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Now, there aren't very MANY places left in the U.S. that only take cash, but there are a few so I still contend that it's a good idea to keep on you.
Regardless, it was still and interesting and informative post, keep it coming.
Cheers!
Andrew
-Postal Mail: I've been making an effort to call individual vendors (catalogues & charities mostly) to stop sending me stuff. It's a bit time-consuming, but the bulk mail stop services can't stop these.
-Biz Voicemail: I started using a virtual PBX about 6-months ago for my biz, and LOVE it (RingCentral.com) My clients only have to remember one #, and all my messages/faxes get sent to my blackberry.
Now you're making me think about consolidating my personal voicemail to an email sevice too. One small step I made was to turn my cellphone v.m. off, and have it forward to my home v.m. instead. (So I've got one inbox for personal vm.)
So while I'm off to a good start, you TOTALLY raised the bar with having postal mail emailed out. You are definitly 'ninja' with reducing information input!
In Switzerland men's wallets do have pockets for change. As far as I know we are the only ones to have this. I also hate loose change. Curious to hear whether there are other countries where men's wallets come standard with a coin pocket.
Cheers, Lukas
I need a few more gallons of coffee. LOL... you are absolutely right. I should have qualified my post: these recommendations are definitely targeted at the post-industrial knowledge worker economies (North America, Western Europe, Japan, etc.). Broadband-enabled, credit-based, cell-phone-wielding populations. Trying to use a credit card at a kiosk in Ecuador or restaurant in rural Armenia will get you a nice laugh. "Where's the closest Bank of America ATM?" will get you an even bigger laugh ;)
Very good observation. Thanks for pointing that out!
Tim
WOW! THIS IS HUGE! This is a powerful way to break any habit.
I used to be a total PDA nerd. My last unit broke in France and when I returned to Canada I was curious to see how long I could go entirely without a celphone, since it had already been 7 days incident free.
6 months later I still don't have one! And I run 2 companies with several employees. If someone would have bet me $1,000 if I could go a month without my phone, I wouldn't have taken the bet. It just seemed impossible. Today I wonder why I ever needed one. My wife loves it too!
So in my own words "Challenge yourself to [adopt new behavior] for 7 days... then just see what happens. You will have to find new solutions to cope. You might surprise yourself with what you come up with.
Thanks for the repiphany Tim! (re-epiphany)
JOIN MY 4HWW NING!
http://4hwwLINKEDINbusinesswarriors.ning.com
80/20 rule Web 3.0 tools Outsourcing = 4HWW . Discuss, collaborate, partner up! 4 hour workweek? . Is it Possible? . Do we need $1M/yr to live the millionaire lifestyle?
Love the sentiment. I think the best tip though is your challenge “How would you do ____ for a week if your life depended on it?� it is this sort of thinking that is required for us to turn conventional lifestyles on their head and build the life we want. Asking yourself this question can unlock a world of possibilities.
I don't mean to be an arse. But I believe that even in Western Europe it's not always easy to get by with only a credit card. I'm living in Berlin for example and a lot of bigger places accept debit cards. But a lot of smaller shops, like corner shops, small cafes, ice cream shops only accept cash.
I agree though, the no-cash way would be great. Also because that way it's easier to track at the end of the month where all your money is went.
Just to throw a wrench in the works: you can even do without e-mail, if you have some other key replacement for communications. Example: Hank Paulson has never used e-mail in his life, but when he was running Goldman he would sometimes make 400 calls in a day, many of them to the v.m. boxes of Goldman staff. They knew how to reach him, he knew how to reach them (or just leave a message without talking to them), and lots of stuff got DONE.
We proceed with our cast-iron assumptions until something comes along that shakes them up. More power to you as you *keep* shaking up our assumptions.
I'm a big GTD fan, so I've been implementing some of those for a while now, but the whole "no phone calls, everything by email" just doesn't fly with most clients, at least in my field (design & web design/development). It doesn't matter if you answer their questions they left you on voicemail by email religiously, they just *want* (not need...) to talk to you. You can definitely get your point across by forwarding all your calls straight to mailbox and answering most of them by email, but somehow it doesn't satisfy them...
If you have a secret recipe for this case scenario, I sure would love to read about it :)
Thanks for the book, take care.
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/bus...
Thanks for changing the RSS feed options so that it sends the whole article and not just the teaser. (At least, I think you changed it...we'll see with the next post whether it comes through in its entirety too.)
I enjoy your blog but it was driving me nuts to only get the teaser and I was about to ditch it as I refuse to keep the "teaser feeds." Having to "click through" to the site doesn't help my batch processing of the blogs I like!
http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/2007-05-31/news/...
Cheers!
Mari
Like you, however, I hate change. Any I collect usually gets dumped immediately in some donation jar (there's always one around for some cause or the other).
I have a bank branch in my local grocery store, so no ATM fees and no extra trips needed.
I have been thinking some of these things for a long time but have never really come across someone who doesn't think they are insane - until now. I love the outsourcing ideas. And I have been taking mini retirements for my whole adult life - in fact it is a very Australian thing to do. Loads of people in Australia plan their lives around these.
Good on ya for taking these ideas and trying them out,
Mia
Very interesting indeed, as usual...
Living in the UK, I am interested to know if you, or anyone reading this, knows of a service like GrandCentral or Remote Control Mail, which is available to UK residents...?
Can someone email me if they do know! reachjm at googlemail.com
Many thanks guys and gals! Appreciated!!
Jon :-)
Regarding the comment on eliminating cash I try and use a credit card as much as I can and I'm searching around for one that gives the best rewards for using it (cash back, travel miles, etc).
Cheers, Cpt. Flint
Nice blog entry. I have been cashless for a while. All I carry is my ID & Card. Thats it. The only problem with having a card out at the bar or club is they start a tab and the bill can add up quick when you not pulling out cash to pay for every round of drinks!
Drew
I've been a 'phoneless' business for quite some time, but to be mail-less would be a dream. I'm going through your recommendation later today to set that up. Thanks for the info!
I actually have calls that come in go to a voicemail that says to contact me via email. I go through email once a day. This has been working very well, but now I thing I will do the Simulscribe thing and see how that works as well. I liked having the caller decide how important the call was by requiring them to write down the email I gave them in my greeting, then have them take the second step of having to email me, but who knows how many possible customers I may have lost with this old system? To Simulscribe I go! Thanks again.
Sterling
As about 10% of your visitors are from my neck of the woods (UK) I wondered if a few people from the UK that are implementing Tim's ideas are interested in meeting up to make friends and spur eachother on? I think 7 is the magic number. There are already 2 of us so we are looking for another 5 people. If you are interested click my name on this comment and use my email address on my site, look forward to talking. Sorry for squatting T.
home (time savings in shopping/prep/cleanup increased variety, like mini-vacations), spending most the day in cafes/eating out of small restaurants (around $6 a meal), having cash is required, as typically $10 is the minimum for using...even a debit card (bastards!)
Wallet. check out http://www.nobulges.com/ made of sailcloth. Like you I opt to only carry the minimum cards. Some are mini cards, since I keep local there are also frequent buyer cards which add up to free drinks/meals.
RE: Paperless
I make it a policy to 'never let it hit the pocket'
if you do networking or track reciepts, get a portable camera (e.g. Casio EXILIM), and just take pictures, to OCR, put in quicken later. It's also useful for doing product research, addresses, collect and forget cards (I mean business cards) and the batteries last for weeks.
If you have time, check out what I'm up to at www.zenzoomie.com.
Example:
2125551234@teleflip.com
https://www.teleflip.com/blog/services/flipout/
hey Charles, yep Dan K has always lived these exact time management philosophies Tim teaches. His NO B.S. time management book is a nice compliment to 4HWW.
BTW... our NING group is about to break 50 members. (2nd biggest 4HWW Ning is 14 members... so 50 is pretty good).
The topics are 4HWW (Lifestyle design,Outsourcing, 80/20 rule), Web 3.0 (mashables, widgets, the future of Linkedin),
Thanks Tim for directing us to NING!
http://4hwwlinkedinbusinesswarriors.ning.com
I also have a specific response for Joel Mueller. If you would like to check out an alternative service to handle parcel mail, check out http://usabox.com/what.asp. USAbox uses Miami addresses. I have never used them, but I have heard good things about them from some other expat communities.
It is easy to think of excuses why not to put some or all of Ferris' principles to work-Its hard to think how to make them work because it is counter to our culture and society. I've enjoyed the new mindset and "teaching" my employees and customers how to best communicate with me effectively (which is less rather than more).
I've got my vision and list of qualities I would like to have in an ideal partnership, and am finding very few venues in which to meet men that are at the same place in life and heart as I am. The pool of eligible men becomes smaller the further up-the-ladder I advance in my life.
Many are either threatened by my success and lifestyle, or looking for someone to take care of them financially.
Had poor experience with online dating sites, though I've been a successfull IMer for over 5 years. Something gets lost not being able to look into someones face and feel their energy...
Your thoughts and experiences?
Barbara D
Credit? Oh boy, Credit is sooooo...how shall I say it...90's? Cash is still King, especially outside the U.S.
Besides, the average American is buried to the eyebrows in credit card debt, do you really think it's wise for them to be carrying around more?
Don
I need to get my crap in order and get my muse moving. It's only been a friggin month!!!!!
One such vendor is Tim Ferriss who promised various "bonuses."
I have tried every imaginable way to obtain them. Then, I contacted Tim's support people. I have received emails, etc. suggesting how to get them (none work.) Over 1 month ago I was told his web and technical people would check into this problem.
As a result of bad vendor selection, I spend 4 hours per week trying to get vendors to deliver on promises. If I provided equally lousy service, I could save many hours. Of course, I would quickly have NO CLIENTS OR CUSTOMERS.
Cheers
Thanks
I'm really sorry to hear that you've had some trouble. Are you referring to the reader-only section on www.fourhourworkweek.com? We've worked really hard -- there is a team of four or so who work on the site -- to add even more extras than are listed in the book. We are really proud to have less than a 1% inquiry rate from those who attempt to register, but sometimes things do pop up, like glitches related to Firefox 2, spam filters for Earthlink/AOL, etc. We also sometimes take down a bonus to add to it or make improvements. More are on the way.
I apologize if you ran into problems and promise that my tech team is really doing their best. They respond to at least 98% of our tech-related e-mails in 18 hours or so, and we've made repeated improvements to the registration area based on user feedback.
In all cases, I can't stop you from putting us on fraud sites, but I'd ask you not to, as there is no fraud here. Please take a second to give it another shot at http://fourhourworkweek.com/wms/login/login.php and email Steve at guru@fourhourworkweek.com if you still have problems. We're really doing our best. Alex and others may also be able to help.
Cheers,
Tim
The articles trash the founder, not the service! What's your freakin' problem? The guy left, what more do you want? LifeLock is a great service, and I highly recommend it. Since using it, I get almost no junk mail, and I have verified it's tough as nails to get credit in my name without my permission. Those articles didn't have one bad thing to say about lifelock except: "They charge you for something you can do yourself." WTF! I can cook for myself, but I often eat at restaurants... I can change the oil in my car, but it's a lot easier to have walmart do it for me. Stop moaning and get a life.
Just wanted to say thanks for writing the 4HWW.
All my life I dreamed of being a Park Ranger. I graduated with a degree in parks and recreation management and was promptly hired by the National Park Service. Lots of really cool experiences and great friends. But after 10 years, I just couldn't take the bureaucracy, red tape and utter nonsense.
So I quit my job and have since started four different businesses. Now I find myself a slave to email and voicemail. I came across your book at just the right time. Thanks, its really made a difference.
Shortly after reading 4HWW, I came across this quote that reinforced the message of your book:
"In order to seek one's own direction, one must simplify the mechanics of ordinary, everyday life." ~ Plato
Keep up the great work!
Rob
http://www.rangercareers.com
M Savage
I have an email box with thousands of messages (and that is with the spam removed). It causes me great stress and anxiety that I don't have the time to go through it all. So, I have decided to outsource to a VA to clean it all up and delete 90% of it.
I liken me taking on that project myself to cleaning out my basement filled with 30 years of "stuff". I would not be able to simply clean the garage, I would have to stop and reminisce over every trophy or photo of a long lost friend. Now granted, my email box is not a sentimental thing however I know that if I don't see what is there, I won't be torn or agonize over it -- out of sight, out of mind. Bottom line, if it was important, I would have dealt with it already, right?
Thanks again for helping me keep the main thing the main thing!
H Korngold
http://www.businessweek.com/careers/content/jul...
I do wish there was a way to have them scan your letter mail automatically as soon as it arrives, instead of you having to hit "scan" and then waiting 24 hours -- Yes, it really does take a full day for them to scan it, even if you hit "scan" as soon as the mailpiece arrives at 10AM. I do suspect that as they get more customers, they'll improve on scanning turnaround.
Secret tip: Oregon has no sales tax, and ECM will happily sign for and forward packages for you. Great if you live in California and want to order something expensive from the Apple Store. >:D
The refer-a-friend email also mentioned that they're increasing their rates soon, and that old customers will be grandfathered at the old rates.
And as far as sending all voicemail calls to e-mail, I would find that obnoxious. If you need to have a conversation with lots of questions and answers with someone, you'd have to keep sending e-mails back and forth, probably spending way more time than the quick time spent on the phone. Talking is faster than typing.
Another great alternative for a free phone is AIM Phoneline. I just signed up for one myself, one public and one private. It's like Skype or Vonage except it's a real phone number for free. Check out my blog entry for more details.
http://hackerclass.blogspot.com/2007/07/call-me...
I'm half-way through your book. I agree with one reviewer (NY Times?), it is STUNNING. Thanks so much for sharing your knowledge with us!
My husband and I are eating up your new book. We just finished up 9 years in the Air Force last week and are entering the new world of entreprenuers. Your book could not have come out at a more perfect time than this. Thank you. :)
A question about credit cards, though. My CC company of 7 years just sent me something telling me they're going to flip my 9.9% fixed to a ~19.9% variable, due to "rising interest rates." As a result, I'm looking for a new, lower-interest or at least something with a good rewards program.
You say you've got a MasterCard, do you have any particular CC company that it's with? Or any particular reason for going MC over Visa or the like?
With the success of Tim Ferriss' book, we've now successfully placed several of our virtual assistants with individuals and company executives in the U.S.
I highly encourage you to contact me at paul@openaccessmarketing.com if you have any questions about getting your first virtual assistant, The Philippines, and why it is better to work with a company directly rather than an individual contractor overseas.
Cheers!
It's a full featured web bill pay service and has some bells and whistles that your typical bank sponsored service doesn't have.
PayTrust is owned by Intuit, makers of Quicken, etc.
It is not a free service and while I haven't used it personally, I've heard nothing but good things about it.
Although, with services like Earth Class Mail, PayTrust might be a bit redundant or even unnecessary.
Cheers.
http://www.entrepreneurjoe.com/2007/08/15/the-4...
So far, its great, cant wait to finish it and implement your concepts.
-ejoe
Here's their GrandCentral page: http://www.inviteshare.com/site.php?id=17
You can sign up for an invite and existing users can share their invites with the community.
Cheers
I decided to go paperless when I constantly had to be reimbursed for trips and other materials for the office. For years I have eaten up expenses that should have been paid for by someone else. Everything that I have to buy on my own I will do it online so I can just put the receipt through http://www.shoeboxed.com.
I think another important thing to mention is that the South of the United States produces a lot of paper products and it's really responsible to diminish our impact on Southern forests. A good resource on information about that is http://www.dogwoodalliance.org
I hope you're all as successful as Mr. Timothy Ferriss. Otherwise, keep your immature, self-obsessing opinions to your self. To Mr. Latin America, what a triviality. Picking on the details. A sure sign we are dealing with a big noter with low confidence.
Thanks to everyone for commenting - especially Mr Latin. Ignorance is always unkown to the carrier.
Sincerely,
Michael Alexander
Doesn't that put you in reactive mode - having to answer comments all the time, and weed out spammers?
###
Hi J,
The comments serve to make the blog a dialogue, and as it reaches a critical mass, people begin to help each other, much like the forums. I also get some great advice and recommendations from my readers. Akismet handles almost all spam, and I just delete idiots. I check out comments no more than once a day, and it doesn't take more than 15 minutes or so. If it gets to be a burden, I'll 1) outsource it to my assistants, then 2) eliminate comments if I have to. I'm enjoying so far, though.
Thanks for the question!
Tim
My advantages include not having a house or children, and possessions that can be condensed into a suitcase.
Any advise you might have would be wonderful!
Thank you,
Alexa
Great tips. I've been using RemoteControlMail (now called EarthClassMail) and GrandCentral for a while. For voicemail transcription, I used to use a service called DictoMail (http://www.dictomail.com/).
For paying bills, I've started trying PayTrust http://paytrust.com/
My problem recently has been having to deposit the affiliate checks (when they don't deposit directly into my bank account or paypal account). Unless you have a better idea, I'm going to try out a scan checking service called DepositNow (https://www.depositnow.com) which a number of banks also offer as a service.
-Simon
The low information diet is another great way. while it may sound crazy, you dont need face book or myspace to get through college. reduce how offtend you check it, and let your friends know to contact you through your phone, screen the calls and check your voicemail after and quickly decided if its urgent to respond to or if it can wait till later. Finish projects first befor checking e-mail or voicemail and so on, check FB/MySpace less offtend. If something big is going on, people will be talking about it or ask you about it. If you get your stuff out of the way befor attending to distractions, you wont miss any thing any way.
the thing the earlier part of the book emphisizes the most is focusing on the important and getting it done.It is much faster than letting distractions get in the way. transitioning between tasks adds large ammount of time, so focus is key.
getting out of class is probly not the best idea becuase some profs will factor it into your grade, something you cant do much about, and can mean the differance between a B and an A- when its close. also, i like his idea of makeing the proffessor think twice befor giveing you a lower grade, if you read the book, you'll know what im talking about.
PLAN YOUR DAY OUT THE DAY BEFORE. plan plan plan. figure out what you need to get done the next day to fell like you got what you needed done, then get it done FIRST. You then have the rest of the day to enjoy what ever, but get the major stuff out of the way with all your focus.
any ways hope that helps. I'm a college student as well, and I'm curently reading this book as well. I know its not going to be easy for me to adjust to all these things at first, but i will benifit from it as well. One thing i know is that i want to find a way to apply my education in IT-network and security, to starting my own buissness, and automateing it, rather than just becomeing a Admin for a company and being on call 24/7.
But, I think that the principle behind the tips are powerful, and can be used anywhere:
-- cut out as much paper as possible (but making sure to create backups)
-- centralize capture points
I think these are useful tips, but there is a larger basic structure behind them that can be understood for these, and all time management "tips." When that structure is understood, and the basic elements well-practiced, only then do tips make sense, and can be implemented by us individuals at our own skill-levels.
For example, I have no access to Pinger, but I suspect that there is a principle behind its use that I could use without having it. Also, I might very well able to apply the principle to a basic element, making me productive wherever I travel in the world.
I wonder if it ever occurred to them to implement those things which would work, and ignore that which will not. For example, I run an internet retail business, but am very small and have erratic inventory and cash-flow, as well as not netting a whole lot to begin with.
To attempt to use a fulfillment service for all the products I stock (several hundred SKUs, easily) would be a nightmare, I think. However, that's not going to stop me from investigating the idea, just in case.
However, the suggestions regarding email, not looking at websites, and doing other things that interrupt the work-flow were goldmines of information. While my business is web-based, there are many non-web things I can be doing to increase business.
Or, I could be visiting relevant websites instead of hovering over, and responding to, email as it comes in, as well as working to promote my new entrepreneur's discussion forum.
Since I just finished reading the book this past weekend, I will be implementing different steps to help improve efficiency. We'll see how it goes.
Thanks, Tim!
TimW
Phoenix
About mobile, I store "names" of those people with who I would like to talk. Rest of the calls meet with "no answer" or "busy" fate. Of course, I will take these calls if they persisted and called repeatedly.
Voice mail is seldom used.
Also, our wallets do have coin pockets. You can buy a cup of tea for around 8 cents. In fact, India has a very rich culture of street food. These guys and almost all sweetmeat shops do not accept credit cards. They prefer the old school. Coins are handy in this part of the knowledge workers' universe!
I would have piles of mail in my room waiting to be shredded, but I didn't want to take the time to do it. Eventually I would end up shredding it all at one time (batch processing), but it would take over an hour to sort out all the junk and shred everything. So I attacked the root cause and I went with www.tidymailbox.com to get rid of most of my junk mail. I also went paperless with most of my bills.
Sandy is really meant to be a virtual personal assistant. You just tell here in natural language what you need kept track of or what you need looked up, and she does the organizing and retrieval. The idea is that she is a little more like a secretary than a PDA or Outlook (or whatever is your PIM tools of choice). Best of all, you can access your "secretary" from email, sms, PDA, IM and even by telephone (via Jott). How do you make a note of an idea or set a reminder when all you have is a plain old telephone handy, or you are driving and cannot enter stuff on your PDA? I hope that helps explain the difference. In a way, you have to try it out to fully appreciate the service! I hope this helps!!!
Also, not sure if you saw about Om Malik's heart attack (GigaOm.com), but he thanks GotVoice for simplifying all of his phones and voicemails, and being able to rapidly read through his hundreds of iPhone, VoIP and landline voicemails he received after his heart attack in only 50 minutes:
http://gigaom.com/2008/01/08/checking-in-with-g...
"I also want to thank a service called GotVoice. It is sort of like Yahoo for voicemail — a nifty web-based voicemail management system. I had signed up for it before the holidays to “review” the service. It worked with my iPhone, my AT&T line and my softphone VoIP service. It pulled the voicemails from the various systems and put them in the order received. More importantly, it sent me a transcript of the voicemails in the email inbox. In less that 50 minutes I read your sentiments."
Cloudmark connects millions of users to a central database. Users identify spam, and this information is passed to the database. Users receive constant updates, so the program knows which emails other people have identified as spam. Because it doesn't use a filter there is little risk of losing real emails. The program works in the background and deletes spam almost instantly.
I came across the reference to Earth Class mail in this post: http://blogs.computerworld.com/how_to_work_from...
Cheers and thanks for what you do.
Phil
Scratch my last comment.
(How emabrassing).
Also, I have to say, this would not work for us Canucks because Tim Hortans does NOT take debt or credit card, cash only. I NEED MY TIMMYS SO it's not possible.
Can you help please...?
I'm reading your book at the moment, I'm somewhere in the middle. It's realy good, one of the best ones I've ever read! Website's great too, almost made me cry when I first I look through it, hehe
I understand it all very well, and totally agree with most of the things you write about, but I'm in a very difficult position at the moment, and don't know how to break out of it.
I've been dreaming of having my own business for a while, as soon as possible; I have a whole plan in place, but I need more cash. Now, multiplying my income seems to me almost impossible, since I only work in administration, stuck in this bloody office from 9-5 :(. I started looking for a new job, something where I could be rewarded on my performance, rather then time I've spent at work, but it's just not easy, and I'm getting very frustrated.
Do you have any suggestions? Or anyone really... I know Tim's not replying to all posts.
Cheers! :D
You can also self-scan and upload to your account, upload your electronic documents, email documents to your account. Now, you can search, share and download ALL of your documents from one central location.