BennyEast.Com/Blog The official blog of Kenny West

Mile By Mile

So, my Surf income is currently at $254 a month.  Not too shabby.  The last time I calculated it, it was at $244, which is up from what it was before.

What does that mean?

Nothing really.  It means I have some extra beer money to buy beers at open mics that I'm going to start playing.  Or, coffee... Should the open mic be at a coffeeshop.

That money is used for one thing and one thing only... Creative ventures related expenses.

What about the investments?

What about them?  Basically I haven't sold a single one in the last year really.  I've only been buying.  But even the buying part, I've slowed with that.  My last purchase was a few weeks ago.  I just setup the trade, usually the night before, and let it auto execute the next day on market open.

That way, I don't have to worry about it while I'm at my job and I can focus on my actual day job.

For now, I'm letting the current investments all ride.  I'm not going to make any new investments for a little while and just let the cash income come in off the investments.

One of the trickiest things to do in the investing world... Is nothing.  Most people who dabble in stocks get burned because they can't just sit there and be patient.  They get addicted to the constant trigger of the trade button.

My current trade button is on snooze for now.  I may pick up another stock, or more shares in a stock I currently own here or there if I see a REALLY good opportunity... but for the most part, I'm just snoozing it out and using that $254 a month as creative projects cashflow.

For me a good investment opportunity is a drop in share price in a dividend aristocrat stock.  That means, the dividend yield goes up.  Although, it depends on why the share price is dropping.  For the most part, I'm only looking for stocks to buy and hold forever and collect income off the dividend yield.

I don't have time to babysit stocks during the day anyway.  It's a busy time of the year at work so I have work to do.  I just check them each night before I go to sleep and spent 10 or 15 minutes then tending to them.  For the most part they are grown up stocks, they can take care of themselves.

My goal isn't to take up my days trigger trading stocks.  It's to build up an income portfolio, hit the snooze button on trading, then use the income to pay for creative related expenses.  New guitar strings, a drum set, new mics, travel to open mics, beer at open mics, cover charges at open mics, another acting class, fees to upload music online to CDBaby, headshots... Etc. etc.

I did recently receive a small deposit from digital music sales... About 13 bucks.  So, that money goes back in to join the creative salary.  The more coming in, means, the more music related things I can do.  The more money coming in means I can buy more music equipment, or travel further to play open mics.  Basically cashflow is important to any business... So, if I run my creative hobbies like a business... And focus on generating more cashflow, that means I can do bigger and better things.  Maybe I can then write music and record it on better equipment, or even send songs off to be mastered professionally.  I could maybe hire studio musicians to record the parts so they sound a little better than if I play everything myself or a professional producer to really get that mix just right...  I mean, basically, the more money coming in, means, the more I can do to get the ideas that I come up with turned into actual art.

So, that's the focus right now.  Using my investment strategy to fund my creative strategy.  Then using any income earned from creative endeavors to reinvest back into boosting the investment income.  Additional investment income goes to more creative projects.  It's my creative feedback loop.

And hopefully eventually the inch by inch... Becomes a mile by mile.

Hey, if nothing else, I have a little bit of extra money coming in to go splurge at the music store once a month.