Hopefully you are someone who is interested in making an extra income by using your own skills, learning from others and being enthusiastic. You are looking for business ideas that can be started on a part time basis at home.

Traditional jobs and a regular income are OK for some people. But you want something more. Something where you are in control and something that gives you more long term security than a 9 to 5 job.

I believe that the wrong way to create an income is to try and find that one thing that is suddenly going to earn you $20,000 per month, or make you a millionaire within a year. Possibly those things exist, but they are very rare.

I think that the best way to create a secure future for yourself and you family is to create multiple streams of income. What this means is that instead of having one big business or single job that you rely on you have several small businesses.

These businesses should also be diverse, so that if one is affected by fashion or economic changes you can rely on the others.

With multiple streams of income you start one small income generating idea, get it running smoothly and profitably. You then move on to starting another small business. You continue doing this until you have built up enough businesses that provide the total monthly income that you desire to have a comfortable life.

One of the big advantages of having several small businesses is that if one fails, you still have the income from the other businesses. This will give you time to replace the failed business with a new business. There are several reasons why a business could fail, perhaps a competitor drastically undercuts your profit margin, or perhaps something goes out of fashion. Who cares why? You have the other businesses to keep you going.

If you are currently in a full time job, do not suddenly resign and say that you are about to earn your income form many small businesses. Things don't work out like that. For example starting one small business could take you over a month to get up and running. You need to get your first business running smoothly and profitably before you start your second.

If you need a total income of $8000 per month, you may decide that you can do this with 10 small businesses each providing a profit of $800 per month. That should not be too difficult; there are hundreds of opportunities around.

You should always be on the look out for new business ideas, always have some in development, and have some that you are researching. Be ready to launch new business ideas. Make sure that you also diversify between internet only businesses and actual real world businesses. Again this will protect you from the "winds of change"

You can usually start these small businesses very quickly and for a low cost. What you learn from starting one business can then be used to start subsequent businesses more quickly and efficiently.