The 4-Hour Workweek Summary (Plus PDF)

Summary: The 4-Hour Workweek is a practical guide to living an exciting and happy life without becoming a millionaire. Basically, it’s documentation of Tim Ferriss’s life, the kind of mistakes he made, and what you should do to live the richest life.

Tim introduced me to the 80/20 Pareto principle which changed my life forever. Just like that, I hope, this will change the way you see your life.

So let’s take a deep dive.

The 4-Hour Workweek Summary

Start seeing Time as the most valuable thing in life compared to money. It’s the same ideology, if you die at this movement, what will you do with all your money? 

Tim says “To enjoy life, you don’t need to be a millionaire”

Making money doing 8 hours of work every day is a not good sign to be a millionaire. Rather, making money with full of freedom on your time is a better way to become a millionaire.

As the author says “Make sure you have the freedom to do what you want to do rather than working for money for the rest of your life.”

Related: 15 Must-Read Books in Life

One of the biggest takeaways from The 4-Hour Workweek for me was “Don’t plan for retirement rather do the things that you want to do, so you don’t have to wait till the age of 60”

With that being said, let me share with you 8 rules that Tim wants you to follow: 

1. Take Time off from whatever work you’re doing and do what makes you feel good.
2. Build a system that makes your life easier whether it’s by hiring people or building a passive income.
3. Time is always right to work on your dreams, so don’t wait for the right time or place.
4. Spend the majority of your time on the things you’re good at and be the best.
5. Money is not the solution to all the problems.
6. Don’t spend your time on things that don’t add value or make you little money.
7. Step out of your comfort zone and face the fear.
8. Sometimes it is better to do the things that are worth doing and later ask for permission.

This is just a start, now, let’s dive into the four pillars of the book.

I’m keeping my promise, this is the mini-ebook of The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss. So download right now and read wherever you want for free. Happy Reading.

Define Your Dreams and Fear

Most people choose unhappiness over uncertainty. They don’t want to step out of their comfort because they fear what if something goes wrong.

For example, you’re doing a 9 to 5 job and you have an idea about business but you’re having thoughts like

• What if the business doesn’t work?
• What If I lose all of my money? 
• What will people say? 
• Will I get my job back, if my business doesn’t work? 

These are the right questions to ask but this can’t be a reason to drop the idea of business. 

Rather ask these questions,

• Why are you scared to do business?  
• If you don’t start a business, what are you missing? 
• What is stopping you from starting a business?
• What is the worst-case scenario? 
• If the worst happens, will it be the end of your life?

The last question will give you all the answers you’re looking for “What is the worst-case scenario?” 

What can go wrong, think of the worst thing.

The worst won’t be like “It will end your life”. 

Be aware of the situation you’re in or you want to be in. Ask questions and find the right answer, this will give you a clear idea of whether starting a business is good for you or not. 

Don’t be like, I don’t want to do it because that or this might happen.

Face the Fear and you will do wonders in life, don’t stay in a bubble. Take one step ahead and you will be closer to your dream.

What Makes You Excited

If you’re doing what makes you happy then it won’t stay the same forever. Times will change and you will start asking “Why this doesn’t feel good”.

So what you can do right now is, find something that makes you excited, and to do that, you can follow these simple steps: 

• List 5 things you want to do, want to have, or want to be.
• Select the top 3 things out of 5 things that you listed.
• Come up with an action plan to do what you have selected.
• Now, do the first thing and take action right away.

Of course, you will have thousands of ideas that you want to do and that’s the reason why we’re choosing 5.

As the author says “The question you should be asking isn’t, “What do I want?” or “What are my goals?” but “What would excite me?”

So in the end, do the things that excite you the most and work on that while doing the job or even running a business. This will add spark to whatever you’re doing.

Ways to Be Productive 

Tim Ferriss talks about Parkinson’s law and the 80/20 Pareto principle which now everyone knows but still, let’s talk about it.

One of the biggest productivity tips you can apply is “Set a deadline for whatever task you’re doing or you will be doing in the future”

This will give a signal to your brain that you only have 1 hour to perform this activity and your brain has all the powers to do so. 

It is like, if your mom says, you have time till the evening to clean your room then you will take good time to clean up your mess but if she says “You only have 1 hour” then you will start cleaning your room right away without wasting a single second.

This is what Parkinson’s law says.

Now, imagine you’re running a business where you have 10 products but somehow, only 3 products are making you most of the money.

So it’s better to make those 3 products better and try to cut down on other products.

This is what the 80/20 Pareto principle says. 

I have used both of these rules and trust me, it works in all kinds of scenarios. So try them out and see what kind of change you see.

Why You Should Hire

I was one of those people who thought “Why hire if you can do it by yourself” but then I realized you don’t have unlimited time, so if you can outsource some work then do it.

This was the reason why I hired a video editor for my YouTube Channel, so I could focus on my writing.

Now, Tim Ferriss shared one thing that might be good for the business but maybe not good for someone’s ideology. 

He was like, if you’re earning in dollars then hire people from cheaper countries where they don’t charge much.

It’s perfect from the business perspective because if you hire a video editor from the USA then he/she will charge more money but if you hire from other countries then you might get an editor at a chapter price.

I don’t want to drop the names of those countries but you get my point right.

So try to hire when you need to and when you can. Don’t be that guy who says “I have time, so will do it by myself”

By hiring you will have free time and with that free time, you can do what only you can do. You can use that time to learn new things or just spend it on your business or something else.

The 4-Hour Workweek Lessons

• Fear will slow you down from reaching to your goals, so face the fear and take action where you need to.
• Do those things that excite you the most and you will be 100x happier than anything else.
• Set a deadline when you’re working on any kind of project, this will make you aware of the time you have to finish the task.
• Don’t spend time where you want to, spend time where you need to.
• Hire people where you have to because you don’t have unlimited time to do everything by yourself.
• Money can’t be the end goal of yourself, just do what makes you Excited and happy. Money will eventually follow you.
• Don’t wait for the right time to start a business or any sort of activity. The right time is right now, just do it.

The 4-Hour Workweek Quotes

“For All Of The Most Important Things, The Timing Always Sucks. The Stars Will Never Align And The Traffic Lights Of Life Will Never All Be Green At The Same Time. 

The Universe Doesn’t Conspire Against You, But It Doesn’t Go Out Of Its Way To Line Up All The Pins Either. Conditions Are Never Perfect. 

Someday Is A Disease That Will Take Your Dreams To The Grave With You…if It’s Important To You And You Want To Do It ‘Eventually’ Just Do It And Correct Course Along The Way.”

“Nine times out of ten, a meeting is unnecessary and you can answer the questions, once defined, via e-mail.”

“Earn dollars. Live on pesos. Compensate in rupees.”

“What would you do if there were no way you could fail?

“Our goal isn’t to create a business that is as large as possible, but rather a business that bothers us at little as possible.”

“Focus on being productive instead of busy.”

“Being able to quit things that don’t work is integral to being a winner”

“Excitement is the more practical synonym for happiness, and it is precisely what you should strive to chase. It is the cure-all.”

“Never automate something that can be eliminated, and never delegate something that can be automated or streamlined. Otherwise, you waste someone else’s time instead of your own, which now wastes your hard-earned cash. How’s that for incentive to be effective and efficient?”

“1. Doing something unimportant well does not make it important. 2. Requiring a lot of time does not make a task important.”

“If the recipe sucks, it doesn’t matter how good a cook you are.”

The 4-Hour Workweek Review

Some of the things in The 4-Hour Workweek are a bit outdated and you will realize that once you start reading it. Nonetheless, it’s the perfect toolkit to organize your life in a way you want to.

The 4-Hour Workweek has 396 pages and you don’t have to read all of them. You will know what to read and what to skip when you pick up the book.

Go read it, if you haven’t already. It’s worth your time.

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