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I have a problem with MJ DeMarco (Follow your passion gets a beatdown)

AFMKelvin

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First of all I have read the Fastlane Millionaire every year for the past 3 years or so. I love the book. And yes I already order Unscripted I'm still waiting for it in the mail.

I respect MJ DeMarco and his work but since the the first time I read his book I can't get over the fact that he says that money is more important than your passion. That doing what you love will not make you rich.

Imagine you're on your deathbed sweaty, nervous, trying your best to stay awake because you know that as soon as you go to sleep that will be the last time you close your eyes. You're dying on a 24k gold bedframe. But you don't care nor notice all that, you keep going back to that one thing you always wanted to be. A guitarist.

That was your dream and what you enjoyed most. But it wasn't paying the bills or putting food on the table. Nobody was buying your music either because they were been torrented. Yet you still enjoyed yourself and could survive off ramen noodles as long as your guitar was properly tuned.

But the pressure from your family to provide food and shelter made you take a detour on your dream. That detour led to riches but it also robbed you of your time with your precious guitar. Yet everytime you saw your dusty guitar in the coner of your room you told yourself next week I'll have free time to play. But you never did.

And yes I know money can buy you some good guitar lessons, your own record label, and even a recording studio. But unless you're Fastlane it won't give you time. So you either choose to strive to be rich or to follow your passion. Comfort in life or regret while dying.

Both passion and riches are essential for your life so is it possible to combine them both? Or are we forever force to decide for either or?
 
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thehighlander

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Yes it's possible to combine them both but maybe it's not probable. Great if you can pull it off. Maybe you're passionate about guitar but you're not good enough or you are the good in a genre that won't pay the bills.

Do something you have an aptitude for. The better you get the more you will like it.

Don't do something you hate but it's OK if sometimes there may be parts of a job you hate.

It's not good to be on your deathbed thinking about how rough your life was because you stuck to your passion project! Find a balance so that you take care of yourself and also get to do what you love as time and resources permit.

I've lately been thinking there's some value in sucking it up in a pursuit that is profitable solely to create a solid financial future. Basically save up enough to become financially independent. Live within your means and do what you like. That's much better than slaving to afford stuff that won't really make you happy.
 

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First of all I have read the Fastlane Millionaire every year for the past 3 years or so. I love the book. And yes I already order Unscripted I'm still waiting for it in the mail.

I respect MJ DeMarco and his work but since the the first time I read his book I can't get over the fact that he says that money is more important than your passion. That doing what you love will not make you rich.

Imagine you're on your deathbed sweaty, nervous, trying your best to stay awake because you know that as soon as you go to sleep that will be the last time you close your eyes. You're dying on a 24k gold bedframe. But you don't care nor notice all that, you keep going back to that one thing you always wanted to be. A guitarist.

That was your dream and what you enjoyed most. But it wasn't paying the bills or putting food on the table. Nobody was buying your music either because they were been torrented. Yet you still enjoyed yourself and could survive off ramen noodles as long as your guitar was properly tuned.

But the pressure from your family to provide food and shelter made you take a detour on your dream. That detour led to riches but it also robbed you of your time with your precious guitar. Yet everytime you saw your dusty guitar in the coner of your room you told yourself next week I'll have free time to play. But you never did.

And yes I know money can buy you some good guitar lessons, your own record label, and even a recording studio. But unless you're Fastlane it won't give you time. So you either choose to strive to be rich or to follow your passion. Comfort in life or regret while dying.

Both passion and riches are essential for your life so is it possible to combine them both? Or are we forever force to decide for either or?

You become passionate about something when you become good at it. MJ doesn't want you to throw away passion, just don't fall for making it the focus of your income. Instead, focus on how you can provide value to people.

The reason you will be satisfied if you were to achieve the "riches" (in my opinion, some may be different) is because it shows that you provided value to people on a massive scale.

You can still do things your passionate about..
 
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AFMKelvin

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You might be reading the words but not the message.

All I can say is you're doing yourself a disservice by reducing concepts to zero-sum/binary thinking.

I get it since MJ was talking in the context of self help gurus telling everyone to follow their passion.

Eitherway what's the message according to you. That's why I wrote this post to get some perspective from other members.
 

TheDillon__

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I missed the chapter where MJ advocates aimlessly chasing money for the rest of your life.

His whole approach is exactly what you're looking for. Building a business system that affords you exactly the lifestyle that you're looking for.

It's not that he advocates turning away your passions in hopes of earning more dollars. He simply doesn't subscribe to, nor promote, a "paid to do what you love" philosophy. Rather, he wants you to find a need and build a business so you can get paid WHILE you do what you love.

No need to point fingers. Maybe I'll come play violin and eat tacos with you.
 
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The-J

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Fastlane is predicated on the idea that time is more valuable than money, and that time is better spent doing things you love. However, using the time to do what you love to make money might not be the most efficient use of your time... or the most efficient way to make money. It also has the side effect of permanently etching an association between work + hobby. For some, that's terrible for morale.

Most people do what they love on their off time. They work a job to pay the bills and support themselves or their family, then do what they love whenever they find off time. Maybe weekday nights or on weekends. This is not efficient, either, because you spend 1/3 to 1/2 of your weekdays at work.

The independently wealthy can do what they love at any time. $10 million earning 4% interest is $400,000 a year minus taxes. This money works to make more money, so you don't work a job OR run a business. The Fastlane is the efficient path to achieve that monetary goal (whether it's $2.5m, $10m, or $1b). You build a business that has 5 important properties that make it attractive as a model, and you sell it to someone who either (1) makes a career out of taking late stage startups to IPO or (2) represents a large enterprise who would be better off with your business under their control rather than out in the marketplace.

That's the idea, anyway. In practice, it's a long journey. If you don't enjoy it, you might as well pick up that guitar and start strummin'.

tl;dr yes; no
 

QDF

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Following your passion and creating a Fastlane lifestyle aren't mutually exclusive - you can do both, even if they are not tied together.

If anything, by disregarding your passion in your Fastlane pursuit and focusing solely on where you can provide value, it allows you to achieve the freedom necessary to pursue your real passion sooner than if you'd try to combine your passion and the Fastlane.
 

startinup

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Let me start off by saying that I don't think you have to give up both honestly...

With that said, you will definitely have to define your priorities. Luckily this only takes a quick exercise:
  1. Write down what you want to accomplish in life, anything you want. Do you want to write a book? Run a marathon? Build a 7+ figure business? What do you want?
  2. Organize your list from most important to least important. What would you regret not doing? What do you only sort of want to do?
---

For a lot of us, or at least me, building a strong financial future is the most important goal on the list right now. Because I know if I hit that one goal, I will be able to accomplish all of my other goals more easily. Imagine what other areas of your life you could improve without having to go slave away at work for 40+ hours a week.

If you read TMF , you should know that MJ's business success allowed him to accomplish other dreams, like writing a book. For me and others, money is the first thing to get handled.

It might not be necessary for you. Just depends on the type of lifestyle you want.
 

MJ DeMarco

I followed the science; all I found was money.
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Nice strawman bro, salted with a heaping spoonful of binarism...
 
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AFMKelvin

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I missed the chapter where MJ advocates aimlessly chasing money for the rest of your life.

His whole approach is exactly what you're looking for. Building a business system that affords you exactly the lifestyle that you're looking for.

It's not that he advocates turning away your passions in hopes of earning more dollars. He simply doesn't subscribe to, nor promote, a "paid to do what you love" philosophy. Rather, he wants you to find a need and build a business so you can get paid WHILE you do what you love.

No need to point fingers. Maybe I'll come play violin and eat tacos with you.

Bingo. Thanks for clearing it up for me. I was missing the "paid to do what you love part." This is the trading your time for money pitfall.

I'm down for that make sure bring the world's smallest violin so you can play it while I eat my 50¢ tacos from Jack in the Box.
 

mike24601

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Simply put: If your business is taking away so much of your time that you have to neglect your hobbies, your family, or your health, it isn't fastlane. What you have in that situation is a job, and there are many of them out there that pay you a fastlane lifestyle but the one immutable tradeoff is you must give up most of your time. You trade the 12 or so hours a day you spend at the law firm or in an office somewhere, and then if you're lucky you get to take your motorboat out on the weekends, which is also a trade in time. We who strive to reach the fastlane refuse to accept that we need to sacrifice the best parts of our life in the pursuit of wealth. Rather, we have to commit to working our tails off for a few years to create a system that frees us from ever having to work again.
 
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rollerskates

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The thing about guitar playing and ramen eating is that it is an entirely selfish endeavor. Well, not the ramen, that's disgusting. If you want to make it your entire life, not only will you get bored quickly, you will start to feel worthless. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt. The Fastlane mentality is to create something of value for OTHERS. If your guitar playing is of value to others, then you're not eating ramen, you're recording music that millions will buy, and that is Fastlane.

Lastly, if you are set on playing the guitar and eating ramen as a lifestyle, a van down by the river will be warmer in the south. ;)
 

TreyAllDay

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Both passion and riches are essential for your life so is it possible to combine them both? Or are we forever force to decide for either or?

Nobody says anything is wrong with doing what you love. Go ahead.. I have friends who will never own a home or have a steady job, they just like to do what they love - travel, meet people, be a free spirit.

The point is, if you want financial freedom and the ability to do what you love at the same time, you cannot use what you love as a source of income.
 

Roli

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First of all I have read the Fastlane Millionaire every year for the past 3 years or so.

Yet you can't even get the title right? Try absorbing its message the next time you read it, that speed reading course did you no favours.
 
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Yet you can't even get the title right?

Yeah, that's disturbing imo.

You missed the whole point of the book.

You achieve the Fastlane during your youth, not your late 70s.

Your whole rant about dying on your deathbed is illogical.

Like @MJ DeMarco says, "Folks, you don't want millions to accompany your cane, you want it to accompany your youth"

You make time an asset, not a liability. The reason you go Fastlane is to have FREEDOM!

• Freedom to play the guitar.
• Freedom to be with your children.
• Freedom from trading 5 days for 2 days!

#ThinkBeforePosting
 

KSR

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You've read the book 3 times and didn't quite get the gist of 'TMF '? I thought it was pretty obvious... build a business to sell it -- then you can play guitar and eat ramen noodles until your heart is content (or dead, whichever comes first).
 

Sully1994

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I think you might be incorrectly defining what "wealth" is. In his book, Demarco defines wealth as a trinity of health, relationships with family and friends, and the freedom to whatever you want, whenever you want. The reason he titled the book "The Millionaire Fastlane ", is because we've been conditioned by society to equate wealth with vast sums of money and shiny material things. In short, it sells.

Money is certainly not more important than doing what you love. However it is necessary to attain the time freedom to do so.

Also, I don't completely agree that you can't do what you love and make money doing it- predicated on the fact that in order to get good at any skill, you have to have some amount of interest and passion in the subject. You will meet obstacles on your journey to success ( long before you're making decent coin in your venture) and then what will keep you going? Money is not a great enough motivator to push someone through a path with a statistically very low probability of massive success.
 
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Longinus

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That was your dream and what you enjoyed most. But it wasn't paying the bills or putting food on the table. Nobody was buying your music either because they were been torrented. Yet you still enjoyed yourself and could survive off ramen noodles as long as your guitar was properly tuned.

laughing-gifs-foolish-human.gif


That's probably why 99.9% of all musicians, while trying to follow their dream, are bitter, frustrated and absolutely not enjoying themselves.

In case you still don't get it: playing songs on a tuned guitar won't solve problems for many people. Curing cancer will.
 
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CycleGuy

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Most people die in a bed of mediocrity without living their true dreams following the slowlane mentality...

At least if you're in a fastlane business you can have more freedom to pursue your dreams.
 
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Lex DeVille

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What if you were on your deathbed and ..

Suddenly you weren't because ..

You spent your life building wealth and ..

You funded life-extending products that actually worked and ..

You used those products to extend your life indefinitely and ..

You had an infinite amount of time to learn guitar because ..

ugh.

If you're on your deathbed regretting not learning guitar, it's because you believe there's no chance to survive.

Or ..

You don't have the will to fight for your survival so you just gave up.

In either case:

A) Believing you don't stand a chance
B) Not having the will to fight

You lose. Same with business.

If you're nearly dead and believe there's a chance to survive, you wouldn't give a shit about guitar. You would only care about doing what it takes to survive.

It's basic human psychology.

Maslow's Hierarchy level 1 = survival

d9efbd0addc79a40c49d479d099419b5.png


Survival forms the base of the pyramid. Creativity is at the top.

The drowning man doesn't care about not learning guitar.

He splashes to keep his head above water, even when he doesn't know how to swim.

The man whose foot is trapped beneath a boulder doesn't care about what he didn't create.

He uses a pocket knife to saw off his leg so he can f*cking survive.

In both cases, when survival is secure, the men do not whip out their guitar.

They seek other basic human needs before seeking out family for safety and security.

So even if your theoretical situation were real ..

Guitar would almost certainly be the furthest thing from your mind.

And if there's 0 chance you will live.

Then it doesn't matter anyway.

Because when you're dead, you're dead.

Game over.

(Unless you believe in an afterlife in which case you'll have plenty of time to learn guitar there.)
 
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