The Art of Non-Conformity: Unconventional Strategies for Life, Work, and Travel

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Fed up with work? Not enough time for the things you want to do? Here’s the answer: decide to retire! You don’t have to be 62 ½ years old, and you don’t have to be rich.

In fact, you can usually make plans to retire in about 36 hours. That’s the average time it takes to pack up your office, check on health insurance options, say goodbye to friends, and so on. What are you waiting for?

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I finally broke down and joined part of the social networking revolution. I’m officially no longer behind the rest of the world, at least in one aspect: I’ve been using Twitter on a trial basis for a while now, and I’ve decided I really like it.

See, I’ve never used Myspace… or Facebook… and hardware-wise, I don’t have a Blackberry or an expensive MacBook laptop. I just have Gmail, a $3 Skype microphone I bought in Belgrade last year, and a $500 Dell laptop that does everything I need.

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Two weeks ago, I wrote about the financial payoff of following your passion. If you deliberately take steps to do the work you love instead of the work you don’t enjoy, most of us would agree that you’ll feel a lot better about yourself.

But will you also make more money?

This is a controversial issue, so I asked some of the writers I read on a regular basis to chime in with their thoughts. The list of respondents includes:

• Leo Babuata, writer at ZenHabits.net
• Tim Clark, founder and writer at Soul Shelter
• Naomi Dunford, small business owner and writer at IttyBiz.com
• Mignon Fogarty, host of the very cool Grammar Girl podcast (#1 on iTunes for Educational Podcasts)
• J.D. Roth, finance guy at GetRichSlowly.org
• Darren Rowse, professional blogger
• Gretchen Rubin, author, attorney, and happiness blogger
• John Wesley, founder and writer at PicktheBrain.com

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I read a lot of personal development books—probably at least two a month. Like most books of any kind, each one usually has some things worth learning and some things that aren’t valuable to me.

If there is one common theme to most of these books, it is that “following your passion” – or doing what you love to do—is the most important work we can focus on in life. According to this thinking, work should involve a number of things you really like to do and are really good at, not simply a series of tasks you do to make a living.

So far, so good, right? But sometimes the thinking goes even further. Not only will you feel better about yourself and provide more value to others, you’ll also end up making more money.

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Here’s a proposal for you: raise a quarter of million dollars through withdrawing your life savings, borrowing from family members, and maxing out your credit cards. Pay that to a company that will “give you a business.” Operate that business precisely how they tell you– no exceptions are allowed. Every decision from whom you hire to what services you offer to where you locate your store is defined by the company.

They’ll even tell you what color shirt you are required to wear to work in “your own business.”

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