Tried 5 Skills, Quit All 5 — What Am I Missing?

Not disagreeing with you, but to become an electrician in Canada it’s a 4 year apprenticeship. Same with plumbing. The rest in your list though, I don’t know enough about, though sounds kinda right maybe

I believe it is different for every country. In my list some are 1 yr schools, some of them are 2 yr - some of them can be learned fast like cleaning or cooking also.
But that doesn't take away from the skill - they need to be attentive and actually do the work.

80% of jobs are never posted on online

Do you have a link to this stat?

— 1% reply rate feels low because it is. But when we A/B’d cold emails for dev tools, the real bottleneck was price anchoring: ‘I’ll do X for $0’ vs ‘I’ll audit this page for free.’ The latter got replies from tire-kickers, the former from buyers. Try leading with a micro-scope (e.g. ‘SEO audit for your homepage in 24h’) and price it at $0 only if they commit to a call afterward. We saw a 3x reply→conversion lift when we did this https://cxgo.ai/l/KGWrFFz . Painful truth: rejection often means you were solving the wrong problem first.

Networking. You need to find poeple who are doing the career that you want. Forums Facebook groups, Discord chats, LinkedIn, wherever your poeple are that's where you go. Join a group and see how other poeple are making this work.

I succeeded in my freelancing career by finding and working under some very good mentors. They gave me advice and when my skills developed enough, started tossing me some work and clients. It's possible, but it's work and requires a lot of soft skills.

Source: I read it once on the internet.

If you are sending things via email 99% of it is going to hit the spam folder. If I register a domain name I get no less than 6 emails selling my web site designs, logos, seo, hosting and other stuff I neither want nor need. Figure out of the rest you will get less than 10 percent interaction.

Build a website, create 20 mock logos, write some articles, then head to local businesses to give them a chance to take a look. When you get a few locals that you can get on board and have some links on your site that show you have real customers with real locations.

Use your SEO skills and people will make it to your site and inquire about your services.

Without all of that if I received an email randomly in my spam I wouldn't even look. Some rando sending me an email for a service is no different than the ShinyHunters hacking group junk I get saying I've been hacked and send them 2000 in crypto, the German guy sending me a notice that I have money they are holding for me, or the junk saying thank you for your Microsoft 365 purchase that I didn't make.

I know it sounds harsh but pulling punches isn't going to help you here. Also randomly starting something then quitting because you are not successful then doing it again on something else and wondering what the problem is.... well they say the perfect definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results. It sounds like you are changing the wrong variables. If you really want this to work you need to put in more effort than watching a few videos, making minimal effort, sending random emails, then moving on when it didn't work. When you can walk in to an established business in your preferred field and get a job doing what you are trying to randomly sell then you can start a real business and be successful.

I used to be a financial advisor. I cold called 1,000 numbers. I got 1 to a meeting (0.1%), never became a client. Idk how many doors I knocked on, I got 2 meetings, neither of them clients. Every client I got was someone I already knew. Just kinda what going off on your own is like.

Was there any skill you actually enjoyed doing? Is there a way to get a job somewhere to build experience as like a trainee before going off on your own?? I'm kind of in a similar situation, except I'm eyeing up bookkeeping. I'm good at math, it's potentially fully remote, no degree required, no regulatory board/exams to pass/ low regulation. The downside is that it can be hard to break into because of the low barriers to entry and anybody can just call themselves a bookkeeper so it's a little oversaturated. .

I'm going to self study, learn bookkeeping software, then start applying for jobs like "junior bookkeeper", "accounts payable clerk", "assistant bookkeeper" etc just to try and get my foot in the door and see where it goes.

"accounts payable clerk"

My wife started at a company as relief receptionist. They realized she was a smarty-pants and put her in as Accounts Receivable Clerk as soon as one opened. Now she's managing the A-R team of 8, makes decent bank and they pay a great bonus and fund training every year -- e.g her two-year designation recently. Her boss is a nepo hire with actual talent, so it's glass ceiling, and she's okay with that.

People who are driven enough to self-employ will often thrive in a good spot where the barrier can appear low but excellence stands out. I think A-P and A-R clerks are examples of this.

Additionally, working for The Man means you don't have to find the work, get the insurance, do the complex taxes and worry about the market as much. Also she gets a fantastic yearly bonus.

She makes more than my day job, if we remember it's unionized and we remove standby and call-outs. It's not yacht money, but we're okay.