past 2 years. All trying to solve different problems, but none of them an actual success.

Most would be described as “failed,” “aborted,” or “stagnating.”

The worst of those other business types being the last: stagnating.

At least the failed and aborted businesses provided valuable lessons and let me move on. It’s the “stagnating” business that forced me to keep muddling along trying to turn it into a success and wasting my two most precious resources as an entrepreneur: time and passion.

Which brings me to priority #2 with this site: learn fast and act quickly. I will not judge my progress on the failures, but on how fast I learn and act on the lessons learned to try something new. I’m a big believer in the “Cult Of Done Manifesto” (currently my desktop background).

I will also value, respect, and trust the process over focusing on the end result (priority #3).

Priority #3 is crucial as focusing on the result tends to sap enthusiasm and passion. I want to trust the process and know that if I start with a solid foundation and process, the result will take care of itself.

Part of my process is to be overwhelmingly helpful and focus on the success of others first. By solving other peoples problems and being genuinely interested in helping them succeed, monetization will follow.

This one is a little tricky, as working for free forever means you never make money. But I truly believe in (and have experienced first-hand) the power of putting other peoples success first. And it doesn’t really mean working for free. It means that putting the success of others first will lead to even bigger financial gain in the end. So that’s priority #4 – be overwhelmingly helpful.

And the ultimate point of this blog brings us to priority #5.

To track my progress because what gets measured, matters.

When working outsides the confines of a corporate office, finding ways to hold yourself accountable is critical. A blog that shows the timestamp of every post, is a fast reminder of the goals I have set and promises I have made.

I am determined to never go back to the corporate world. That means I need to do more, work harder, learn faster, and find more people to help. This site will document every step I take to find a business that provides the life I envision by helping others solve real problems.

It’s an exciting adventure to start. But the strongest feelings are ones of nervousness and fear.

Gulp… here we go!

My 5 Priorities

1. Unwavering & brutal honesty
2. Learn fast & act quickly
3. Value, respect, and trust the process over focusing on the end result
4. Be overwhelmingly helpful
5. What gets measured, matters