More on this book
Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
Dear All, I am considering making a career move and am interested in all opportunities that might come to mind. Nothing is too outrageous or out of left field. [If you know what you want or don’t want on some level, feel free to add, “I am particularly interested in …” or “I would like to avoid …”] Please let me know if anything comes to mind! Tim
Before the development of tourism, travel was conceived to be like study, and its fruits were considered to be the adornment of the mind and the formation of the judgment. —PAUL FUSSELL, Abroad
All he needs now is an idea of how to exploit this freedom and the tools to give his finite cash near-infinite lifestyle output.
The Mexican looked up and smiled. “I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take a siesta with my wife, Julia, and stroll into the village each evening, where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos. I have a full and busy life, señor.”
“But what then, señor?” The American laughed and said, “That’s the best part. When the time is right, you would announce an IPO and sell your company stock to the public and become very rich. You would make millions.” “Millions, señor? Then what?” “Then you would retire and move to a small coastal fishing village, where you would sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take a siesta with your wife, and stroll to the village in the evenings where you could sip wine and play your guitar with your amigos …”
If your dream, the pot of gold at the end of the career rainbow, is to live large in Thailand, sail around the Caribbean, or ride a motorcycle across China, guess what? All of them can be done for less than $3,000. I’ve done all three. Here are just two examples of how far a little can go.
$150 U.S. Three days of chartering a private plane in Mendoza wine country in Argentina and flying over the most beautiful vineyards around the snowcapped Andes with a personal guide.
There is more to life than increasing its speed. —MOHANDAS GANDHI
Thanks to the Interstate Highway System, it is now possible to travel from coast to coast without seeing anything. —CHARLES KURALT, CBS news reporter
TRUE FREEDOM IS much more than having enough income and time to do what you want. It is quite possible—actually the rule rather than the exception—to have financial and time freedom but still be caught in the throes of the rat race.
Learn to slow down. Get lost intentionally. Observe how you judge both yourself and those around you. Chances are that it’s been a while.
1. Use credit cards with reward points for large muse-related advertising and manufacturing expenses.
To be free, to be happy and fruitful, can only be attained through sacrifice of many common but overestimated things. —ROBERT HENRI
There are tons of things in your home and life that you don’t use, need, or even particularly want. They just came into your life as impulsive flotsam and jetsam and never found a good exit.
I asked every vagabond interviewee in this book what their one recommendation would be for first-time extended travelers. The answer was unanimous: Take less with you.
It became clear that the biggest risk in life wasn’t making mistakes but regret: missing out on things. He could never go back and recapture years spent doing something he disliked.
It is fatal to know too much at the outcome: boredom comes as quickly to the traveler who knows his route as to the novelist who is overcertain of his plot. —PAUL THEROUX, To the Ends of the Earth
1. Take an asset and cash-flow snapshot. Set two sheets of paper on a table. Use one to record all assets and corresponding values, including bank accounts, retirement accounts, stocks, bonds, home, and so forth. On the second, draw a line down the middle and write down all incoming cash flow (salary, muse income, investment income, etc.) and outgoing expenses (mortgage, rent, car payments, etc.). What can you eliminate that is either seldom used or that creates stress or distraction without adding a lot of value?
What is the 20% of my belongings that I use 80% of the time? Eliminate the other 80% in clothing, magazines, books, and all else. Be ruthless—you can always repurchase things you can’t live without.
In all cases where doubts crop up, ask yourself, “If I had a gun to my head and had to do it, how would I do it?” It’s not as hard as you think.
Virtual Tourist (www.virtualtourist.com) The single largest source of unbiased, user-generated travel content in the world. More than 1,000,000 members contribute tips and warnings for more than 25,000 locations. Each location is covered in 13 separate categories,
U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (www.cdc.gov/travel) Recommended vaccinations and health planning for every nation in the world.
Universal Currency Converter (www.xe.com)
1-800-FLY-EUROPE (www.1800flyeurope.com) I used this to get the $300 roundtrip from JFK to London that left two hours later.
Discount Airlines for Flights within Europe (www.ryanair.com, www.easyjet.com)
Paid Housing—from Arrival to the Long Haul Otalo (www.otalo.com) Otalo is a search engine for vacation rentals that searches across the Internet’s many different vacation rentals sites and 200,000+ homes. Otalo is like a Kayak.com for vacation rentals. The site scours a variety of other rental search sites and aggregates the results in one easy-to-use search tool.
Craigslist (www.craigslist.org) Besides local weekly magazines with housing listings, such as Bild or Zitty (no joke) in Berlin, I have found Craigslist to be the single best starting point for long-term overseas furnished apartments. As of this writing, there are more than 50 countries represented. That said, prices will be 30–70% less
www.rentvillas.com) Provides unique renting experiences—from cottages and farmhouses to castles—throughout Europe, including France, Italy, Greece, Spain, and Portugal.
VoIPBuster (www.voipbuster.com) and RebTel (www.fourhourblog.com/rebtel) Both VoIPBuster and RebTel can provide “alias” numbers. Enter a friend’s overseas number on their sites, and both will give you a local number in your area code that will forward to your friend. VoIPBuster also acts as a cheaper Skype with free calls to more than 20 countries.
http://spanish.about.com
I’ve Got More Money and Time Than I Ever Dreamed Possible … Why Am I Depressed? It’s a good question with a good answer. Just be glad you’re figuring this out now and not at the end of life!
Subtracting the bad does not create the good. It leaves a vacuum.
It will be wonderful and unforgettable, and you should do it.
Offices are good for some things: free bad coffee and complaining thereof, gossip and commiserating, stupid video clips via e-mail with even stupider comments, and meetings that accomplish nothing but kill a few hours with a few laughs. The job itself might be a dead end, but it’s the web of human interactions—the social environment—that keeps us there.
Don’t fret. The greatest rewards are to come, and you’re 10 feet from the finish line.
Sooo good
People say that what we are seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think this is what we’re really seeking. I think what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive. —JOSEPH CAMPBELL, The Power of Myth
Most of this can be overcome as soon as we recognize it for what it is: outdated comparisons using the more-is-better and money-as-success mind-sets that got us into trouble to begin with.
Think of a time when you felt 100% alive and undistracted—in the zone.
The “meaning” of “life” question is unanswerable without further elaboration.
If you can’t define it or act upon it, forget it.
It’s being smart and putting your effort where it can make the biggest difference for yourself and others.
What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for a worthwhile goal, a freely chosen task. —VIKTOR E. FRANKL, Holocaust survivor; author of Man’s Search for Meaning
I BELIEVE THAT life exists to be enjoyed and that the most important thing is to feel good about yourself.
“What can I do with my time to enjoy life and feel good about myself?” I can’t offer a single answer that will fit all people, but, based on the dozens of fulfilled NR I’ve interviewed, there are two components that are fundamental: continual learning and service.
Americans who travel abroad for the first time are often shocked to discover that, despite all the progress that has been made in the last 30 years, many foreign people still speak in foreign languages. —DAVE BARRY
(1) adults can learn languages much faster than childrenfn3 when constant 9–5 work is removed and that (2) it is possible to become conversationally fluent in any language in six months or less. At four hours per day, six months can be whittled down to less than three months. It is beyond the scope of this book to explain applied linguistics and the 80/20 of language learning, but resources and complete how-to guides can be found under “language” at www.fourhourblog.com.
Service is an attitude. Find the cause or vehicle that interests you most and make no apologies.
Adults are always asking kids what they want to be when they grow up because they are looking for ideas. —PAULA POUNDSTONE
The miracle is not to walk on water. The miracle is to walk on the green earth, dwelling deeply in the present moment and feeling truly alive. —THICH NHAT HANH
Don’t be in a rush to jump into a full-time long-term commitment. Take time to find something that calls to you, not just the first acceptable form of surrogate work.
