# The 4-Hour Workweek - Timothy Ferriss Synced: [[2023_11_30]] 6:03 AM Last Highlighted: [[2019_03_29]]  ## Highlights [[2019_03_17]] (Location 259) > Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect. —MARK TWAIN [[2019_03_17]] (Location 261) > Anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination. —OSCAR WILDE, [[2019_03_17]] (Location 627) > I can’t give you a surefire formula for success, but I can give you a formula for failure: try to please everybody all the time. —HERBERT BAYARD SWOPE, [[2019_03_17]] (Location 630) > Everything popular is wrong. —OSCAR WILDE, [[2019_03_17]] (Location 846) > Set aside a certain number of days, during which you shall be content with the scantiest and cheapest fare, with course and rough dress, saying to yourself the while: “Is this the condition that I feared?” —SENECA [[2019_03_17]] (Location 899) > Don’t save it all for the end. There is every reason not to. [[2019_03_17]] (Location 901) > I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened. —MARK TWAIN [[2019_03_17]] (Location 952) > The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man. —GEORGE BERNARD SHAW, Maxims for Revolutionists [[2019_03_17]] (Location 990) > The fishing is best where the fewest go, and the collective insecurity of the world makes it easy for people to hit home runs while everyone else is aiming for base hits. There is just less competition for bigger goals. [[2019_03_17]] (Location 1000) > Bear with me. What is the opposite of happiness? Sadness? No. Just as love and hate are two sides of the same coin, so are happiness and sadness. Crying out of happiness is a perfect illustration of this. The opposite of love is indifference, and the opposite of happiness is—here’s the clincher—boredom. [[2019_03_18]] (Location 1084) > The existential vacuum manifests itself mainly in a state of boredom. —VIKTOR FRANKL, Auschwitz survivor and founder of Logotherapy, Man’s Search for Meaning [[2019_03_19]] (Location 1252) > What you do is infinitely more important than how you do it. [[2019_03_20]] (Location 1368) > Limit tasks to the important to shorten work time (80/20). Shorten work time to limit tasks to the important (Parkinson’s Law). [[2019_03_20]] (Location 1526) > There are many things of which a wise man might wish to be ignorant. —RALPH WALDO EMERSON (1803–1882) [[2019_03_20]] (Location 1555) > only read the sections of the book that were relevant to immediate next steps, which took less than two hours. To develop a template e-mail and call script took approximately four hours, and the actual e-mails and phone calls took less than an hour. This personal contact approach is not only more effective and more efficient than all-you-can-eat info buffets, it also provided me with the major league alliances and mentors necessary to sell this book. Rediscover the power of the forgotten skill called “talking.” It works. [[2019_03_21]] (Location 1618) > Focus on what digerati Kathy Sierra calls “just-in-time” information instead of “just-in-case” information. [[2019_03_22]] (Location 1892) > If you are a micromanaged employee, have a heart-to-heart with your boss and explain that you want to be more productive and interrupt him or her less. “I hate that I have to interrupt you so much and pull you away from more important things I know you have on your plate. I was doing some reading and had some thoughts on how I might be more productive. Do you have a second?” Before this conversation, develop a number of “rules” like the previous example that would allow you to work more autonomously with less approval-seeking. The boss can review the outcome of your decisions on a daily or weekly basis in the initial stages. Suggest a one-week trial and end with “I’d like to try it. Does that sound like something we could try for a week?” or my personal favorite, “Is that reasonable?” It’s hard for people to label things unreasonable. [[2019_03_22]] (Location 2035) > Why not combine a mini-retirement with dentistry (or medical) geoarbitrage and finance your trip with the savings? I lived in Thailand for four months and got root canal treatment and a crown for ⅓ of the price that it costs in Australia. There are many upmarket clinics set up for “expats” and health travelers in Thailand, Philippines, Vietnam, Goa, etc., with English-speaking dentists. [[2019_03_22]] (Location 2041) > Learn more about the incredible world of medical tourism and geoarbitrage at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_tourism. Even large insurers like AETNA often cover overseas treatments and surgeries.] [[2019_03_30]] (Location 2353) > I encourage you to be similarly pound-wise and penny-foolish.