I Love the The 4-Hour Workweek

As the author of the international bestseller The Joy of Not Working (over 225,000 copies sold) and How to Retire Happy, Wild, and Free (over 110,000 copies sold) I follow the principles in my books.

Indeed, I have a great lifestyle. I work only 4 to 5 hours a day and make a comfortable living. In my books I advocate that people leave corporate life as soon as possible and work less than half the hours of the average working stiff. I always considered that the paradigm that I operate with is much different than that of the average working person.

But after reading The 4-Hour Workweek, I realize that my paradigm is much closer to that of the average working person than that of Tim Ferris. I now want to operate closer to the level of Tim Ferris. I love this book.

There is a lot of valuable material in this classic that we all can use although we may never get to the point of working only 4 hours a week. We may be able to work only two hours a day, however, and still make a great living. Some of the most important principles in this book are:

• Get unrealistic.


• Practice the art of nonfinishing.


• Cultivate selective ignorance.


• Do not multi-task.


• Outsource as much of your life as you can.


• Being busy is a form of laziness - lazy thinking and indiscriminate action.


• Forget about time management.

This book is written for ordinary people who want to accomplish extraordinary things with minimal time involved. Here are five of several favorite inspirational quotes from The 4-Hour Workweek:

1. The blind quest for cash is a fool's errand.


2. It's lonely at the top. Ninety-nine percent of people in the world are convinced they are incapable of achieving great things, so they aim for the mediocre. The level of competition is thus fiercest for "realistic" goals, paradoxically making them the most time-consuming and energy consuming. It is easier to raise $10,000,000 than it is $1,000,000. It is easier to pick up the one perfect 10 in the bar than the five 8s.


3. The fishing is best where the fewest go, and the collective insecurity of the world makes it easy for people to hit home runs while everyone is aiming for base hits.


4. Tens of thousands of people, most of them less capable than you, leave their jobs every day. It's neither uncommon nor fatal.