This is the book I recommend you read ►►► The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss
For the last 17+ years, I’ve been traveling around the world on my bicycle. I’ve cycled across more than 50 different countries on 5 different continents and I’ve lived in dozens of different cities all around the world. I bought my own house at age 22, I drive a motorcycle (and a camper-van), and I own my own business.
Because of the way I live/travel, people are always asking me:
- How do you finance your lifestyle?
- Where do you get the money to go on so many incredible adventures?
- What is the secret to traveling the world like you do?
- Do you have sponsors that pay for your trips?
- Are you (or your family) wealthy?
The truth is, I am far from wealthy; I don’t have any sponsors; my parents have never given me money for my travels; and I have financed all of my bike tours on my own… in a very simple way.
My big secret is this: When I was 17-years-old and a freshman in university, I started reading business books. I read hundreds of books about marketing, sales, finance, etc… and in those books I learned about something called “passive income.”
Passive income (according to Wikipedia.org) “is an income received on a regular basis, with little effort required to maintain it.”
Some examples of passive income are:
- Rent from property.
- Interest from a bank account.
- Royalties from publishing a book or from licensing a patent or other form of intellectual property, such as computer software product, music, etc.
- Earnings from internet advertisements on websites.
- Dividend and interest income from owning securities, such as stocks and bonds.
- And earnings from a business that does not require direct involvement from the owner or merchant.
If you work a job where you trade your time for money, you are not earning a passive income. Instead, you are earning an active income – because in order for you to get paid, you have to show up at work.
I have never been interested in earning an active income! My focus, from the age of 17, has been to earn a passive income that will support the lifestyle I want to live. Because earning a passive income means you have more time to do the things you most want to do in life.
Earning a passive income isn’t easy though. With passive income, you put in a lot of time, effort and money in at the start of a project and then hope that the work you’ve done up front will pay off for you later down the road.
I’ve created dozens of different passive income steams over the years, and this is how I’m able to sleep till noon, wake up, check my bank account and see that I’ve made several hundred dollars while I was asleep. It’s also how I can go on a 9-month-long bike tour in Europe and come home from that trip with more money in my bank account than when I first left home 9-months earlier.
I don’t make a lot of money (compared to many of the people in my life), but the income I derive from the passive income sources I’ve created over the last 16+ years is enough for me to live on and do just about anything that I please.
As Tim Ferriss explains in his best-selling book, The 4-Hour Workweek, “People don’t want to be millionaires – they want to experience what they believe only millions can buy. Ski chalets, butlers, and exotic travel often enter the picture. $1,000,000 in the bank isn’t the fantasy. The fantasy is the lifestyle of complete freedom it supposedly allows. The question is then, ‘How can one achieve the millionaire lifestyle of complete freedom without first having $1,000,000?'”
This is how I’ve approached my life. I don’t personally have a million dollars in the bank, but I do my best to live my life as though I do. This is how I bought my own house; how I’ve managed to travel the world; how I’ve spent several winters seasons skiing at high-end resorts; how I’ve made friends with world-class athletes, artists and musicians; and how I’ve done an bunch of other amazing things – all with very little money.
Tim Ferris was right – you don’t have to be a millionaire in order to live like one!
If you have not yet read The 4-Hour Workweek, this is the #1 book I recommend you read for learning how to make the money you need so you can go off and live the live you’ve always dreamed about.
Here are the points I’m trying to make:
- Time is more valuable than money.
- Passive income is better than active income.
- You don’t need to be a millionaire in order to live like one.
Click here to buy ►►► The 4-Hour Workweek and learn to escape the 9-5, live anywhere, and join the New Rich.
Comments are closed.