Today’s milestone: I’m ready to kill the consulting cash cow and start a product business.

The startup media is full of stories of twenty-somethings grinding out long hours for little to no pay to build their business. When you have a wife and kids dependent on you keeping food on the table, reality is much different. A speculative gamble is exactly that: a gamble.

However, I’ve finally achieved enough confidence to start pursuing my dream more aggressively. The contributing factors include:

• Late November and December are slow in the consulting world, which makes it the perfect time to explore.
• Our family monthly expenditure is relatively stable, so that part of the budget is manageable.
• Good amount of cash runway for if/when I decide to go all-in on a given product idea.

I feel I’ve hit 70% degree of certainty in knowing what I need to do. The why is the motivating factor. A fulfilled life is one full of actively-sought challenges. Once you’ve de-risked the opportunity sufficiently, it’s just a matter of getting out there to do it.