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

JAJT

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That detour led to riches but it also robbed you of your time

I grew up as a shy, sheltered introvert. I wanted to play video games professionally. That would have totally been my passion.

Know what I ended up choosing to get into? Sales.

Sales is a terrible, hard, uncomfortable place for a shy introvert to be. I spent my first few years hoping nobody finds out that I was a sham. It was easily the furthest possible profession from what I was passionate about. A pure money and time play. I later learned to love it but that was far after the decision to step into discomfort.

My wife and I bought our house (mortgaged - soon to be paid off in full) at 22/23 years old. Owned our car in cash. Got married. Honeymooned in Hawaii. We ate out whenever we wanted to and traveled all the time and went camping all the time and lived our lives however we wanted to, because we could choose to do whatever we wanted from a huge buffet of options that cash allowed. Best years of our lives in our leisure hours because I chose to make money during my working hours. When we had our fill, we decided to slow down and have two kids (that we planned and tried for). Now it's a new adventure.

All of our friends who did what they were passionate about couldn't believe the things we could afford to do. It's now over 10 years later and TO THIS DAY most of them are still behind where we were back then. One of them is considering buying a house, maybe, in the next few years, if they can find the cash. They'd also like to have kids, one day, maybe if they get that promotion on the horizon. But hey - at least he's doing what he loves, right?

Now I'm taking the time to try the bigger play - entrepreneurship. It means years of hardship to hopefully hit even larger levels of wealth than before. When it works out it will mean even more options than a sales career allowed. More travel, more options, more fun, more life.

I look at life as having two parts to it - working hours and leisure hours. The way I see it, all effort you put towards your working hours is equal. Whether you are flipping burgers or selling 6 figure solutions or playing guitar or building a business - it's income generating hours and effort. Leisure hours are where you get to spend the fruits of your working hours. The more you earn, the more you can play.

Personally I think it's INSANE to try to turn your leisure hours into income hours. You're shooting both feet doing this. You make nothing during your work hours so you can do nothing in your leisure hours. And that's what you strive for on your death bed?

I'd rather work my a$$ off, through any discomfort, while I'm on the clock so that I can play my a$$ off with my family when I'm off the clock.

Work hard.
Play hard.

If you'd rather work light, play light - well, go nuts. I'll send you a post card from Hawaii with a guitar on the front - I hear you're really into that kind of thing.
 
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MJ DeMarco

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Sorry I haven't commented yet, but I've been looking for the law that says if you make a fortune early in life, playing your guitar is illegal.

Thread marked NOTABLE. :rofl:
 

G-Man

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playing your guitar is illegal.

Playing guitar is illegal if you're busking trying to scrape together enough cash for some ramen.

Bonus: living in the street on nothing but ramen and that death bed will probably come a little earlier. :thumbsup:
 
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MJ DeMarco

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Yoda

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Both passion and riches are essential for your life so is it possible to combine them both?

The funny thing is, the more riches you have, the better quality time you can spend within your passion.

Try flipping that around.

I'll wait.
 

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Pretty sure the whole concept is that you build a business for 5 year or 10 years, sell it, cash out and live off the interesting and finally enjoy the lifestyle you've always wanted (playing guitar and eating ramen) without needing to worry about the bills.

Read the book 3 more times bro, you might discover things you might have missed the first 3 times (seriously).
 
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As much as this person is asking to get flamed, it seems as if he or she is grappling with the issue and genuinely wants to come to a resolution.

Every young person struggles with this conflict. Ultimately the two paradigms do not need to be mutually exclusive, but often times you have to delay gratification to do what you want.

“A nation is born stoic, and dies epicurean” - Will Durant

People have commented and have given great points already.

Here are some words of wisdom from Kemmons Wilson founder of the Holiday Inn chain of hotels, relevant wisdom in bold.

1. Work only a half a day; it makes no difference which half-it can be either the first 12 hours or the last 12 hours.
2. Work is the master key that opens the door to all opportunities.
3. Mental attitude plays a far more important role in a person's success or failure than mental capacity.
4. Remember that we all climb the ladder of success one step at a time.
5. There are two ways to get to the top of the oak tree. One way is to sit on a acorn and wait; the other is to climb it.
6. Do not be afraid of taking a chance. Remember that a broken watch is exactly right at least twice every 24 hours,
7. The secret of happiness is not doing what one likes, but in liking what one does.
8. Eliminate from your vocabulary the words, "I don't think I can" and substitute "I know I can".
9. In evaluating a career, put opportunity ahead of security.
10. Remember that success requires half luck and half brains.
11. A person has to take risks to achieve.
12. People who taker pains never to do more than they get paid for, never get paid for anything more than they do.
13. No job is too hard as long as you are smart enough to find someone else to do it for you.
14. Opportunity comes often. It knocks as often as you have an ear trained to heat it, an eye trained to see it, a hand trained to grasp it, and a head trained to use it.
15. You cannot procrastinate-in two days, tomorrow will be yesterday.
16. Sell your wristwatch and buy an alarm clock.
17. A successful person realizes his personal responsibility for self-motivation. He starts himself because he possesses the key to his own ignition switch.
18. Do not worry. You can't change the past, but you sure can ruin the present by worrying aver the future. Remember that half the things we worry about never happen, and the other half are going to happen anyway. So, why worry?
19. It is not how much you have but how much you enjoy that makes happiness.
 

arfadugus

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Isn't the whole point of the fast lane to buy vast amounts of free time to do whatever the F*ck you want to do? You obviously didn't read the book. That, or you are making excuses because you do not believe in yourself. Inb4 working 40 hours a week for the rest of your life gives you tons of free time to learn the guitar. Once I'm rich I'm gonna play Mario Kart 8 deluxe on the Nintendo Switch every night with my family. And still have time to play guitar, become a scientist, become a pilot, go skydiving, get my black belt in Brazillian Jiu-Jitsu, babysit my grandkids, shoot guns and get some tactical training, explore the world, buy my girlfriend a hefty diamond, buy a bar of gold, feed starving kids, buy my black Audi R8 Spyder GT, get good at boxing, fight in an mma fight, write a book, invent something that changes the world, meet the dragon queen from Game of Thrones, give Marky mark a high five, play some starcraft 3, buy a tesla, buy my mom a house, get singing lessons, get dancing lessons, learn Muai Thai Kickboxing, become special forces if war breaks out, buy supplies and a bunker for the apocalypse, help people become rich so that they can give back to the world, train a dog, hang out with a monkey, change some lives, go on the Joe Rogan Podcast, buy a modest house, relax whenever I want to. Give my kid time with his mother and father and the rest of our family, Snowboard, and a bunch of other shit. Sounds like a life of regret....
 
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PedroG

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You misunderstood what MJ is saying. Become passionate about providing NEEDED value as opposed to providing UN-NEEDED value because that "value" is your passion.

When you do this, you will eventually be in a position where you can focus on whatever your other passions are (other than providing value) because you won't need to make money from them.

Make providing value, a passion in itself. It shouldn't matter what the value is as long as there is a need.

When you focus on your passions that don't solve a need, you are trying to solve your own problem and not the problems of your customers.
 
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AFMKelvin

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Nice strawman bro, salted with a heaping spoonful of binarism...[/QUOTE
I grew up as a shy, sheltered introvert. I wanted to play video games professionally. That would have totally been my passion.

Know what I ended up choosing to get into? Sales.

Sales is a terrible, hard, uncomfortable place for a shy introvert to be. I spent my first few years hoping nobody finds out that I was a sham. It was easily the furthest possible profession from what I was passionate about. A pure money and time play. I later learned to love it but that was far after the decision to step into discomfort.

My wife and I bought our house (mortgaged - soon to be paid off in full) at 22/23 years old. Owned our car in cash. Got married. Honeymooned in Hawaii. We ate out whenever we wanted to and traveled all the time and went camping all the time and lived our lives however we wanted to, because we could choose to do whatever we wanted from a huge buffet of options that cash allowed. Best years of our lives in our leisure hours because I chose to make money during my working hours. When we had our fill, we decided to slow down and have two kids (that we planned and tried for). Now it's a new adventure.

All of our friends who did what they were passionate about couldn't believe the things we could afford to do. It's now over 10 years later and TO THIS DAY most of them are still behind where we were back then. One of them is considering buying a house, maybe, in the next few years, if they can find the cash. They'd also like to have kids, one day, maybe if they get that promotion on the horizon. But hey - at least he's doing what he loves, right?

Now I'm taking the time to try the bigger play - entrepreneurship. It means years of hardship to hopefully hit even larger levels of wealth than before. When it works out it will mean even more options than a sales career allowed. More travel, more options, more fun, more life.

I look at life as having two parts to it - working hours and leisure hours. The way I see it, all effort you put towards your working hours is equal. Whether you are flipping burgers or selling 6 figure solutions or playing guitar or building a business - it's income generating hours and effort. Leisure hours are where you get to spend the fruits of your working hours. The more you earn, the more you can play.

Personally I think it's INSANE to try to turn your leisure hours into income hours. You're shooting both feet doing this. You make nothing during your work hours so you can do nothing in your leisure hours. And that's what you strive for on your death bed?

I'd rather work my a$$ off, through any discomfort, while I'm on the clock so that I can play my a$$ off with my family when I'm off the clock.

Work hard.
Play hard.

If you'd rather work light, play light - well, go nuts. I'll send you a post card from Hawaii with a guitar on the front - I hear you're really into that kind of thing.


So far you have explained it better than anyone else. Thanks. I would give you some rep but I gave it away to the first answers.
 

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I had a similar conflict when I first read the book a few years ago.

Being an artist at heart I wanted to paint all day, be a world famous artist and make millions. Art is my passion.

I put the book aside and focused on my passion. No money came in. I ended up going back to work for someone else and hating it.

Picked up the book again and gave it another shot. Now I work for myself and allocate time in the day to create art and focus on my passion. I'm not a millionaire yet but I make enough already to have time to paint when I want or take days off.

Think of it like a ladder.

Building a freedom business is just one rung on the ladder to your dreams.

While it's possible to become successful at your passions first, the odds of that are slim without business knowledge anyways.

Even successful passion business, artist, musician, etc started somewhere else first usually anyways.

I didn't like my odds of either being the next Picasso who lived rich as an artist or dying broke like Van Gogh. Also didn't want to beg galleries to show my work and be at the mercy of the art elite. Instead, I decided to commit as many years now as it takes to build a freedom business that can will give me all the money and freedom I need to never need a gallery or be told what I should paint.

I've learned to love business as much as art. And have grown faster as artist using the business principles I've learned.

Just my 2 cents.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
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MJ DeMarco

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I had a similar conflict when I first read the book a few years ago.

Being an artist at heart I wanted to paint all day, be a world famous artist and make millions. Art is my passion.

I put the book aside and focused on my passion. No money came in. I ended up going back to work for someone else and hating it.

Picked up the book again and gave it another shot. Now I work for myself and allocate time in the day to create art and focus on my passion. I'm not a millionaire yet but I make enough already to have time to paint when I want or take days off.

Think of it like a ladder.

Building a freedom business is just one rung on the ladder to your dreams.

While it's possible to become successful at your passions first, the odds of that are slim without business knowledge anyways.

Even successful passion business, artist, musician, etc started somewhere else first usually anyways.

I didn't like my odds of either being the next Picasso who lived rich as an artist or dying broke like Van Gogh. Also didn't want to beg galleries to show my work and be at the mercy of the art elite. Instead, I decided to commit as many years now as it takes to build a freedom business that can will give me all the money and freedom I need to never need a gallery or be told what I should paint.

I've learned to love business as much as art. And have grown faster as artist using the business principles I've learned.

Just my 2 cents.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Excellent story.


Most definitely not 2 cents, more like millions. :praise::fistbump:
 

AFMKelvin

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I had a similar conflict when I first read the book a few years ago.

Being an artist at heart I wanted to paint all day, be a world famous artist and make millions. Art is my passion.

I put the book aside and focused on my passion. No money came in. I ended up going back to work for someone else and hating it.

Picked up the book again and gave it another shot. Now I work for myself and allocate time in the day to create art and focus on my passion. I'm not a millionaire yet but I make enough already to have time to paint when I want or take days off.

Think of it like a ladder.

Building a freedom business is just one rung on the ladder to your dreams.

While it's possible to become successful at your passions first, the odds of that are slim without business knowledge anyways.

Even successful passion business, artist, musician, etc started somewhere else first usually anyways.

I didn't like my odds of either being the next Picasso who lived rich as an artist or dying broke like Van Gogh. Also didn't want to beg galleries to show my work and be at the mercy of the art elite. Instead, I decided to commit as many years now as it takes to build a freedom business that can will give me all the money and freedom I need to never need a gallery or be told what I should paint.

I've learned to love business as much as art. And have grown faster as artist using the business principles I've learned.

Just my 2 cents.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

By far the best thank you.
 

McFirewavesJr

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Driving the fastlane and enjoying your passion are not mutually exclusive. I'm personally way more relaxed and happy to enjoy my passion since I don't need to monetize it anymore (I actually am, but I don't care or need to).

Also, relying on your passion for survival is not as glamorous as it sounds. It can kill creativity and make you hate what you used to enjoy.
 
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ZF Lee

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Passion only works if the passion SOLVES someone's problem.
Playing the guitar CAN be a Fastlane. I found some websites which sold soundtracks in bulk when I was trying to make a promo video.
I took some of their freebies and they were good. I'll try to pay next time for more serious videos.
Not to mention music classes and books. When I used to prepare for music theory exams, we bought a hell lot, and mark my words, you could start a business with the money spent!
Music learning is A BIG BUSINESS. Look at the official ABRSM and Trinity Guildhall exam syndicates. Freaking businesses.
Same goes for any art like dancing and animation.

The passion that MJ disagrees with is SELFISH PASSION. The kind of passion that has you lock yourself away from the world to enjoy your own stuff rather than share it with the world. The negative passion that is just a lovey-dovey dreamland of fantastical perfection, that gets shattered if you suddenly lost your interest.

I like piano. It can be considered a passion. I took lessons for it. But it died. Why? I couldn't read notes. My teacher was abhorrent. I gave up. Up until school, when they announced they wanted to make a brass band. I joined because I saw a need. And that need gave me the push to revitalize my musical ability because I didn't want to see the band go to crap.

The Fastlane style of passion works because it gives purpose for the passion to help others. It's never about you. It's about the masses who need the idea, which needs YOU as the executor and the giver of the breath of life.

Why do you need the masses of people to like your passion and even pay money for it in the Fastlane sense, should you chose to monetise it? Because they give INPUT in the form of feedback, ideas, disagreements. And that enriches the activity itself as you have more things to use to create new things.

To keep passion alive, you need to put it out to people, and that is via the Fastlane Law of Effection. It's not easy, but MJ realised that. The general perception is that passion is for fun, just a hobby. No! Passion is to be weaponised as a goal to achieve, to motivate you, or as a tool to push the masses to you to get their money in the form of sales!

As for your dusty guitar, I symphathize. I haven't played my trumpet in a year..... :(
But I remind myself that my passion is to be mastered by ME and not I be mastered as the slave to my passion. I can choose which is my passion and which is not.

Don't live for your guitar. If you do desire passion for your guitar, do find people who need help with it and Fastlane it. Create some guitar string that doesn't break easily or some special technique that cuts the music learning curve! Remember jazz? It was created out to compensate the lack of musical education of Negro musicians, and countless millionaires have been created out of both the development and distribution of the music. You can either be the musician or the distributor ( remember Sex Pistols by Richard Branson). Or the teacher.

Don't worry about abandoning your passions. If you want passion to be at your side. Take it, and weaponise it, because your opponents lack that! They will never understand how their customers love the art and cherish it, and as a result will never deliver as well as you.

Always, provide value through your passion, to masses, and you can have millions. Don't be so hard on MJ. He loves writing. He expressed once that he wanted to be a scriptwriter. On some old thread, he actually wanted to create some post apocalyptic story (@MJ DeMarco , do you still have it?). But then the success of TMF and TFLF got him busy. He had to push these passions momentarily. Therefore, the anti-passion route was his route. It was painful. He mentioned how he took three years to write the book, detailed in TMF . Procrastination, doubt, desert of desertion....he faced them. That's what weaponizing passion for the masses will invoke. It's not easy. But he had to be merciless, for the sake of millions who needed a way out of mediocrity.

He weaponized his passion of writing in the TMF we know and love. Look at his posts....sharp, witty, chokefull of critical thinking and wisdom. Full of passion. But he was no slave to his passion. He was the master of his passion.

I will be direct and honest. He literally saved my life. Saved it! Saved me from buying crap get rich courses. Saved me from chasing the glitter. I was about to try real estate in a bad timing and funding position before TMF! If he just kept to himself for his writing passions, I'll be F*cked. So would you and many others on this forum!

If a country never produced soldiers to fight for its survival, the country will never last long. The next generation will have no place to call home.

Will you be the master of your passion? Will you say to your guitar, 'I know you are dusty and unused, but you are my tool. As my tool, I will make sure you give great value to others.'?
 
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amp0193

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I had a similar conflict when I first read the book a few years ago.

Being an artist at heart I wanted to paint all day, be a world famous artist and make millions. Art is my passion.

I put the book aside and focused on my passion. No money came in. I ended up going back to work for someone else and hating it.

Picked up the book again and gave it another shot. Now I work for myself and allocate time in the day to create art and focus on my passion. I'm not a millionaire yet but I make enough already to have time to paint when I want or take days off.

Read some of @AgainstAllOdds earlier posts. He tried to make painting work for a while, now he's in china importing stuff in to the U.S.

A friend of mine double-majored in theoretical physics and music composition. Over 3 years in his garage, he developed an improvement to a fuel injection system on a certain kind of diesel engine. He sold the tech for 7 figs. Now he can do what he really wants to do... which is play piano and write music.
 

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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.
Would you like to know how you can achieve the happiness you connect with "being a guitarist" or "being rich" right now?

There is a critical error in the underlying assumption of your story, which is that something on the outside like achieving a dream will bring you happiness. If this error exists in your mind, you'll always follow the next thing and pursuing your passion won't give you what you're searching for.

Or in other words: Once you are a guitarist, you'll suddenly be on your deathbed thinking about your hidden passion for cooking or playing with kittens. The point is that the mind ALWAYS feels like it has missed out on life and regret starts coming in once the possibility of death becomes relevant.

But what is the nature of this regret? Why do we always feel like we don't have or are enough? Why do we always want more or different things than those that are present?

The mistake lies in the concept that the mind is right. We unconsciously assume that the mind knows what we want because we identify with it. We think we are the mind.

"I want to be a guitarist" is not the truth. Your mind wants to be a guitarist because it thinks that this is a solution to all its problems. But this is not you.

Just say "hello" in your mind a few times. You can hear that, right? If you can hear it, you can't be it. As simple as that.

The truth is, the mind can never be satisfied. It's not designed this way, it's a survival mechanism.

If it was satisfied, it would be quiet, and if we're brutally honest with ourselves, we don't really want that because it's unfamiliar and evokes fear. Fear of nothingness, fear of death. If there's nothing in the outside world that can satisfy our thirst for happiness, we think that we would be hopeless and empty. But that's not reality.

So if nothing that the mind says can ever make us happy, what then?

Here's the second underlying assumption: "When in our basic state, we are unhappy. We need to do something to achieve happiness."

What if I told you that being happy is our natural state? And that we don't need to take off and fly, but just let go of what's dragging us down? That would render the initial assumption, that we need to follow our passion for achieving happiness, irrelevant.

How to be happy right now

Step 1: Become aware of what makes you unhappy currently. Sit still, breathe, and feel your body. Ignore your mind and concentrate on what's happening in your body. If you're not happy now, then you will feel tension in your body - it can't be differently.

Step 2: Focus on that tension and just be with it, without attempting to change it or modify it in any way, shape or form. Your only goal is to be with what's making your body uncomfortable.

Step 3: Once you've been with that tension, consciously decide (not try!) that you let go of this tension and want to be back to your natural state of happiness more than you want to cling to that tension.

You feel noticeably lighter when you let go of something. Repeat this for everything that bothers you and after a few months (or years) you'll be in a state of constant peace and joy. Then you can enjoy every moment, whatever happens, and don't have to lie on your deathbed thinking "what if".

Best,
Harti
 
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MJ DeMarco

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Would you like to know how you can achieve the happiness you connect with "being a guitarist" or "being rich" right now?

There is a critical error in the underlying assumption of your story, which is that something on the outside like achieving a dream will bring you happiness. If this error exists in your mind, you'll always follow the next thing and pursuing your passion won't give you what you're searching for.

Or in other words: Once you are a guitarist, you'll suddenly be on your deathbed thinking about your hidden passion for cooking or playing with kittens. The point is that the mind ALWAYS feels like it has missed out on life and regret starts coming in once the possibility of death becomes relevant.

But what is the nature of this regret? Why do we always feel like we don't have or are enough? Why do we always want more or different things than those that are present?

The mistake lies in the concept that the mind is right. We unconsciously assume that the mind knows what we want because we identify with it. We think we are the mind.

"I want to be a guitarist" is not the truth. Your mind wants to be a guitarist because it thinks that this is a solution to all its problems. But this is not you.

Just say "hello" in your mind a few times. You can hear that, right? If you can hear it, you can't be it. As simple as that.

The truth is, the mind can never be satisfied. It's not designed this way, it's a survival mechanism.

If it was satisfied, it would be quiet, and if we're brutally honest with ourselves, we don't really want that because it's unfamiliar and evokes fear. Fear of nothingness, fear of death. If there's nothing in the outside world that can satisfy our thirst for happiness, we think that we would be hopeless and empty. But that's not reality.

So if nothing that the mind says can ever make us happy, what then?

Here's the second underlying assumption: "When in our basic state, we are unhappy. We need to do something to achieve happiness."

What if I told you that being happy is our natural state? And that we don't need to take off and fly, but just let go of what's dragging us down? That would render the initial assumption, that we need to follow our passion for achieving happiness, irrelevant.

How to be happy right now

Step 1: Become aware of what makes you unhappy currently. Sit still, breathe, and feel your body. Ignore your mind and concentrate on what's happening in your body. If you're not happy now, then you will feel tension in your body - it can't be differently.

Step 2: Focus on that tension and just be with it, without attempting to change it or modify it in any way, shape or form. Your only goal is to be with what's making your body uncomfortable.

Step 3: Once you've been with that tension, consciously decide (not try!) that you let go of this tension and want to be back to your natural state of happiness more than you want to cling to that tension.

You feel noticeably lighter when you let go of something. Repeat this for everything that bothers you and after a few months (or years) you'll be in a state of constant peace and joy. Then you can enjoy every moment, whatever happens, and don't have to lie on your deathbed thinking "what if".

Best,
Harti


Read some of @AgainstAllOdds earlier posts. He tried to make painting work for a while, now he's in china importing stuff in to the U.S.

A friend of mine double-majored in theoretical physics and music composition. Over 3 years in his garage, he developed an improvement to a fuel injection system on a certain kind of diesel engine. He sold the tech for 7 figs. Now he can do what he really wants to do... which is play piano and write music.

I had a similar conflict when I first read the book a few years ago.

Being an artist at heart I wanted to paint all day, be a world famous artist and make millions. Art is my passion.

I put the book aside and focused on my passion. No money came in. I ended up going back to work for someone else and hating it.

Picked up the book again and gave it another shot. Now I work for myself and allocate time in the day to create art and focus on my passion. I'm not a millionaire yet but I make enough already to have time to paint when I want or take days off.

Think of it like a ladder.

Building a freedom business is just one rung on the ladder to your dreams.

While it's possible to become successful at your passions first, the odds of that are slim without business knowledge anyways.

Even successful passion business, artist, musician, etc started somewhere else first usually anyways.

I didn't like my odds of either being the next Picasso who lived rich as an artist or dying broke like Van Gogh. Also didn't want to beg galleries to show my work and be at the mercy of the art elite. Instead, I decided to commit as many years now as it takes to build a freedom business that can will give me all the money and freedom I need to never need a gallery or be told what I should paint.

I've learned to love business as much as art. And have grown faster as artist using the business principles I've learned.

Just my 2 cents.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

These posts turned this thread from NOTABLE to GOLD.
 

ZF Lee

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These posts turned this thread from NOTABLE to GOLD.
Hehe...this is why I keep coming back to this Forum. We turn sad, bad negative threads into threads full of hope, opportunities and value. Is it me, or have the number of NOTABLES multiplied these few weeks?

We are really pushing up the content for the launch of UNSCRIPTED ! I can imagine how pleased new readers of UNSCRIPTED will be when they find so many answers once them are led here!
 

MitchM

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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.)
I agree with the concept, except for in most cases when you are dying at an old age there is no way to fight your way out of it. Sure, if you are about to drown in a F*cking river maybe - but that's not how most people die. Like you said though, it doesn't matter in the end because once you are dead you are dead. It also doesn't matter that it doesn't matter.

Here is what I would say: life needs to be nurtured in able to thrive. You have your vegetables and then you have your deserts. There is no such thing as having it all good. Wanting this is retarded anyways because it is the lows that give context/contrast to the highs within our lives. View your time starting a business or working as time watering your garden. Only later can you enjoy the fruits.
 

Greg R

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It's one thing to eat ramen and not pay bills at 19 or 20, but try it at age 45.

Ramen is actually a luxury item at restaurants in Chicago.

I've seen places packed out the door selling $25 ramen. I must admit, I was one of those people.
 

Greg R

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It's one thing to eat ramen and not pay bills at 19 or 20, but try it at age 45.

Ramen is actually a luxury item at restaurants in Chicago.

I've seen places packed out the door selling $25 ramen. I must admit, I was one of those people.
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.

For some reason Putin memes do really well on this forum.
 
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AFMKelvin

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Every young person struggles with this conflict. Ultimately the two paradigms do not need to be mutually exclusive, but often times you have to delay gratification to do what you want.

You're right about this when I was in high school and everyone was deciding to either go to college or not is when I started battling between following what I liked to do or wait it out and get financially settled first. Thanks for the input.
 

AgainstAllOdds

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Read some of @AgainstAllOdds earlier posts. He tried to make painting work for a while, now he's in china importing stuff in to the U.S.

And one thing few artists understand is that your capability of making great art increases as you have more money.

For example, now I can hire an entire studio in China to paint my works. Or start creating sculptures and installing them wherever I please.

It's the same with music.

As you get money, you can purchase better production, better singing lessons, etc.

And if that's not the route you want to take, then at the very least you can purchase more time, and then use that time to create great works.
 

Hyrum

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My only problem with The Millionaire Fastlane is that I've read the thing four times and I'm still not a millionaire. Luckily, I just received Unscripted in the mail yesterday. I bet by the time I'm done reading it my luck will have changed!

@AgainstAllOdds raised a good point. I have always enjoyed writing and at times have had a strong desire to become a professional author. Problem is, I'm not very good at it. My (current) plan is to create the outlines and notes and hire a professional ghostwriter to do the parts I can't. I still get to exercise my creativity and have the feeling of accomplishment of seeing it completed. I just get to focus on the parts I'm good at.
 
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ZF Lee

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My only problem with The Millionaire Fastlane is that I've read the thing four times and I'm still not a millionaire. Luckily, I just received Unscripted in the mail yesterday. I bet by the time I'm done reading it my luck will have changed!

Ahem....being a consumer of books does not make you a millionaire producer....
And luck does not change just because you read a book the same way one apple isn't going to save me from cancer.
However, many apples combined with a healthy diet, sugar reduction, exercise routine and enough sleep might reduce the odds of cancer.
The same way that product validation, sales, problem solving and scaling will provide the millions.
 

PedroG

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My only problem with The Millionaire Fastlane is that I've read the thing four times and I'm still not a millionaire. Luckily, I just received Unscripted in the mail yesterday. I bet by the time I'm done reading it my luck will have changed!

You have read the book four times and have understood it zero times.
 

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