#836: The 4-Hour Workweek Principles — 13 Mistakes to Avoid, The Art of Mini-Retirements, and Navigating the Dizziness of Freedom

Many people want to retire as millionaires so that they have the time and money to travel, buy luxury cars and homes, or visit with their friends and families. However, you don’t need to be a millionaire to do all these things. You don’t even need to retire.

In The 4-Hour Workweek, entrepreneur, consultant, and life coach Tim Ferriss explains how anyone can live the retired millionaire lifestyle by building their own business, automating it, and then collecting the income while they go off to live their dreams. In this guide, we’ll describe each of Ferriss’s steps to creating this life. We’ll also examine why some of his recommendations are particularly effective and explore alternatives and counterarguments to other suggestions.

The modern world lures us into giving away our freedom, argues early retiree Jacob Lund Fisker. The vast majority of adults are caught in an unfulfilling cycle of consumerism: They sell decades of their lives to employers so they can buy consumable goods and status symbols that don’t make them happy. Luckily, Fisker says, it’s possible to break out of this system: He did this by learning how to survive on just $7,000 a year, which allowed him to permanently retire at age 33. In Early Retirement Extreme, he teaches others how to do the same.

In this guide, you’ll learn the basic principles of Fisker’s frugal mindset and how you, too, can retire at an extremely early age. In our commentary, we’ll examine popular ideas from the early retirement community that provide intellectual context for Fisker’s argument and help you save even more money. We’ll also highlight counterpoints to Fisker’s point of view from books including 168 Hours and I Will Teach You to Be Rich.

Global uncertainty and digital overload are driving travelers in 2025 to prioritize experiences offering peace, connection, and meaning over traditional sightseeing. Their interest in mental well-being plus environmental consciousness is leading to new types of experiences like “calmcations” and “destination dupes.”

Just about everyone dreams of wealth, but why do so few people turn that dream into reality? Self-made millionaire Felix Dennis wrote How to Get Rich to teach you the mindset and the skills you need to start a business and build a fortune, and to explain why so many fail at doing so.

In this guide, we’ll start with Dennis’s warnings about how difficult it really is to get rich and what you might lose in the pursuit of wealth. From there, we’ll discuss how to start and run your own business. Finally, we’ll examine Dennis’s advice about how to live a healthy, happy, and satisfying life with your newfound riches.

Our commentary will compare and contrast Dennis’s ideas with those from other business guides such as Purple Cow and Start With Why. We’ll also discuss which of Dennis’s principles are backed by scientific evidence and which are currently not. Finally, we’ll provide some actionables to help you start your journey to wealth.

Although we live longer today and have more material wealth than ever, many people feel anxious rather than happy. In Flow, psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi offers an antidote. People are happiest when they feel in control of their inner thoughts and feelings and experience a “flow state”: a sense of enjoyment, purpose, and meaning.

Csikszentmihalyi explains: how controlling and ordering your consciousness brings flow and enjoyment, which personality characteristics produce flow, and how to find flow in your work and relationships.

Like most people, Paul Millerd was taught to place conventional, full-time work at the center of his life—but it made him miserable. Now, he’s a freelance blogger, consultant, career coach, and online course creator—and he’s much more satisfied with his life. In The Pathless Path, Millerd encapsulates his non-traditional approach to career success and lifelong happiness: deprioritizing work and pursuing a more meaningful, creative life through freelancing instead.

In this guide, you’ll learn about the historical trends that have led most Americans to prioritize work, the disadvantages of prioritizing work, and an alternative to this way of life—freelancing. You’ll also learn how and why Millerd shifted from the traditional workforce to the world of freelancing and his advice for making the transition yourself. In our commentary, we’ll talk about other perspectives on work and what makes life meaningful, and we’ll provide additional tips for those interested in freelancing.

In today’s hustle culture, many people think the only way to live a productive and rewarding life is to work as hard as possible. This idea is so ingrained in our culture that many work to the point of near-constant exhaustion, sacrificing their mental and physical health. But according to business strategist Greg McKeown, there’s an easier way to get the most out of your time and effort. In Effortless, he expands on this one simple truth: Achieving your goals doesn’t have to be so hard. By simply taking the easiest path, we can be healthier, happier, and more productive.

In our guide, we’ll lay out McKeown’s argument that the easiest path to success is the most viable, and we’ll provide actionable advice on how to implement this idea into your daily life. We’ll also further explore McKeown’s main points by comparing and contrasting them to other ideas in books on productivity and happiness.

In his epic 707-page Tools of Titans, Tim Ferriss shares the habits and beliefs of 101 people at the top of their game, including tech investors like Chris Sacca and Peter Thiel, entrepreneurs like LinkedIn’s Reid Hoffman and Evernote’s Phil Libin, superhuman athletes like Amelia Boone and Wim Hof, media figures like Edward Norton and Whitney Cummings, and more.

These are the principles that successful people use to achieve audacious goals, improve themselves, and be happier. The premise: if you can apply the lessons from this book, you can be more effective.

In today’s fast-paced world, our lives increasingly revolve around productivity, efficiency, and work. It’s now normal for many people to answer emails during dinner and pack their days with as many tasks as possible. Yet in Do Nothing, radio journalist Celeste Headlee argues that by trying to do too much, people are working less efficiently because the human brain isn’t designed to multitask or work without rest. In addition, the culture of overworking has led to worse health outcomes and increased social isolation.

So if all this work isn’t serving us, how can we end an addiction to productivity? And if not work, what should we be doing? Headlee’s solution is to embrace true leisure—doing things just for the fun of it. In this guide, we’ll explain the historical origins of the modern work addiction, how it impacts society, and what you can do to live a healthier life. We’ll also supplement Headlee’s ideas with more context on global labor trends and tips from other wellness and productivity experts.