Neal O'Grady

I'm 34 years old. I've never had a full-time job.

Not once.

No, I did not grow up rich without needing to.

My dad passed when I was 13, my mom made $26,000 CAD, and he left her with an invalid life insurance policy. He had changed it to void unless he was 65 years old or older

He did that 2 days before local laws changed where your spouse needed to approve life insurance policy changes.

He also left her with tons of debt on credit cards she didn't know about.

So she was forced to file for bankruptcy.

We were real poor.

I managed to go to university only because she moved to Vancouver with me.

And I paid for it by aggressively applying for scholarships. 75% of it was covered.

Yet, I've never used that degree.

Since then I've:

- Taught myself programming
- Worked as a freelance developer
- Worked as a freelance copywriter
- Lived out of a backpack for 3.5 years as a digital nomad
- Started two 7-figure revenue businesses in the marketing industry

At no point was I hungry, broke, or homeless.

People think that forging your own path is risky.

What I think is risky is taking out a mortgage based on a full-time job that can be taken away from you at any moment

Ask people who were earning 1%-er incomes at Amazon, Meta, Peloton, Stripe, Wayfair... the list goes on.

As a freelancer, you have numerous income streams—losing one isn't existential.

As a business owner, your job can't be taken from you. You make more if you hustle harder and smarter.

This is why I've dedicated my life to helping people start, build, and grow companies. I share my journey, and what I'm learning along the way.

My growth agency, Bell Curve (www.bellcurve.com), helps companies create the growth and brand strategies, and execute on the highest leverage ways to grow their companies.

My marketing education company, Demand Curve (www.demandcurve.com) creates courses, content, and events that help founders and marketers grow their companies and passion projects. We were accepted into Y Combinator's summer of 2019 batch.

My goal is to make entrepreneurship easier and more approachable. Because we all benefit when we each build the future we want.