I registered another domain name today. I registered my first domain a decade ago — evolutioncoaching.com — and that has served me well as a business name. Today’s score puts me somewhere between 20-25 domains in total.

The last decade has seen many of my domains come and go.  There was saveyourhead.com, my now defunct site that pitched an ebook about the truth about hair replacement (I’ll save you the 29 bucks, if you’re thinking about a hair replacement, don’t do it, man!) and more recently, nyyanktees.com, a site that makes funny t-shirts about the New York Yankees in a timely fashion.

Off the top of my head, today’s new shirt would read "Don’t blame Roger — Rockets need fuel!" or something to that effect. By the quality of that joke, perhaps you understand why I’ve not created the site or a single shirt yet.

For the record, my favorite domain — the one I believe with ultimately be the most valuable to me — is verycoollife.com. Currently this hosts my Very Cool Life Network website, and I have long felt that this was my true brand and that this domain captures my grandest visions. As my dad would say, we shall see what we shall see as to what that domain becomes in the future.

In the vein of Ralph Kramden and Ed Norton, I frequently find ideas popping into my head as to how I can create a business that will put dollars in my bank account without me having to do very much. In listening to my clients and entrepreneurial-minded friends, I know I am not alone in this regard. The success of Tim Ferriss’ recent book, The 4 Hour Workweek, is another testament to the power of creating passive income using the the web instead of (or in addition to) clocking in at a more traditional job.

 

Like I said, I get lots of ideas. If these ideas linger, it leads me to my next step: the purchase of a domain name. Of course, the truth is that the majority of my domains remain mere parking spaces, reminders of what I once considered to be a cool idea. Currently domains like whatihavelearnedsofar.com and rockstarmind.com have powerful ideas behind them, but I do not know whether these ideas will ever manifest into a live site or product. But the potential excited me enough that it’s a no-brainer to drop my 10 bucks into the fountain and keep my hope alive for another year.

In my experience, sometimes there’s an incubation period for your idea. Just because you have a great idea, it doesn’t mean that the timing for that idea to take from in the world is the present moment. For example, a decade ago, I became a distributor for DISC assessments (these are communication/team building tools). I made the investment to use the assessments with my clients and "someday" perhaps I would expand sales to companies outside my personal clients.

Upon investing in my distributorship, I went domain hunting. DISCReports.com was my second or third choice, but I snapped it up, surprised it was still available. I did not touch it for a couple of years. I simply did not have the energy or the interest.

Then — for whatever reason — the time arrived, and in a couple weeks, I had created the entire site (today, I would hire someone to do this for me). Over the years, this site has earned me around $100K of profit with very little work on my part. It’s also gotten me some lucrative speaking gigs all across the country. While there’s no raging passion burning in my heart to share DISC with the world, it’s a solid product and it’s been a wonderful way to bring dollars in without much effort.

In fact, I just came in from an afternoon of playing basketball and running errands. When I checked my messages, one of the calls was for an order worth over $1200 in profit. My total time investment on this order was less than an hour. This does not happen every day (yet), but by having this site out there, the potential to come home to this sort of message is always there, 24/7/365.  I have created a portal for my desire to express itself. And it does.

Of course, I am a big fan of having multiple (and yes, diverse) streams of income. There’s nothing like getting one of those e-mails that says money has just been deposited into your account as you sit enjoying a hot cup of coffee (or tea, if you prefer). If you have not experienced this, then please let me encourage you. Allow yourself to experience what it would FEEL like for you to receive an e-mail saying $1000 has just been deposited in your account.

Maybe you’d dance around. Maybe you’d give it a little fist pump, yell "Cool!" and move on with your day (this tends to be my M.O.) Whatever your response, just allow yourself to tune into what that feeling would be like for you.

Seriously, please do not read on unless you’ve connected with that vibe.

If you connected, super.

If you skipped my little request, I’ll assume you either (1) thought it was silly, or (2) perhaps you felt like this did not apply to you. After all, you do not have any ideas in this moment. Nothing comes to mind as to how you would create a passive stream of income. Perhaps you have never created a business. Or –omigod! — you don’t even have a website or blog! But my friend, remember not to let your mind get in the way of your intentions. Like a hot air balloon, your intentions will raise you to great heights, but before you get off the ground, you’ll need to drop the sandbags of your mind’s limited perspective.

You do not need to sit down and burst a blood vessel trying to think of a great online business. I don’t know about you, but that’s not how any ideas come to me. It reminds me of people who come to me wanting to "find their passion." Frequently they are talking to me because they’ve been wandering in a vast field of stones, turning each one over, one stone at at a time. While flipping these stones, they ask themselves, "Is my passion under here? Is is here?" I tell these folks that if they want to find their passion, they just need to allow themselves to notice what’s present inside themselves rather than looking for their desire somewhere on the outside. I believe the same is true with great ideas. They are not something you consciously try to find. Rather you are better served by setting your intention to raise your awareness. You simply allow yourself to notice your great ideas when they pop up. That way, instead of hunting for a great idea with your mind, you are constantly scanning with your knowing. Knowing always trumps thinking.

But if you’re not open to finding an answer, chances are you will not. So the first step is to set that intention that you’d like to see cash show up in your inbox. You don’t need to know how. Let me repeat that… You. Don’t. Need. To. Know. HOW. You don’t need to know anything about websites. Shopping carts. PayPal. Credit card accounts. At this point you need not know anything about any of that. If you’re not interested in that kind of thing, don’t be interested in it. It’s unimportant. Irrelevant.

You just want to see that e-mail float in that informs you that dollars (or euros, etc) have made their way to your bank account. If it seems like magic, I assure you that it is a form of magic. Money appears because your intention was for money to appear. Thrilling at first, with time this becomes your expectation. And when you are clear and clean in your expectation, this is what you naturally create more of in your life.

So what was the domain name I registered today that inspired this post?

Fridgeworthycards.com.

What does that mean? Well, I’ll wait to elaborate (and hopefully get some feedback on my idea) in a subsequent post. But I wanted to share my perspective and some experiences on intentions, passive income, and making a small investment on an idea that you allow to come to you.

Some people buy lottery tickets. A dollar and a dream. I buy domains names that make my heart flutter.

And while my ideas may ultimately prove to be of equal value as an expired lottery ticket, in the long run, just by thinking this way I feel like I’ve won something.