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The Intentional Pursuit of Less (why we sold 3 businesses in less than a year)


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Over the last few years, I’ve really admired people who have ONE big thing.

For years I watched my friend Kevin build his singular mobile app. He was completely focused with no employees on a single app that brought in meaningful income (until he sold it).

I also look at friends like Kara & Nate who through relentless focus have crushed it on platforms like Youtube.

I felt envy for people with one major project because I saw what can happen with focus. You have the ability to master that thing and do it incredibly well.

Over the last 5-7 years Alyssa and I have done the opposite of focusing on a single item.

We have:

  • made a documentary
  • started a freelance videography business
  • hosted a podcast
  • written books and courses
  • founded a software company
  • worked on marketing campaigns for big outdoor brands
  • organized conferences
  • traveled
  • made Youtube videos
  • started a family

Most of these things we did okay.

Some things I know I did poorly.

Many days just sitting down to look at my to-do list felt overwhelming. I would break up my businesses into separate categories. I’d write down items to get done for Campground Booking, RVE, Heath & Alyssa blog, or our campground property, etc.

The list was long.

I loved this comment from our friend Abigail who we met years ago at an RVE Summit. She shared this on Facebook when we announced we were selling our campground:

 

We definitely aren’t experts in handling big-ass projects. We’re just experts in taking on big-ass commitments.

I’ve craved the idea of simplifying.

But it hasn’t felt like an easy switch to turn off.

Then we sold Campground Booking last year.

And we decided to sell the campground (update: we closed two days ago).

And with each decision, we felt significantly lighter, like we didn’t even fully recognize the effect that piling on so many projects had on us over the years.

It sparked a conversation with Alyssa about what we wanted to do next now that we had lightened the load.

Her answer: travel more. This is unsurprising. While we’ve adventured a lot in the US, we’ve barely scratched the surface internationally.

Travel is something we haven’t been able to do as much since I really started growing Campground Booking (and then with COVID). We both miss it. In two weeks we are flying to Italy and couldn’t be more excited.

As we talked about what we wanted to do next, the topic of what we wanted to do with the RV Entrepreneur community came up.

We started RVE back in 2016 (the podcast, school, and annual Summit) when we had already been full-time RVing for over two years. We told each other that we wanted to host five RVE Summits—we hosted the 5th one in the fall. And we’d produced over 200 episodes of the podcast. We had 15 courses in the school.

As we talked it over, it felt like the right time to wrap up RVE too. The idea of removing another project from our plate felt liberating.

The struggle was figuring out what to do with the conference, podcast and school. The community has meant so much to us over the years. We didn’t want to quit and walk away without a succession game plan.

We wanted to hand off RVE to someone who was excited to grow and invest in it.

So, last week we sold RV Entrepreneur.

The podcast and Summit and school will all live on through Joshua (our new podcast host) and Andy, who bought RVE. We know Andy through his website RV LIFE which is run by a community of RVers. RVing and community is what RV LIFE is all about, so when it came time to sell, we felt this would be the perfect fit.

Plus since RV LIFE’s big focus is on community, there will still be RVE events.

Speaking of events…

Will there be another RV Entrepreneur Summit?

Yes.

Photo credit Joe Hendricks Photography

 

Last year Alyssa and I hosted what we said was our last RVE Summit. However, both the RV LIFE team and Joshua are excited to continue bringing the RVE Summit to life.

There aren’t any set dates or locations yet, but you can stay tuned for future RVE Summit communication 🙂

How It Feels to Sell RV Entrepreneur

Alyssa and I have sold three businesses in less than a year.

It’s honestly been hard letting go of three big projects that we’ve worked on for years.

I was talking to a friend about it and he shared something helpful he heard in a Steve Carell interview. In the interview, Steve shared that he likes to walk away from things a little before he’s ready—like leaving The Office during season seven before the show ended.

When you leave before you’ve outgrown something and while you still love it, you set yourself up to go into the next project without being exhausted from your last business or burned out.

I wasn’t ready to let go of RVE quite yet. I still had product ideas around it, we still want to travel and start businesses. But it felt like the right time to walk away and force a fresh start.

Alyssa has been on a Shutterfly kick lately making custom memory books.

Last week she made one that shared the story of RV Entrepreneur with photos of me hosting the podcast and our annual RVE Summits. It made me tear up looking at all of the amazing people we met as part of this community. Some of our best friends and people we will be friends with for the rest of our lives.

Starting the podcast was a dream. People listening was a bonus. The fact that a conference came to life was surprising and we loved it. The amount of people in our lives because of starting this podcast, conference, and Facebook group is astonishing. It’s been one of the best decisions we’ve ever made.

I feel sad to be closing this chapter but grateful that RVE will continue to live on without us at the helm.

What’s Next? 

Perhaps more difficult than selling our businesses has been fighting the urge to immediately replace them with something new. It’s uncomfortable to answer the question of what’s next with uncertainty. Yet, the idea of creating space to dream and enjoy this season of life is exciting.

So what’s next? Next we fly to Italy. I bike the Tuscany Trail. Alyssa’s next book comes out in May.

And we take a beat to spend time as a family and reset before we launch the next thing.

A Thank You to Our RVE Family

An exercise I do on a regular basis is 5 minutes of deep breathing with visualization. As part of that visualization, I think about 3 moments of gratitude in my life. While I often think about moments with Alyssa or our kids, I also think about RVE Summit. The friends we’ve made because of deciding to start a silly podcast have been life-changing to us.

If you’ve taken time to share your story with me on the podcast, I can’t thank you enough.

If you’ve driven across the country to spend time with us at RVE Summit, I’m incredibly grateful for your energy and your presence.

If you’ve ever sent us a thoughtful email or engaged in the RVE Facebook group, I’m deeply appreciative of your words.

Words never feel adequate when you’re trying to sum up something that has meant so much. Thank you and we love you.

-Heath & Alyssa

PS We will continue to blog here in HeathandAlyssa.com and send you emails through our weekly newsletter, so don’t think you’ve gotten rid of us! 🙂



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