The 4-Hour Workweek | Book by Tim Ferriss

I should start by telling you that Tim Ferriss works for more than four hours per week — he doesn’t quite practise what he preaches. The four hour target is more an attention-grabber than a realistic goal — don’t let it put you off reading for fear that the book will be a big pile of exaggerations.

Now don’t get me wrong — I do think some statements in The 4-Hour Workweek are exaggerated. But I can forgive them simply because the book introduced me to enough new ideas to totally make up for any hyperbole or false promises. It introduced me to the 80/20 principle, taught me lessons on how to overcome self-defeating fears and provided a framework for simply getting things done.

A word of warning, however. You’re likely to come out of the book feeling like your life goal should be to generate a ‘passive income’ and spend every waking hour relaxing on a beach. Regardless of whether this is actually possible (I don’t doubt that some people have done it but is it a realistic goal for everyone?), I think that the book ignores the question of whether this is actually desirable — is creating a business purely for income really that fulfilling?

If you’d like to delve further into that last question (and ‘finding your passion‘ in general), read So Good They Can’t Ignore You by Cal Newport. But don’t miss out 4-Hour Workweek entirely — it’s far too valuable to ignore.

If you’d like more from Tim Ferriss, check out his podcast. I’ve written on Find A Spark about episode #2, episode #64, episode #117, episode #145, episode #148 and episode #313.