First and foremost – Happy New Year, everyone! I hope you all had a tremendous holiday season with family and friends and everything that goes with it! I know I certainly did.

With a 10-day posting hiatus behind me, I am very proud and extremely excited to announce the fact that I have achieved my 2010 goal of becoming a Full-Time Virtual CEO..!!!

Before going any further, I would like to thank each and every one of you for all the support you’ve shown me on my journey over the last 12 months, since the Virtual Business Lifestyle blog was launched. The response and interest has been amazing, and although I am sure I would have hit my target without it all (its just the kind of guy I am!), it sure was more fun with you all in my corner, so thank you!

I’d also like to thank my wife for all her love and support and understanding – especially over the last couple of months – which demanded some very long hours from me, to make sure everything that needed to be in place, was, by the deadline.

Above you’ll see a quick note that I scribbled to myself about 9 months ago (after I had announced the goal, obviously), whilst enjoying a weekend at a resort here in Cebu, Philippines. It’s been in my wallet ever since, and every time I reached in to grab some cash, it reminded me, every time.., of my year long goal.

The funny thing is that whether I hit the target of getting this all set-up by the end of 2010, or not, didn’t really matter all that much to me. If it needed another month or two, or even six – it wouldn’t have bothered me. I would have put the extra time in to achieve the goal. It was the GOAL ITSELF which was the most important thing.

So, Ducker – What Now..??!

Good question! Well, first things first… I will be playing things very carefully in the first 4-6 weeks of the year, as I roll into my new set-up. I need to make sure that the systems and processes that myself and my management team have been working on over the last few months, more than anything else, actually do what they are supposed to do – keep me out of the office as much as possible!!!

The plan is to basically go into the office no more than three times a week, for around 2 hours at a time. This time spent in the office will be with management staff exclusively. Going over everything, making sure things are running well and that the quality aspect of working with our clients will not drop in any way.

Following this, I expect twice a week, maximum (again at 2 hours a time), in the actual office facility, is all the time I will need to continue to run, manage and grow my group of companies.

They’ll be a lot more along the way, obviously, which I will keep you all up to date with, here on the blog.

The Lifestyle Awaiting Me

Part of creating this goal for myself in the first place (in fact the main contributing factor behind it) was to be able to spend more time with my family. That will certainly happen. In fact, the last 10-days have been awesome, I have barely touched a computer (perhaps a little surfing and tweeting via my iPad has taken place, but thats about it!), so much so, that I find myself typing this post out at an alarmingly slower rate that usual…!!!

Over the Christmas break I was able to sit down with my family and plan out our travels for this year. Dates are yet to be confirmed, based on school holidays, etc., but we’ll be enjoying not one, not two but THREE family vacations this year, all in different parts of the world, which we are all super excited about! I’ll post more details on where we’ll be nearer the time, as I love the idea of trying to set-up some VBL Meet-Up’s to coincide with the trips (let me know if you think this is a cool idea!).

A New Year, A New Virtual Business Lifestyle!

One of the things I am initially very excited to get going with is the all new VBL blog, which will be launching in two parts this month…

The first part will be the unveiling of the brand new, fully customized re-design of the blog itself, which will go live on Wednesday! The second part of the re-launch will be towards the end of the month, with tons of new resources and additional sections covering every aspect of the VBL and how you can get going with planning, creating and realizing your very own VBL. All of which I need your help on – more details on Wednesday!

You see, last year was all about that journey for me… This year I am on a mission to not only live the lifestyle I’ve been planning for the last 365 days, but also promote it to the WORLD and help as many entrepreneurs to create a life they’ll love to live for themselves and their families.

And thats exactly what the VBL Blog will now become going forward… A huge, one-stop-shop and all-encompassing ‘How to Guide’, on helping you to create a lifestyle centered around business, but focusing on launching, running and operating your businesses (whether they be online, or off) from a distance and with a renewed focus on creating passive income, utilizing outsourcing and being a true-blue entrepreneur, in every sense of the word.

Closing Thoughts…

A few days ago I got this tweet from VBL fan @orvillejparker on Twitter. I replied saying that the biggest take away, above and beyond everything else from 2010 was quite clear to me… And that is that if you work very, very hard towards one particular goal, you will achieve it.

In fact, thanks again, Orville, for sending that tweet through. I did ‘think’ before I replied to it. That thought process alone was enough to help me realize just how incredibly lucky, and blessed, I was to have everyone around me that I did over the last year…

See you on Wednesday for the first part of the 2-part re-launch of the VBL Blog. I’m looking forward to seeing what you guys think of it!