The 4-Hour Work Week

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💡 Key Takeaways

• The opposite of happiness isn’t sadness; it’s boredom.
• The definition of happiness is excitement.
• Prioritize the 20 percent of tasks that will yield 80 percent of the results.
• Start weaning yourself off email, distractions, and meetings.
• Liberate yourself from the office.
• Automate your income.

✏ Top Quotes

The question you should be asking isn’t, “What do I want?” or “What are my goals?” but “What would excite me?”.

If you’re not measuring, you’re guessing.

The timing is never right, and will never be right, so just do it now.

The options are limitless; the lack of time is not an excuse.

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📝 Summary + Notes

Redefine life

• Life is short
  • We get ~20,000 days/480,000 hours awake. We are rarely fully in the present moment.
• We tend to adhere to commonly accepted norms
  • We work at specific times, and places, for ~45 years, and then retire.
• This is archaic
  • Active is valued more than productive.
  • Work to live is the norm.

• This is unscientific

  • Unproductive
    • Work expands to fit the time given.
    • Idle time leads to unproductive tasks.
  • Unhealthy
    • Stress without purpose.
    • Long screen time indoors.
    • Meaningless trivial activities.
  • Ineffective
    • Mismatched retirement and savings.
    • Cyclical energy and interest.
    • Youth cannot be relieved.
• Upgrade options exist
  • For all ages and employment statuses.
• We do not act or take steps
  • Unclear wants, feasibility, and process.
  • Fear of change and vulnerability.

Revise your assumptions and convictions

• Different is only better if it’s more effective or enjoyable.
• We tend to fear what we don't understand.
  • Accept that timing is never perfect, view life as an experiment, and treat failures as feedback.
  • Determine the worst-case scenario and find ways to mitigate it, and identify and solve any excuses for inaction.
  • Consider the costs of not taking action, both financially and emotionally.
• Learn to accept small failures.
• Setting unrealistic goals can lead to better performance and more innovative solutions, and our failed outcomes from these goals may still be better than realistic goals.
• We often overestimate what can be achieved in a day and underestimate what can be accomplished in a year.

Clearly identify your desired outcome or goal

• Inject excitement into your life
  1. Visualize having $100 million in the bank and being the most intelligent person you know.
  2. Determine what you would “Have”, “Do”, and “Be” within the next 6 and 3 months.
  3. Transform any "Be" into an actionable "Do".
  4. Choose four items from your list to establish as goals.
  5. Compute the ongoing monthly financial expenses.
  6. Calculate the monthly/daily income needed to make them a reality:
     Target Monthly Income = [ Monthly Goals + (One Time Goals / Total Months) ] * 1.3 Monthly Expenses
  7. Define the next actions to move you closer to those goals (Today, Tomorrow, and the Day After).
  8. Complete those actions by 11 a.m. each day.
• Eliminate emptiness
  • Achieving financial independence is just the starting point.
  • Over time, things that once thrilled you may become less stimulating.
  • The type of purpose you choose is not critical, but many people prefer to pursue continuous learning and help others.
  • Take action after making your decision. Your new sense of purpose will reconnect you with the world.
  • Above all, engage in various projects and reap the social benefits of life.

Eliminate everything except the essential tasks

• Be both efficient and effective
  • Doing an unimportant task well doesn’t make it important.
  • The importance of a task is not determined by how much time it takes.
  • "What" you do is more important than “How” you do it.
• Focus on what truly matters
  • Use the Pareto principle (80/20) to increase your happiness (find and do the 20% of the work that delivers the 80% of results).
  • Remove anything that doesn't contribute to your happiness, try new things, and keep what works.
  • Don't waste your time on toxic or unfulfilling relationships.
• Work faster with Parkinson’s Law
  • Imagine having limited time to complete your work (2 hours per day or 4 hours per week).
  • Prioritize and focus on mission-critical tasks by asking if you would be satisfied if only those tasks were completed and what the consequences would be if they were not.
  • Set a deadline to complete these tasks by 11 a.m. the next day.
  • Avoid multitasking.
• Prioritize your time by eliminating unimportant tasks
  • Recognize activities you use as distractions from important tasks.
  • Create a list of things to avoid doing, such as checking emails or attending unnecessary meetings.
  • Ask yourself if you’re creating unnecessary tasks to avoid the important ones.
  • Avoid wasting time on tasks you can't control or define.
• Reduce email overload
  • Establish filters (either automated or with the help of an assistant) to delete or delay low-priority emails.
  • Simplify responses to minimize unnecessary correspondence (provide clear instructions or alternatives).
  • Group emails together and limit the number of email-checking sessions per day.
• Minimize disruptions
  • Create more time by declining low-priority tasks and obligations.
  • Decrease time and energy spent on repetitive tasks by scheduling them in batches.
• Minimize meetings
  • Decline meetings that lack clear goals.
  • Request an email outlining the specific objectives or desired outcomes to ensure clarity.
  • Resolve any objectives that can be addressed via email or phone, saving in-person meetings as a last resort.
  • Encourage others to be concise and avoid idle talk.
  • Establish a predetermined end time for the meeting.
  • Keep meetings brief, lasting no longer than 30 minutes.
• Stay focused on your goals and don’t lose sight of your dreams
  • Avoid micromanaging and wasting time on trivial emails.
  • Delegate tasks to others when possible.
  • Prioritize emails that lead to sales or require personal attention.
  • Efficiency over perfection.
  • Implement rules and processes to avoid repeating tasks.

Automate everything else

• Automate and outsource tasks to focus on more important work
  • Do not outsource tasks that can be eliminated altogether.
  • Do not delegate tasks that can be automated or streamlined.
• Hire a Virtual Assistant
  • Avoid depending on a single person and consider hiring an agency or team instead of an individual.
  • Measure the cost per task completed and consider the potential impact of cultural or language barriers.
  • Clearly define the tasks you need assistance with, including any necessary language or communication requirements.
  • Interview and trial multiple virtual assistants with a challenging task and a short (48-hour) deadline.

Escape the office

• Strategize your remote work options
  • Ask your employer about remote work opportunities and demonstrate how it benefits them.
  • Pick an appropriate time to request remote work.
• Prove your productivity when working remotely
  • Test remote work arrangements during a planned absence or personal emergency.
  • Collaborate with your boss to establish a plan that benefits both parties.
  • Increase productivity while working from home and keep track of progress.
  • Record your productivity for future negotiations.
• Prepare quantifiable benefits
  • Communicate the business benefits of remote work.
  • Identify quantifiable out-of-office results.
  • Determine causes of increased productivity.
• Propose a revocable trial period
  • Approach the boss after an absence
  • Propose a short trial period (e.g. 2 days from home for 2 weeks).
  • Use evidence to demonstrate the value of remote work.
  • Emphasize trial can be canceled by the boss.
• Expand remote time
  • Repeat bullets 1 and 2 on remote days.
  • Propose a longer trial period (e.g. 4 days from home for 2 weeks).
  • Address specific concerns if met with resistance.
  • Re-emphasize the revocable nature of the trial.
• Let go of a job that isn’t working
  • Don’t let pride interfere with the right decision.
  • Quitting unproductive work is integral to success.
  • Consider the worst-case scenario and mitigation.

Replace binge travel with mini-retirements

• The concept of replacing end-of-life with frequent mini-retirements is gaining popularity
  • Energy and interest levels are cyclical, making it difficult to sustain long-term productivity.
  • Taking time to unplug and gain perspective is beneficial for mental health and can take up to two to three months.
  • Relocating during mini-retirements can lead to decluttering, simplification, and prioritization, which have emotional benefits.
  • Financially, mini-retirements involving relocation are often cheaper than vacations or staying at home.
• Mini-retirements differ from traditional escapes such as vacations, binge traveling, or sabbaticals in terms of duration and frequency.
• Mini-retirements can be planned even for those with children by taking trial runs, attending language classes, and using bribery and incentive schemes to keep children under control.
• Timeline for preparing for a mini-retirement:
  • Four months out: Start mentally preparing by assessing your assets and cash flow and dreaming about a location to spend your mini-retirement. Begin researching starting points to explore.
  • Three months out: Begin eliminating belongings through a process of packing, storing, selling, giving away, or throwing away. Look into travel insurance, and prepare to rent, swap, or sell your home. Overcome any doubts or fears by imagining a gun to your head and figuring out how you would do it.
  • Two months out: Automate your finances by setting up auto payments, direct debits, and online banking for billers. Cancel paper statements and give power of attorney to a trusted person
  • One month out: Forward mail to a trusted individual, get necessary immunizations for your destination, and set up any software or processes needed for remote work.
• Steps to take in the two weeks leading up to a mini-retirement, as well as upon arrival:
  • Two weeks out: Scan important documents and cards and give printed copies to family members. Downgrade cell phone plan, set up email and voicemail autoresponders, and plan and book accommodation.
  • One week out: Move remaining possessions out of your apartment, save digital copies of documents and prepare automobiles for storage.
  • On arrival: Take a hop-on-hop-off bus tour and a bike tour of potential apartment neighborhoods. Buy an unlocked cell phone and SIM, and contact apartment owners or brokers to find a place to stay for one month. Later, eliminate any unnecessary belongings.

Create an automated income stream [a Business

• Start with the end in mind
  • Focus on owning a business rather than simply working for it.
  • Keep the business model simple, and avoid trying to create the next big thing.
  • Prioritize scalability, and focus on creating a product-based business that isn’t reliant on time investment.
  • Test the market with a minimum viable product and aim to develop the business with scalability in mind.
• Step 1: Target an affordable niche
  • Focus on filling demand, not creating it.
  • Choose a niche you understand and has active advertisers.
  • Look for frequent advertisers for more profitable niches.
• Step 2: Generate product ideas, but don’t invest yet
  • Summarize the main benefit in one sentence, determine the target audience, and differentiate from competitors.
  • Aim for a retail price point of $50-200 and a unit cost that allows for an 8-10x markup.
  • Obtain pricing for different production quantities and look for a product that can be manufactured quickly and easily, explained in a clear FAQ, tested for under $500, automated within four weeks, and requires less than one day of management per week.
  • Choose to create, license, or resell a product (in that order of preference), or consider information products for their high margins and difficulty to duplicate.
• Step 3: Micro-test
  • Micro testing uses inexpensive adverts to test consumer response prior to manufacturing.
  • Best the competition by writing a more compelling proposition.
  • Test viability by setting up a simple website and Google Adwords campaigns
  • Review data from the testing phase and estimate potential demand and profitability.
  • Consider improving the offering and trying again or move on to another idea.
• Step 4: Rollout and automate
  • Many entrepreneurs fail to move on from bootstrapping and replace themselves.
  • The reward is a scalable business that can shift from 10 to 10k orders per week.