Choose Yourself

by James Altucher

You’re probably asking: well, if I quit my job, what should I do? I’ve begun asking people who did it. What did they do? How do they quit their jobs and, basically, make a million dollars? Not everyone is Mark Zuckerberg or Larry Page. Not everyone is going to drop out of college and create an iPhone or a time machine or a toilet that resizes itself automatically depending on who is sitting on it (although that would be pretty cool). Some people would simply like to quit their current crappy jobs and make a good living. Some people would simply like to quit their jobs and make a million dollars. In that Facebook movie (you know, the Justin Timberlake vehicle), JT says, “A million’s not cool. A BILLION is cool.” Well, actually JT, very often a million is pretty cool. Not everyone is going to be a VC-funded $100 million hotshot. Sometimes it’s nice to make a million dollars, be your own boss, and use that financial success to catapult to freedom. I called Bryan Johnson, who started a company called Braintree. You may have never heard of Braintree but you’ve heard of their customers. They provide credit card transaction and payment services for companies like OpenTable, Uber, Airbnb, etc. I’ve never spoken with Bryan before. I am not an investor in Braintree. As far as I know I’m not even an investor (unfortunately) in any of Braintree’s clients. I like to call people who I think have interesting stories and hear what they have to say. That’s the way I build my network of not...