The Four Hour Work Week on My iPad as a Reminder to Stay Efficient and Enjoy the Ride

Before I read Tim Ferriss’s Four Hour Work Week, working from home and online seemed the ideal route for me. Four years ago when I began my transition to online, I was juggling two other teaching jobs. One part time at a local university. The other a full time assistant professor position at another university. The full time position required me to be at faculty meetings, prep, and teach several classes during the week. The part time position didn’t require as much commitment, but did require a drive somewhat longer than I was used to. My new online teaching position offered a new kind of freedom that intrigued me. The idea of doing my course responsibilities from anywhere seemed like heaven. Somewhere the seed grew in my mind that maybe, just maybe I could do the online gig alone and sever the tethers to traditional office hours and classroom antics forever. Once that was done, I relished being able to do my work in my pj’s, devoting about 30 hrs a week to students. I had no idea how something so good could possibly be better.

In 2008, I read Timothy Ferriss’s book, “The Four Hour Work Week.” A major component of the book is in how Ferriss challenges the reader to shift their concept of needs, wants, and dreams, to how work plays into all of this. It is possible he argues, to focus on the things that are most important to you, and shape your work choices around that to ultimately achieve them. While I enjoyed a 30 work week in pj’s, Ferriss and the 4HWW showed me that the focus of enjoyable work was still eating up time from an enjoyable life —and I could make that much better.

A principle of the book is to be able to cut the amount of time you spend working, so that you can spend more time living. I used the principles of the Four Hour Work week, not to create an online business that would fend for itself (even though I did; see model here), but to take what I do well (teaching) and turn it into an online occupation that frees up my life to explore and enjoy.

Even now years later I still have days of wonder, and think…”Is this really happening?”

Most days I get up and go to bed when I feel like it.

I work best in the early morning so I will probably get my online work done in the morning when I’m most focused and have fewer distractions. This allows me to have the entire day to read, write, and just be.

I have the freedom to let my day breathe. If I want to sit and read most of the day I can. If I want to go Trikke riding I can. If I get stuck in traffic I don’t worry, because I don’t have to rush to get anywhere.

I have a lot of time to think about what it is that I want from my life and importantly, work on how to get it.

I can travel mostly without consideration to my work. I can work from a laptop in a hotel, on an iPhone on the beach, and now also from my iPad in a coffee shop.

Work is satisfying, not because of the moment I sit down and work on that screen, but for the moment I get up and walk away…out into my life!

At best I do have a four hour work week. It is my belief that without the tactical changes I made in my work, it would take me 30+ hours a week to do these tasks. Now I’ve cut the time by more than 80% and I do what I feel is a better job. Better for my students because of the focus I give them. Better for me because I live a more engaged life.

Over the years I have learned how to do my online work with a focused precision. Ferriss speaks of this time management method as the 80/20 Pareto principle where if you figure that of 100%, 20% is vital and 80% is trivial. If you can give 100% to the vital components and not waste time on the trivial, productivity can be focused and skyrocket. I apply this to my online work. I give attention to students as needed. I do my work with care and give feedback to make the learning process optimal for them. Still, by intently focusing on what has to be done, I am able to treat this precision as a means to gain freedom of time and space that I so love as my main currency to spend.

My 4 hour work week and the application of the principles look like this:

I have two days a week where I am “off” and not responsible for being in the classroom or responding to students at all. I chose to make these Saturday and Monday. By sticking with this, my students learn when it’s best to communicate with me and structure is formed in habit.

During “discussion” weeks, I am responsible for being present 5 days. Being present means coming online at some point during a 24 hr period and responding in a dialogue fashion to students posts to discussion forum questions. I have a certain amount of posts I am required to make. If I’m quick and focused, meaning I don’t get backlogged with reading old comments because I haven’t checked them regularly, I can zone into my students most current and pressing ideas and spend no more than 30 minutes engaging them with new questions or answering responses to ones I posed the day before.

During “attendance”weeks, I do not have to post because during these weeks students are working independently on assignments. My job during such weeks is to check their individual forums 5 days a week to see if anyone has a question or problem to be addressed. If no questions are posed I can usually scan all of the students forums in a matter of minutes and move on. Ferriss discusses this concept in relation to email. We spend an inordinate and wasted amount of time checking emails throughout the day. For me, one focused and careful attending to them per day accomplishes the same thing. By coming online at the same time daily I ensure that students are looking for me, and that I can catch all posts that may come in during a 24 hr period.

Discussion and attendance weeks alternate, so potentially, if no questions are posed during attendance weeks I have a week with an even smaller work load. This is when the appreciation of the time I have rises to the top. If I have a lighter work week, I don’t feel guilty and try to find a way to stay “work-busy.” I step back, exhale, and go find something that fulfills this extra present of freedom.

I have to grade submitted work within 48 hrs of the due date. In most cases this can all be done on Sundays.

Each Sunday I spend the bulk of my online work week grading and posting assignments for the following week. This is my most time consuming day. Depending on the number of students I have, I can still get it done in 2-3 hours. If I have plans to be out of town or my Sunday is inflexible, I can split this time up during the week, and save all my grading and posts as drafts to be released on Sunday. Focused efficiency is the key!

Working online and from home is something I hope more and more people will come to realize as a viable option for them. Teachers. IT experts. Life coaches. Grant Writers. SEO experts. Web and graphic designers. Artists. Writers. Even Apple customer service reps are working out of their homes now. It’s all possible. If you have an idea about your own dream of doing it, drop me an email. I would be glad to help you with the considerations.

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I am a planner. Some would call this being a control freak and on many days, I might be inclined to agree with them. I come from a long line of planners, most evident being my mother, who went to her passage with notebooks full of ideas and unfinished dreams near her side. I too have such notebooks, and if I’m not writing plans out there, I admit to having a dry eraser board tucked in the corner of my office for those moments when I need to see my grandiose ideas drawn out on multicolored mind map diagrams. I actually never knew what a mind map was until my daughter had to draw one for a middle school project. I was smitten. What a way to dream. What a way to plan!

I’ve noticed that my daughter is filling up her own notebooks with ideas and plans. Interesting how our three generations are similar yet different. My mother preferred the .69-cent drugstore wide-ruled spiral classics. I am partial to Moleskin tablets with accordion pockets in the back. My daughter drops mini notebooks in her purse, or index cards in her back pocket where she calculates the pros and cons of life decisions such as staying or leaving a boring but sometimes beneficial part time job. She got this from me. I clearly remember a decade ago when I contemplated moving to the South and starting a new path. We sat a dry eraser board up on the mantle and on the left wrote pros, and on the right, the cons. The pros won out.

The thing about being so specific about planning, dreaming, and idea hoarding is that somewhere along the line, flexibility inevitably smashes up against you. It is a challenge to be admittedly anal about planning, but fluid in the creation and acceptance of change. Especially when dealing with this loss of control comes in the form of a plan crashed and burned in a pile before you. This is why it is important to be able to understand the difference in goals and plans. Goals can be short term or long, but they encapsulate achievement. Whether it’s about what you want out of your life or about the need to have an experience—this part does not matter. What matters is that you see the goal as the fruition of a portion of your overall journey. A plan then, is how this goal can be achieved. If you keep the two connected by a flexible thread that reflects your ability to change plans if needed to achieve a prescribed goal, your journey will be a more flexible one where you are able to go with the ebb and flow of change in your life.

My goals revolve around freedom, and the crux of this in a capitalist world is that I must earn a living at the same time. For me, freedom means not punching a traditional time clock, having boatloads of introspective time in order to fill up the aforementioned Moleskin notebooks, and having the space to travel and explore my world—all of course while earning a living. This sounds like the life of someone on the Travel Channel, and I would love to be someone so fortunate. My fortune and my plans to support these goals currently involve teaching online, selling Trikkes, developing web ventures, and working on creating new paths. Still, a few months ago, I got caught up in the promise of a gift. Such a special gift, and one that would allow me to take some time off from all of my planning and just simply enjoy my goals. In other words, everyday I believed I worked for the goal. This gift held the promise that maybe the planning wouldn’t be so crucial anymore. I was thankful for this because I really had grown weary of planning.

Now I am a responsible person, and even though I was “plan weary,” this gift too had to be planned as to how it would be utilized. Notebooks filled with those ideas on the regular. I allowed myself to dream in a way that was different than the dreams that I held before in prior notebooks. These new dreams were one-sentence affirmative bombshells. “I’m going to _____” and that was that. No plan needed. What a relief to not have to write, “I want to do _____” and follow it with a pyramid of steps required to reach the precipice, each marker laden with its own set of steps tucked within.

Well the gift did come, but not as I assumed it would. In other words, not as I planned! I was crushed for quite a while. Depressed actually. I wasn’t sure if it was because I had allowed myself to dream in a different way, or because I had no plan for this perceived setback. Either way, it wasn’t until I unconsciously reached for my notebook many days into my doldrums, that I realized that my goals were still there undamaged, just waiting for me to see and appreciate them. I realized that my belief that I was working and planning each day for these goals was flawed and was keeping me from living what I had already accomplished. I realized that I am living my goals. The wise choice for me from that day forward, perhaps one my mother never realized, and one that I must instill in my daughter, is that goals are often already achieved, and notebooks should be used to record the experience of living them.

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Lo and behold, you might actually have a life that complicates the pursuit of your core goals! However, in order to achieve them you must stay focused, connected, and accountable to them. This holds especially true when you aren’t able to actively take steps towards them at any given moment due to your job, activities or responsibilities.

Here are 5 simple and useful ways to remind yourself to take a moment to reconnect with your goals.

1. A very common reminder: a rubber band or odd bracelet on your wrist.

2. Set your wrist watch or cell phone to alarm (vibrate) at an odd interval or once a day. Pull out your “And so it is” paper, or just simply take a moment to work on your life script in your head.

3. Install a reminder on your computer. There are several for PC’s http://www.024h.com/, or have your iCal set up a reminder on your Mac. Write something positive and productive on this pop up.

4. Write a reminder or positive vibe-ology and send it to yourself via email. The site http://www.futureme.org/ allows you to set up future emails. Become accountable to yourself and monitor your progress by checking in. If you have a particular goal to finish in 2 weeks, set that email to arrive a few days before the deadline.

5. Become accountable to others. Share some of your goals with a few friends. Ask them to check in via email or phone call on a regular basis and ask just one question, “ How are your goals coming?”

Next Week: We Start Pulling It All Together

Click to Review the Series:
Day 1: Vision Boards
Day 2: Last Thought – First Thought
Day 3: Speak It and It Is

Over the past two days I have discussed tips to visualize goals. Today, we verbalize them. Seeing a picture or actualization in your mind is one powerful directive to manifesting your goals. Saying them out loud, both hearing them and saying them, creates an increasingly powerful dual effect.

In “Speak It and It Is” you will write down your goals as if they are your reality. As if they are already your day to day. You will then return to this note and verbalize this intended reality as a path to manifestation.

The key for this exercise is to stay in the present, to stay assertive, and to stay focused (note the passive voice in the photo). Begin your writing with the words, “And so it is.” This is your intellectual trigger. It serves to reset your brain and prepare you to receive the words you are about to speak. This simple mantra can also be used throughout your day to trigger you to remember these goals.

Next, write your goals out, not in a list but in paragraph form, remembering to state them as if they are reality. State them as if this is your life NOW. Choice of words is very important here. You must say things like, “I am,” versus “I will.” “Is,” versus “will.” “Have,” versus “want.” “Are,” versus “will be.” “And so it is,” versus “And so it will be.”

For example: “I am (not “I will be”) currently the owner of a lucrative ________business that has (not “will have”) in excess of ______ sales per week. This business is (not “will be”) one that has (not “wants to have”) _x number of ____ dedicated customers….etc. ”

Or example #2: “I am a strong and physically fit person who exercises 60 minutes per day as part of my weight loss goals. I watch what I eat, and I have over the past 6 months lost ____ pounds.”

The point is, whether your goals are business, relationship, or lifestyle oriented, you need to write them down and speak them into being by focusing on visualizing this as your reality. Try to be detailed in describing your life here. How long you make this written piece is up to you. Feel free to write your life script. It’s yours after all!

Once you’ve written your goal scenario down on a piece of paper. Fold it up and put it somewhere where you will have regular access to it. Put in your wallet or purse. Put it on your nightstand. Put it on your office desk.

At least twice daily, find a quiet place and unfold your goal paper and read it aloud. Begin with saying, “And so it is. ” Don’t rush through it. Don’t read it to yourself. Say it out loud, even if it is a whisper in a closet at work! Hear each word. See each scenario as the words come alive from the page.

Having a bad day or frustrated with your progress? Say out loud the trigger “And so it is,” to remind you of your words. Or, pull out your folded manifestation and cut through negativity that you’re falling for with a quick read. Verbalize and visualize your way to success!

Tomorrow Day 4 of Goal Focus: Wake Up Calls

Click to Review The Series:
Day 1: Vision Boards
Day 2: Last Thought – First Thought

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“Rainy Days and Mondays…” or so the song goes. After a particularly brutal Monday, I lay down to close it off. Exhaling I said, “Well, let’s hope tomorrow is a better day.” Then in my mind I replied to myself, “It will be. I’m setting it up right now.” This wasn’t a joke or a split personality moment. What I was doing was thinking about what I wanted to do on Tuesday, and I was committing to visualizing how it would look and feel accomplishing it.

Few of us will have a cheerleader ever present in our lives. No one can support our thoughts better than we can, because only we know what we’re thinking at any given moment. To be conscious of the emotions that play out in our minds on a daily basis is important to developing a good balance in our lives. When striving to achieve goals, it is vital that we create within our mind the visualization of the success that we are striving for. Really, what good would it do to visualize failure? Yet, we often do just this.

“Last Thought- First Thought” is a 5-minute exercise designed to set your mind towards a positive track for each day. Like prayer and meditation, this is a moment where you connect, reset, and reflect upon the direction your life will take. It is assertive, positive, and very necessary in order to travel the path you’ve aspired to.

As you are heading off to sleep, spend a few moments thinking about the next day on your goal path. First, get into a positive mindset. Quickly immerse yourself in one simple thought of positivity—-that you are successful. Allow this thought to wash away fears and abstract criticisms that can take you down. Next, think about your broad goals and the small steps that you will be taking towards them the next day. Remove anxiety by realizing how much easier you are making your day by contributing to the script of your life!

Now. Focus on two or three steps. Perhaps it is a phone call that needs to be made. Imagine yourself making that call, and all the things you need to come from that call now become part of your visualization. Keep these small steps in mind, maintaining a positive view of them. Do not allow failure to come into your thinking! Close off your mental exercise by repeating the thought that you are successful. Feel relieved of pressure because you know that you are prepared and ready to begin anew! Be aggressive in contributing to your success.

When you awaken, and especially before you get out of bed to zoom into the world, take a moment of pause to remember. Repeat this process.

It’s important to note that you are not spending more than a few moments on this exercise. You are not to overwhelm the mind with numerous tasks and to-do lists for the next day. The purpose of this exercise is to visualize goal success, and to set the mind in a forward momentum by defining some steps towards the goal. This simple act of visualization before you end your day, and before you begin it, will plant a seed of success in your mind that is extraordinarily powerful and productive.

Tomorrow Day 3 of Goal Focus- ” Speak It and It Is”

Click to Review The Series: Day 1-Vision Boards

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Over the next 4 Days I will be presenting tips and tools for gaining sharper focus on your goals.

Day 1 Vision Boards

When we were younger, a common project was to create a collage of our thoughts, ideas, and dreams represented by words and images. Our teachers would plop us down with glue, blank white board, scissors, and a box of random magazines. We would let our untainted imaginations run wild without fear and flip through the images. We pulled out those we felt connected to and pasted them to the board. What resulted was quite unique and telling about the person who created it.

As adults we rarely connect outer images with inner desires and goals. We “want,” but have no plans to achieve what we desire. In fact, visualizing goals and the road to achieve them are often so blocked by fear that we refuse to even contemplate the path. We think in a straight line instead of broadly and creatively, so when adversity strikes, we are stuck. Many feel the dreaded “dead end” feeling. Thinking of goals broadly allows us the freedom to choose differing paths to overcome adversity, while still maintaining our goals. But first, we must learn to recognize our goals. What is it that we want most? The exercise of creating a vision board connects us to our powers of visualization.

Vision boarding is a free flowing exercise designed to do two things: One, to connect to the inner goals and interests of the self. Purpose two is to present these interests in a tangible medium that we can repetitively refer to, which assists us in manifesting that visualization. It is vital to become attuned to what it is that we really want out of life. We must surround and immerse ourselves in this vision or we are literally wasting time!

5 Key Tips for Vision Boards:

1. Begin-The vision board is the first step to opening these channels of visualization for you. Become childlike. Do not allow fear of failure, past slowed achievement, or bad experiences to change your choices. Open yourself and choose images and words that speak to you. There is a reason for this. You are hearing your inner voice. Listen to it! Freely cut out and place these images on your board. Try not to have regard for design or what others might think about your choices.

2. Revisit- Place your finished vision board somewhere that it can be seen daily. I have mine on the wall in front of the computer I work from. Several times a day, when I lean back to rest or contemplate, the vision board is right in my eyesight, reminding me of my goals.

3. Reflect- Once you’re done with your vision board, consider what you’ve created. Pick up an inexpensive journal and on a clean page (labeled “Vision Board 1”), work through what you’ve created. What words appear? Think about the deeper meaning for you. For instance, I have the word “entrepreneur” on my board. I have a literal meaning of this word, but to help me define my goals I know that this word means “freedom” and “flexibility” to me. As I constantly work on my goals, I see that each one ultimately will reflect the broader meaning of a word like entrepreneurship for me.

4. Leave it Alone- Don’t remove anything! There may be things on your vision board that make absolutely no sense to you now. You may look at it and think, “Well that certainly isn’t going to happen!” Stop those thoughts immediately! Don’t take it down! There was a reason for you to place that image or word there. You might not be able to understand it now but you will. Keep visualizing it as is. Its broader meaning will become clear soon.

5. Blank Slate- Place an empty board up next to your finished one. Make a habit of being attuned to images around you. Don’t become closed off and see the original board as your only path! When a word or image strikes you as significant to your goal search, cut it out or write it down on your blank vision board. Make this an active project, designed at keeping your mind moving forward, while strengthening your visualization and focus.

Tomorrow: Day 2 of Goal Setting- “Last Thought -First Thought”

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From Chapter 16 The Devils Workshop

People who do not succeed have one distinguishing trait in common: They know all the reasons for failure, and have what they believe to be airtight alibis to explain away their own lack of achievement.

IF only I didn’t have a wife and family . . .
IF only I had enough “pull” . . .
IF only I had money . . .
IF only I had good education . . .
IF only I could get a job . . .
IF only I had good health . . .
IF only I had time . . .
IF only times were better . . .
IF only other people understood me . . .
IF only conditions around me were different . . .
IF only I could live my life over again . . .
IF only I did not fear what “they” would say . . .
IF only I had been given a chance . . .
IF only I now had a chance . . .
IF only other people didn’t “have it in for me” . . .
IF only nothing happened to stop me . . .
IF only I were younger . . .
IF only I could do what I want . . .
IF only I had been born rich . . .
IF only I could meet “the right people” . . .
IF only I had the talent some people have . . .
IF only I dared assert myself . . .
IF only I had embraced past opportunities . . .
IF only people didn’t get on my nerves . . .
IF only I didn’t have to keep house and look after the children . . .
IF only I could save some money . . .
IF only the boss appreciated me . . .
IF only I had somebody to help me . . .
IF only my family understood me . . .
IF only I lived in a big city . . .
IF only I could just get started . . .
IF only I were free . . .
IF only I had the personality of some people . . .
IF only I were not so fat . . .
IF only my talents were known . . .
IF only I could just get a “break” . . .
IF only I could get out of debt . . .
IF only I hadn’t failed . . .
IF only I knew how . . .
IF only everybody didn’t oppose me . . .
IF only I didn’t have so many worries . . .
IF only I could marry the right person . . .
IF only people weren’t so dumb . . .
IF only my family were not so extravagant . . .
IF only I were sure of myself . . .
IF only luck were not against me . . .
IF only I had not been born under the wrong star . . .
IF only it were not true that “what is to be will be” . . .
IF only I did not have to work so hard . . .
IF only I hadn’t lost my money . . .
IF only I lived in a different neighborhood . . .
IF only I didn’t have a “past” . . .
IF only I had a business of my own . . .
IF only other people would listen to me . . .
IF only―and this is the greatest of them all―I had the courage to see myself as I really am, I would find out what is wrong with me and correct it. Then I might have a chance to profit by my mistakes and learn something from the experience of others. I know there is something wrong with me or I would now be where I would have been if I had spent more time analysing my weaknesses, and less time building alibis to cover them..

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