With the old work model, a person would work for one company for 30-40 years then retire with a nice gold watch (and a pension if you were lucky). Just the thought of that makes me want to gouge me eyes out with a spork. Today, we know all about the inherent dangers of a pension plan (what happens if your employer goes out of business?) so the guv’mint adapted by creating the 401k plan, which in essence is a retirement plan that goes along with you if you change employers.

But there’s one area we, the people, have not adapted to. What happens if you get fired/downsized/your company goes out of business? Do you lose the car? The house? The dreaded B-word? (No, not that one.) Bankruptcy?

The federal government addressed the issue of retirement. It’s up to each of us as individuals to address our own financial security. Having one job (i.e. one source of income) is a recipe for disaster, especially in today’s volatile economy. Just as we adapted to the need for mobile retirement funds, today we must adapt to our need for financial stability by creating multiple streams of income. For example, if you have 5 different income sources and lose 1 of them, the other 4 will allow you to keep your head above water financially and you can then begin to focus on rebuilding.

So how do you create multiple streams of income? There are numerous ways to go about this and the approach will vary from person to person based on how each of us is uniquely wired. The important thing is that you figure it out.

1 of my streams of income comes from Squidoo, a brilliant concept created by entrepreneur Seth Godin. Squidoo is free and allows me to be creative (and get paid!) by writing about anything my little heart desires. I can be serious or silly or immature. I can put on my teacher hat, talk business or just be a kid. And you can utilize Squidoo too.

Remember, you are the CEO of “You, Inc”. You are in charge of your finances. Don’t leave things to chance–take control of your reality and create multiple streams of income.