Theres one thing most over look when considering becoming a gunsmith or Machinist / tradesman. Its not just the schooling and or degrees you have. It also takes years of exceptional work to build the reputation and gain the experience needed to make top pay. In the gunsmith trade it also takes years to build up the following and to get the needed word of mouth and recommendations from clients. If your going to try it with out support you are in for long days. Start at 6:00 work on projects in the shop till 9 or so. Then customers and order parts materials and plan schedule work, then maybe some "interrupted time" back in the shop. Some jobs may require most of the morning in set up.
When I started out in the tool and die trade I was amazed at the "old guys" sat at their bench didnt look like they were doing much but drinking coffee but at the end of the day they had a big pile of chips and parts to turn in.