I was just looking at Twitter and for the first time I saw something remarkable: someone with lots of followers and is following no one. Tim Ferriss has 9,313 followers and is following absolutely no one. He does appear to post quite often, so I'm not sure how this figures in to his 4 hour work week, but his single-mindedness and focus is amazing.

I don't quite understand the naysayers here. Do people really want to work more than 4 hours a week? 40 hours a week? 80 hours a week? For me, 4 hours per week sounds just about right. I've implemented much of his advice regarding delegation and continue to do so. Hoping to get to 4 hours/week in another couple of months.

Tim, you're awesome!

I purchaced this book because I was preparing a presentation about time management. It almost messed up my presentation, because it messed up my brain.
I tell you, It can actually be done. Work only 4 hours a week. But you have to do a complete reformat of your brain.
The concept of taks elimination and putting yourself out of the equation to avoid bottlenecks is super.
I am not quite there jet, but, now I work less and make more.
I definitelly recommend this book to weight and consider the techniques within.

I must admit I was taken by the concept of "geoarbitrage". It just sounds cool, doesn't it? I thought the concept was quite interesting and eagerly purchased the book. After reading past the introduction, I realized I'd been conned.

The author's first claim, on page 13, is that he is a "no holds barred cage fighter, vanquisher of four world champions". This is a lie. There are online databases (such as sherdog's fight finder or mma.tv's fighter database) that hold the fight records of all professional and most amateur fighters, and no one with the last name 'Ferriss' is listed in any of them. Look it up for yourself. He claims on his blog that these fights were in Japan, but unfortunately for his credibility, Japanese MMA does not use a cage. The fights there take place in a ring, much like boxing.

He then claims to be a "National Chinese Kickboxing champion", a feat he claims to have accomplished (despite no formal background in the sport) by looking for "loopholes in the rules", one of which was that weigh ins were the day before the event. He claims to have dehydrated to the point of losing 28 pounds of water in 18 hours, then rehydrated after weigh ins. Loophole or not, this would not give him the advantage he claims, since weight cutting is utilized by virtually all fighters and, indeed, all athletes in sports with weight categories. He would have you believe that he invented the technique. Given his lies about his MMA record, and the improbability of winning a U.S. national championship in *any* sport after only four weeks of training, and the fact that he doesn't name or give any details that would allow one to look up the results of the tournament, it is overwhelmingly likely that he is lying about this accomplishment as well.

Given that the book starts out with two blatant lies (and his blog ... the lies there reach pathological levels), it becomes difficult to enjoy the rest of the 300 pages of anecdotes and advice. Most of the anecdotes are probably fabricated, so the credibility of the advice is tarnished. What's the point? It is also frustrating to know that your money went to such a person.

Buy 'Vagabonding' and 'The World is Flat' instead.

I read about this book in an in-flight magazine and thought it very much embodied my view of life: Don't delay your happiness or gratification until retirement. Seize the day and live it up now!

However, I was terribly disappointed. First of all, definitely heed the Warning printed on the back of the book. I didn't even notice the warning until it was too late. But there it was the whole time: "WARNING: DO NOT READ THIS BOOK UNLESS YOU WANT TO QUIT YOUR JOB"

I'm willing to quit my job, but you have to REALLY want to quit your job in order to do what this book says. You also have to have a meaningless job that requires almost ZERO work. I don't keep myself busy with busy-work. I am genuinely busy with PRODUCTIVE, results-oriented work.

I'm a mid-level manager at a large non-profit organization. A lot of my job consists or interviewing children and adults for our programs. This is not something I can out-source to India. It has to be done in-person and I have to follow-up in-person.

Even if I did have a job I could out-source to India, I wouldn't want to. To me, that is rather exploitive of a developing nation's people.

Additionally, one of the suggested methods to becoming part of the "new Rich" seems basically to scam people. I think BrainQUICKEN (the author's road to riches) is very much a scam.

Finally, the author seems to dismiss seeking a deeper meaning to life. To me, exploiting people in a developing country, being lazy, and scamming people out of their money is not ethical and certainly not what I would recommend to anyone!

I'm 28 and I've taken a four-month vacation in Guatemala and Honduras, scuba dived in the Galapagos, completed a study tour in Israel, and spent a month conducting research in Ghana. I've traveled extensively on five continents. And yet I found this book infuriating.

If you are a corporate drone in a totally meaningless and worthless job, and you are free of the burden of any morals and ethics, this book is for you! Everyone else, move along.

This book has a lot of positive advice that can be used. As with any other lifestyle books, it's not easy to take on everything the author says verbatim. It is easy, though, to take some of the aspects of this and apply it to life.

This book has a ton of inspiration! It definitely keeps a workaholic like myself, aware of just what I'm spending my work time on. It's help me to realize that some of the work I do can be outsourced. I've implemented that part of the book with satisfactory results.

Sharing his love for travel, I do agree that the traditional two weeks per year is unacceptable for vacation. With all the technology available today, it is possible to have "working gettaways". I've also implemented this part with satisfactory results.

Be mindful that Ferriss does seem to oversimplify a little. For instance, it's not as easy to start a profitable, automatic income generating, online business as he makes it out to be in "Income Autopilot". And getting your foreign virtual assistant to do most everything for you, is also not that easy.

While I don't ascribe to the 9-5 lifestyle, I do love my work. As such, I can't see me dwindling my workweek down to four hours. What this has done for me, and why I do recommend this book, is it has aided me in finding creative ways to get the most out of life, while still putting in all the hours required to run my business.

I hope this review will save someone a few dollars and day of reading. This book was such a waste of time and money. I would suggest you read The World is Flat to learn about outsourcing. It is a much better book on the subject.

Lots of good ideas for those at certain "higher" levels in the corporate setting or self-employed. Still a good read - wish all employers would read it and see how much busy work America does - for others but possibly only a few usable ideas.

Timothy Ferris shows people how to create their dream lives right now, rather than someday when they are "retired." Tim uses outsourcing, geographic arbitrage, and performance/productivity principles to transform his life from 80 hour workweeks to 4 hour workweeks, while making as much per month as he used to make in one year.

The four big ideas to take and use from this book are: eliminate unnecessary and unimportant work from your life; automate anything that can be automated; use technological tools to work anywhere; and outsource work to others who can do the same task better, faster, and cheaper than you.

I like how he applies the 80-20 rule not just to tasks, but to people and customers. Learning how to say "no" to the trivial allows you to say "yes" to the vital.

You can transform services and information into products that automate themselves. If there is basic information that you always tell people, just write it, record it, or video it one time. It's as simple as making a website to pull your niche customers in, rather than making calls all day to push something on your market segment.

Life is good when you earn in dollars and pay in pesos. If your work is related to computers or technology, you can just as easily type on your laptop on a beach as in a desk. I used this technique during a full-time school year to visit over 40 cities.

Outsourcing your work is not about "taking advantage" of poor people. It's allowing each person to do what they do best. If you have a legal problem, do you apply to a law school and spend 4 years to get a license? Or do you just hire a lawyer? If you have to mow a lawn, do you go out and buy a new lawn mower? It's the same principle for most things in life.

Are you treading water or swimming ahead? When you fall of a boat, you have to tread water or else you will drown. But, if all you do is tread water and stay in place, you will eventually drown. You have to swim ahead and move forward to get to your destination.

In life, take three weeks to three months to learn how to tread the water, and then systemize, delegate, or outsource that task so you can focus on swimming ahead. There is no glory, no honor, and no reason to waste your most precious resource--your time--in anything that does not make you grow in life.

Time is the great equalizer. We all have the same amount of time. It is what we do with our time that makes our lives so different. Are you spending your time treading water or swimming ahead?

This book helps me change my life. After read it I always have time for playing games and watching movies, in spite of many homework every week. It help me keep a fresh mind in every statement, and always work with my best.

Hey, I won a martial arts trophy not with skill but through trickery and manipulation of the rules. Am I ashamed of what I did? Not a bit -- in my book, I brag about how clever I was. I figured out how to beat the system and did it without breaking a sweat. All those Wall Street millionaires figured out how to do it too. You can join them and set yourself free! I'll show you how. It's real easy and won't take you more than 4 hours a week.

Since its publication in April 2007 at the height of the financial bubble, more than 80% of the almost 800 reviews have given this book at least 4 stars. It's Nov. 2008 and amazingly this meretricious claptrap is still getting the same ratings. And people wonder how we got into the mess we are in today.

This book has changed my working life. Even though I love running my own business it was taking up a lot of time away from my family. This book helped me to review my work processes and vastly reduce my number of work hours and at the same time increasing my the output I got from those hours.

This has also become a great reference book, when I feel my work hours are creeping up I read certain sections to regain my focus.

I had so much fun reading the book and i thoroughly enjoyed it.It's worth the money.

I like the book and it is worth the money.
But there is a but...

The 4-hour workweek. Would not we all like to have it like that!

I can not read it without getting a feeling that the authors way to his own 4-hour week is making money by living on others dream of a no work and earning money. The book does not come up with any not earlier written subjects but still it is quite entertaining and some real tips to your lifestyle design can be found.

Buy it but it is in no way a bible to the subject but rather a small ignition to your own new lifestyle. It surely more helps the person who may caught up in the squirrel wheel of the business world rather than the CEO which it is flirting with.

It does not reach 4 out of 5 because to me it has a tone of that "serious work" is not cool, which I do not like. 3/5 for this kind of "self development" kind of book is not bad though.



Best Regards
Chris

I'll keep this short. Great book. First half: setting the mindset. Second half: a wealth of practical tips and resources.

This book opens up a whole new range of possibilities.

It's a must buy.

A lot of people criticize this book based on the title and the author's seemingly over the top claims of free money and a life of leisure interrupted by short bursts of activity that just can't be avoided. Some people ask "Who will be working if everyone only worked for four hours week?". It all depends on how you define 'WORK'.

In Ferris's world, 'WORK' is whatever you don't want to do. Maybe what you do for fun is work to someone else and what you think of as work is fun to someone else. Here's a practical example. Last summer, I hired someone to mow my lawn. The guy pulls up with a trailer full of equipment and half an hour later, he's gone and my grass looks great. It cost me $35.00. If I had done that work myself it would have cost me 4 hours of my life that I can never get back. Instead, it cost me $35.00 and I went to lunch and a movie with my wife. I hate yard work, but the guy who mows my lawn, LIKES it and he likes getting paid for it. Conversely, I've spent upwards of 20 hours working on some particularly tricky computer problem and I didn't charge the client a dime, because it was fun and I learned some things that now save me time nearly every day. It was fun for me, but some people would consider it work. In Tim Ferris's world, neither of us is really working.

He says in the book "Eliminate before you delegate". It's about eliminating as much unnecessary BS as you can then delegating the rest, so you only have to address the things that truly cannot be avoided. Why is that bad?

I like the book a lot. I had already done some of the stuff he describes. I almost never answer the phone and I use e-mail for all business related communication, because it's faster and I can use the e-mail as a record of the week's events. I've also raised my rates to get rid of some whiny cheapskates who were sucking up all of my time and making me miserable. Now, I do less work, but make the same amount of money. Why is that bad?

Ferris carries it to an extreme that I wouldn't have considered until I had read the book. I'm not saying everything here is practical or even desirable, but it does have some good tips on how to manage your time and eliminate unnecessary activity so you have time to do more of what you like.

Depending on how you define work, this book is great otherwise it's just hype. It's all about mind set.

This was a quick and easy read for a novice. The antecdotes were funny and I admired the author's tenacity. I think his point was that it is important to enjoy the ride and try to get rich doing it. Find something that you love and market the hell out of it on infomercials and internet retailers. I mean I guess it worked for him. I took his words as a little inspiration not a mathematical formula for happiness and success.

i really enjoyed this book. It's a stimulant to get your bum and give your idea a crack.

Can we all have it all? I just don't know... this guy's story is amazing. The tips are priceless... I don't see my work week trimming down to 4 hours though, any time soon... Still, I loved his humor, his style of writing (which is witty and inspiring), and his lust for living.

I was recently looking over my Amazon reviews and realised that the only time I bother writing a review is when I really love or really hate a book. This one falls into the "really love" category.

Although I am a business owner, I really do love what I do, so working four hours a week isn't really my goal. Giving myself the option of buggering off to Fiji or Buenos Aires or Vietnam and being able to run my business by remote control for a couple of (or few) weeks, however, really does appeal.

With that in mind, I found a ton of great ideas and insights in this book, and overlaying those insights and ideas onto my own goals and ethics, I have accomplished a lot.

I wouldn't have heard of Elance if it weren't for this book, and have now outsourced about 90 jobs to people who have done them better than I could have and let me spend my time doing the stuff I do best. In the book, much is made of how cheap many Elance suppliers are ($2 an hour an up), but I never had the stomach for hiring someone at starvation wages, so hire at higher rates.

I wouldn't have heard of many productivity tools - at least not some of the better ways to us them - like LogMeIn and Skype with SkypeIn and SkypeOut. These have been godsends when I work overseas and on holidays.

Finally, it just shook me out of the "it's my business, so I have to do it all myself" mindset. I've developed a sideline business that pretty much runs itself, have other people doing the non-core parts of my business, and have much sleeker communications options. Travelling is easier. Holidaying is easier.

As for Tim Ferriss, I will say he comes off in this book as something of an uber-selfish egomaniac. I'm pretty okay with that. As I said before, he's got a lot of good ideas and I'm willing to learn from anyone. I (and you) don't have to worship at the mantle of his apparent mindset, and have definitely found room for many of his techniques in my much different lifestyle.

I've given this book as a gift about 15 times, now, and that's the warning I always include with the book. The good news is that everyone I know that has read it has enjoyed the way it expands their vision about the options they have and the resources they have available.

So, with that one small warning in mind, I give it five stars.

A lot of useful information for people looking to escape the old model of making a living. I was able to use of this information in helping myself create a booklet to help parents teach their kids about money How To Raise Kids So They Don't End Up Broke! (Kindle Edition) and it's a great resource for outsourcing your life.

A good friend of mine bought this book for me as a gift. I read it from cover to cover. While on assignment, I remembered a section of the book that I wanted to reference so I bought another. I wasn't looking to work 4 hours a day or live anywhere but as I read the book I realized in-spite of the title, it was very helpful. As an inventor and entrepreneur, I know that some of the knowledge in the book would have cost me a fortune if I hired a consultant. I structured my company's infrastructure using the author's advice. So far, I'm pleased with my results. If you're looking to start an internet based business or sell anything via the internet, this book would be a valuable resource if nothing else a very interesting read. -JW

picked up this book after seeing so much about it in the press.

It's simply tosh.

He offers views on time management, outsourcing, automatic business processes, and travel, that any half-intelligent individual knows already...unless like Ferris you exhibit misanthropic tendencies, e.g. live on a low-information diet, never read a newspaper, only take emergency phone calls, avoid e-mail, divert customers to call centres and don't socialise or belong to any community.

If you want to run an online vitamin supplements business this book may hold some value. Otherwise, use your time more effectively, and save yourself some money. Take it from me.

The one star is only for including Thoreau's seminal work Walden, or, Life in the Woods (Dover Thrift) on the reading list.

Now that is a book worth reading.

Tim Ferriss is one over-achiever. Check out the list of what he has done in the first chapter. Amazing! For us mere mortals, he still offers great advice for changing your life.
Some top quotes and ideas from the book:

- Lifestyle Design. You don't have to live the high stress, long hours life. You can assess the lifestyle you want and then design it. You don't have to work all your life to sit on a beach at 65...you can go sit on one now for very little money.

- Outsource as much as possible. Weigh up how much time you spend on things. Automate them. Outsource them. Pay other people to do them if it gives you more time. Spend $30 on a cleaner once a week and spend a few hours with the family. Get someone from http://www.elance.com to write your articles for you. Virtual assistants are the way forward. [I have used several since reading this book and they are brilliant]

- Be, do , have. Decide what you want in your life. Who do you want to be? What do you want to do? What do you want to have? and then get on with achieving it. Life is too short to be stuck in the office. Set extreme goals that are worth achieving. Question everything.
What are you passionate and excited about? Go do that.

- Elimination. Have a "not to do" list and make sure you don't do it. Don't watch TV. Cut down your email to once a day (and then once a week). Don't waste time being busy. Be productive in less time and spend the difference achieving your splendid goals.

- Find your muse. Discover a way to make money by virtual and outsourced means and free up your time to do what you love. This may take time to achieve, but you can make a plan and achieve it, so you can live a freer life.

- Empower people to make decisions without you. So you can have free time.

- If you don't set the rules, they will be set for you.

- Living more is the objective.

- Know what you will do with this abundance of time. Look at your passions and missions. Move from a life of survival to one of passion and excitement.

- Experiences override possessions every time. Live life, don't postpone it.

I found this book inspirational and it is JAM-PACKED with information and links to great sites!

I love love this book and it has changed my life. If you love this book and this review is helpful, click yes so we can get a good review on the 1st page.

Sounds to me like some reviewers expect too much out of the book. It's not magic. Tim shows how he works a 4 hour work week and the steps that you can take to follow his lead and do the same thing. He also references all the books that led him to where he is so that you can read them also and get a better understanding of the concepts. He puts the whole process together and shows us how he did it. He tells you the whole process of actually how to do it. There are plenty of websites out there created by readers of this book whose lives have been changed just by reading this book. It really gets you thinking. If you are not an entrepreneur then ya it's not a good book for you because you do need to have your own ideas. It's very inspirational.

The people that are giving the book bad reviews are just not the entrepreneur type and thats OK. You can tell because of their comments like "it's not realistic". It's very realistic and there are plenty of websites and blogs full of people, right now, making it happen in their life right now and talking freely about it.

Don't buy this book if you don't want to take the time to come up with some of your own ideas about the type of business you would have.
Don't buy the book if you don't believe that is is possible to make more money and work less hours.


This book was the spark I needed to get the flame going!

Well written book. The information is presented in an easy to follow format with tangible examples. A must read for those in, or falling into, the 45,50,60 hour work week.

Ask yourself if it is necessary to work forty hours; ask yourself if you should work your whole life to provide for a few lean, relaxing years at the end of it. Timothy Ferriss comes back with some surprising answers in "The 4-Hour Workweek". Take mini-retirements throughout your career, 10% of your customers will create 90% of your headaches, so get rid of them! Outsource everything and follow your passions around the globe. He has done it, and in a way that works for Tim Ferriss, and he tells you exactly how he did it. Sure, Mr. Ferriss is young and brash, a 30-year-old with all the answers, and judging by some of the venom in the 1-star reviews, he rubbed a few people the wrong way. But that's fine, if you disagree with Ferriss just continue your forty hours chained to a desk, and those who grasp what Ferriss is telling them will be scuba diving in Tahiti while web sites fill their bank accounts. The beauty of modern technology is that it is smart and barely needs us, and can work basically unsupervised. By synthesizing a way to exploit computers and globalization Timothy Ferriss is a part of the future, and the stalwarts from the past are not going to like it. If you read Thomas Friedman "The World is Flat", or his new "Hot, Flat, and Crowded" you might begin to see Ferriss as a part of the solution. Tim Ferriss' carbon footprint is probably quite minimal as he uses existing infrastructure to produce his products rather than building factories and warehousing. Now he is living on a beach somewhere in the tropics using no electricity, "off the grid" and being lambasted for it by people living in 5000-square-foot McMansions. To directly answer some of the outsourcing criticisms: outsourcing your labor to where it is cheaper, "Chindia" as Friedman calls it, is not exporting slave labor. The reason GM sold more cars in China last year than it did in the US is because of the sweatshops that pay $2-an-hour. That may sound bad, but it's more than double the amount the same young lady could make breaking her back in the fields. Now she can take that money and get an education, feed her family, or join the middle class and buy a GM product. The new middle class of Chindia is the salvation of American manufacturing. There is no way a book like this could rate 1-star as it challenges all of the assumptions that make up your life, the use of your time, working to retirement, and retirement itself, a very important subject for millions of Baby Boomers. Sometimes it hurts to question all of those rules that you have lived your life by, but it is healthy to do so. So read the book, take a couple of its points on board, or dive in and join Ferriss in some exotic locale rapelling down cliffs while the automated market works for you: and remember all of those current free market experts, the 80-hour-week guys who have been operating without oversight for so long are the same guys who just crashed our economy into a brick wall at 100mph. The 80-hour-week guys got it all wrong, maybe "The 4-Hour Workweek" guy has some better ideas.

What an interesting book. I have to say that I bought this as I was intrigued by the title and the strong claim as I am sure most people must be - A triumph of copywriting for a start!

I also have to say I have got my money's worth from it already - some of the references in the book reminded me to take some actions on outsourcing that I when actioned made me significant savings in time and money.

And frankly some of these lessons or reminders in my case were the best bits about the book for me. I wish I had read this many years ago when I was single and "footloose and fancy free", unlike now with kids in school and a number of demanding businesses that root me to the spot.

The reminders worked to re-kindle some of my needs to re-focus certain areas of my life and time plus to try and push out time wasters and distractions.

The rest of the book was fun to read but will not help me until maybe later in life now when I can once again roam the world to my heart's content and setup businesses to enable that to happen on automatic pilot - as the heart of the book suggests is the way to go!

I have been lucky to do many of the things suggested in the book like travel and live many of my dreams already but for most of us this book points to some extraordinary things we could if we just asked "why not" and got on with living our dreams rather than holding back. If you are in a dead end job and have nothing to lose then why hold back and look at ways to live your dreams?

If I my kids were in their 20's I would hand them this and tell them to get on with it - start a business that is totally focused on delivering what you need financially without preventing you doing what you want, when you want and where you want...a great way to fund round the world travel and to drop out of the stereotypical view of life after university!

That could lead to a life lived like that forever or maybe just a spell of total freedom financed by the right type of business. Frankly some of these ideas are discussed in my own books "So you want to be an entrepreneur" i.e. "create a business that works for you and not the other way around"

On the flip side, for many of us in middle age this is less likely to be the tonic we hope for as we have the need for stability and a routine we have to stick too - think school holidays!

However, it still makes for great reading and real world advice on how to achieve the lifestyle - the only thing it can't really help you with is creating a business to finance the idea. But hey if the book lights your fire for travel and freedom you will work something out.

In summary, it's a fun book with real insights and it covers ground for those wanting to become "time rich" now rather than waiting until they retire to achieve all their goals in life while having the time do them.

Hi, I want this book to be selled in Spanish in Amazon.com
Timothy Ferris was some days ago in Madrid launching the book in its spanish version. Can we get some of those book in Amazon.com?

A true 4 hour work week is probably a myth for most people, but this book will definitely help you cut down on the wasteful activity that chews up your time through out the day. I have to agree being a remote worker myself that if you can work that arrangement, you can be just as productive from anywhere with cell coverage and a broadband connection in half the time of an office arrangement. This of course affords you more personal time to do the fun stuff in life. The discussion around setting up muse seems pretty good and Tim offers a ton of information and references on how to do it. Will definitely try it and see how it goes.

This book covers one of the most important things in life that everyone should do before they die. Change their mindset. We grow up "programmed" to believe that there are a set of rules that we must live by to be happy. Tim does a good job redefining the path to being happy. I have read numerous of other "how to succeed" and business books and can tell you that Tim has done his homework. There is a lot of information in here, so I'd recommend going through the book a couple of times.

I've read a couple of other books about making money, but they all fell short for me in one way or the other. This book I love! It's has all the information you could want - phone numbers, websites, step by step instructions on getting yourself whittled down to that 4 HOUR WORKWEEK and making some cash in the process- PLUS it's witty and well written. If I could just find my NICHE...!

I would go so far as to call this book subversive. That's pretty much the best word for it. If, like me, you've grown up being told about the benefits of hard work, 8 till 8 days, 6 days a week, just one holiday a year, and just pay a shedload of taxes like everyone else to support cretins in government, then this book comes as a revelation. For years now I've suspected that this treadmill was a lie (and I'm pretty successful too) generated by adevertisers who want us to consume and governments who want a share of the sweat off our brow, then along comes this young guy and tells it like it really is.

I can see why some people will detest this book, but to appreciate what Ferriss is saying, you really have to think that the western treadmill might oil the wheels of the economy, but all it does to the individual is grinding down the individual with years of crushing effort.

Read this book, and have a life not just a career.

"The 4-Hour Workweek" offers interesting ideas and new perspectives, however they will not be practical for most readers. The book is worth reading anyway for the thought provoking perspective on your job and lifestyle; and ways you can change them.

Timothy Ferriss urges we abandoned the "deferred-life", 9 to 5 employee lifestyle we now live and join the "New Rich". He defines "New Rich" as those who are free to travel as they please, work from were they want when they want and live a luxury lifestyle.

"The 4-Hour Workweek" has a system called "DEAL" to help us achieve that lifestyle. That is an acronym for Definition, Elimination, Automation and Liberation. These topics go on to form the four main sections of the book.

Ferriss is very enthusiastic about the ideas he presents. However his plan is mostly relevant to aggressive business savvy young singles like him. There are a few mentions of one family, but there was no real information about how to address the challenges that families would face. This gives the books a very self-centered and self-indulgent feel.

Never the less the discussion of the role of work in a persons life is important. Many people work for works sake, without ever considering what they would rather be doing and how to achieve it. He does address many of the fears that would hold you back from making that kind of change.

"The 4-Hour Workweek" includes extensive discussion of starting the kind of business that would be suited to the this "New Rich" lifestyle. This is also limited by a very narrow range. The only kinds of businesses discussed involve web advertising, outsource manufacturing and contract fulfillment. Clearly this can work for many people, but is the really the only way, or is it just the only thing the author has done?

There is a lot to be gained by thinking about the subjects raised in "The 4-Hour Workweek", and the Ferriss's recommendations will be useful to some readers. However the plan is only suitable to a small subset of people. The book is strongly based on the authors experience. It be honorable that he is only recommending things that he has done himself, but it limits the value of the book to people in his demographic. The occasionally preachy tone is a only a mild annoyance.

I started reading this book last October and was inspired by the mini-retirement aspect. Ironically, I was let go from my job during the time I was reading this. I discussed taking a mini retirement with my husband and convinced him we could go away for the summer and he could work while we were on the go.
We actually did it! My husband and I took our three kids (ages 8, 5, and turning one) to France for a month. We stayed in Nice, Normandy, Bordeaux, Orleans, and Paris. My husband was able to continue working, although somewhat reduced hours with Skype and the internet. We met others on our travels doing similar things. Although the euro/$ was 1.65/1 we managed okay.
Next summer we are going to South America, maybe Mexico. We learned from our first trip what works and what does not, especially with the kids.

I enjoyed this book very much. The first portion of the book has many helpful hints regarding managing one's life and work. Tim Ferris has a unique outlook on how one should arrange their life and, I suspect, that most of us can benefit, in some way, from his example.

The last portion of this book will be of particular interest to those who wish to make their money from selling a great product online. If your personal "get rich quick" plan focuses on real estate, stocks, or "brick and mortar" businesses, then this portion of his book may be of little use to you.

Overall, this book is a great buy and well worth your time!

Here's the story in a nutshell....find/develope/market a product that sells. Now have other people do all your work for you so you can travel the world. What a piece of crap.

I LOVE YOU TIM FERRIS. Thank you for being so ON HIT! You can have a date with me any time...

Who ever thought a book on organizing your lifestyle could be so damn sexy?

Hilarious, inspirational, easy to read, non-stop revelations and hard-core usable data and resources. This is the ultimate entrepreneurial textbook.

Great book! Many very practical advises on how to improve your performance and improve your life. I can recomend it to all office employees and entrapreneurs who want to improve their lives.

I've been teaching my students for years and years about the issues that Mr. Ferris explained in his book and I'm glad that I wasn't alone! The entire system of education in America (and in most countries for that matter), which is known as Prussian System, implies that the only option we have is to slave full time for somebody else for forty years and quietly die after that in poverty! That's how we are supposed to spend our lives! That it's perfectly normal to identify ourselves with how we make a living. It's unquestionable that it has to be a full time job to make money to survive in this world. It's normal to answer the question "What do you do?" with the explanation about where you spend most of your life trying to make money to survive. Isn't it humiliating! Is that what God planned for us? We stopped questioning it long time ago. Generations wasted their lives working. Just working! Do we even realize how huge it is? When a person can actually enjoy life, spend time helping others, learning something new, spending time with the family, actually doing what he or she enjoys, we somehow settled for forty years of hard work not even in order to achieve something in life, but just to survive, just not to starve to death! We can't even afford to stop working for a couple of month, because we are going to run out of money and become as poor as we are planning on being when we are retired.
The same thing with delegation. We don't know how to do it. We must make sure that we are busy 100% of the time and we can not delegate anything to anybody! If we get some free time it only means that we are lazy and we need to cure the situation by filling free time with more work!
The most ridiculous case of inability to delegate is our national crazy idea (I'm from Russia) that if you grow potatoes yourself - it's free! I still remember how pretty much everybody goes to plant potatoes in the spring. No matter how well off you are, you must do it yourself, because if you do it yourself - it's free! Can you believe it!
Anyway, this book is going to be called at least "controversial" or most likely will get one of those slap-on "get rich quick" or "it will never work" labels.
Our society is not ready for this.
But for a small business owner today it's one of the most comprehensive guides on today's business and a must-have.

While reading the 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferriss I kept asking myself: what world does this guy live in?

Then deja vu hit.

I've seen this world and actually lived in it for a few years. It was called a "bubble" and the year was 1999. Everyone was at the center of their own world of self-aggrandization chasing down pre-IPO stock, throwing lavish parties with chocolate fountains, and creating money losing companies at breakneck speed.

It's as if Ferriss had time traveled from 1999 or is some kind of fossil a book publisher dug up trying to cash-in on a perceived market for a 2.0 generation of greed seekers.

Yes, this book is that bad.

It seems like I'm a minority voice, as the average Amazon review is 4 out of 5 stars... if interested you can read entire review here:
[...]

Tim Ferris is part entrepreneur part action hero, all energy. I picked up the book having little in common with him other than a bald head and a desire to get control of my life and create time to do the things I've always dreamed of. I first picked up this book more than a year ago and have reread several parts of it since. Mr. Ferrris outlines both a plan and a philosophy which are mind opening to the average person. I ave adapted several of his tactics and a few of his philosophies in my own life and have found myself to be more efficient and productive in both my work and personal life. I have not yet gotten to a four hour week and don't expect I ever will but I've always felt that if you read a book like this and find one or two things to adapt into your own life you have made a great investment in both money and time.

This book has helped me to organize my life in such a way that I have completed two novels (not yet published) found time to help coach my son's soccer team and improved my relationship with my wife. These are priceless life improvements which may not have given me a nicely compartmentalized four hour work week, but have gien me a life balance that has changed my lfe.

The 4-Hour Work Week:
Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
By Timothy Ferriss

Twenty-years ago a young psychologist named Marsha Sinetar helped jumpstart a revolutionary approach to work. With the publication of her best-selling book "Do What You Love, The Money will Follow," Sinetar liberated millions from the idea that working was necessary only to make a living so you could do what you loved.

Since that time, the ideas of discovering your right livelihood, balancing work and life and becoming rich enough to afford retirement have spawned thousands of self-help books. Among these are numerous sterile accounts of how to become a millionaire before you are 30.

Now, a 29-year old suggests what may become the next step in the work revolution. In his book, The 4-Hour Work Week: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich, Timothy Ferriss relays to us in his high speed text that change is long-overdue. Instead of the slave/save/retire mentality of most overworked employees today, there are new opportunities for workers that have never existed before.

But The 4-Hour Workweek is not another book on the work-life balance describing the problems we all face. It is about creating solutions by changing not just your workstyle, but your lifestyle. The new currencies, he says, are time and mobility. These should be used in the here and now to create a luxury lifestyle. The author assures us it is not difficult. It simply takes the courage to make a few uncommon decisions and follow them with equally uncommon actions.

There is already a fast-growing subculture who has abandoned the "deferred-life" plan and are now distributing retirement throughout life instead of saving it for the end, Ferriss says. He titles this group the New Rich (NR) and states their main goal is to escape the rat race entirely, not win it. The NR believe that traditional one office locations and 9 to 5 workdays are obsolete. Money alone rarely ever solves problems or gives enjoyment.

The desire for more money, the author argues, is often laziness. "If only I had more money is the easiest way to postpone the intense self-examination and decision-making necessary to create a life of enjoyment--now and not later," he says. "Busy yourself with the routine of the money wheel, pretend it's the fix-all, and you artfully create a constant distraction that prevents you from seeing just how pointless it is."

Ferriss is no poverty guru however. A few years ago, he was a poster boy for the extremely overworked and underpaid cubicle dweller. Using the insights he developed for this book, he went from $40,000 a year and 80 hours a week to $40,000 per month and four hours per week. In part because of his extensive world travel, he now speaks six languages. He is a national champion in Chinese kickboxing, an actor on a hit television series in Hong Kong and holds a world record in tango.

The author offers four steps and strategies to reinvent yourself, whether as an entrepreneur or in your current job. The first letters of each step form the acronym of "DEAL" The manifesto of the "dealmaker" is simple: Reality is negotiable. Outside of science and law, all rules can be bent or broken. Here's the four steps for reinventing yourself:

* Definition: Define what you want to be doing.
* Elimination: Ask yourself three times a day "am I being productive, or am I being busy?" Eliminate interruptions. Stop checking e-mail more than once a day.
* Automation: Delegate or automate the remaining tasks, even sending personal tasks overseas. If you're a writer, outsource your research the night before to a virtual assistant in India. Have it ready the next morning. Cost: $4. Per hour.
* Liberation: Enjoy your mobility and use the time you create. Surround yourself with positive people who have nothing to do with your work.

This is a book about challenging assumptions. For example, the New Rich credo is not to strive to buy all the things you want, but to do all the things you want to do. The NR goal is not to have more, but to have more quality and less clutter and of course, the time to do what matters.

Can you have it all--by working 4 hours a week? Tim Ferriss's belief-blasting, fast-paced, book makes you want to believe it. It's an exciting, mind-expanding declaration about how our lives don't have to be all about work. If Ferriss' book is the ticket to the workplace of the future, you definitely want to get on board.

Finally completing a journey began a couple of months ago, I finished The 4-Hour Workweek while travelling this week. This is a must-read, but not because the book is so spectacular. Rather because the book offers many insightful business and entrepreneurial tactics that will help anyone improve their personal lifestyle, small, or even large business they are a part of or run completely. I did not find the book was written directly for me, or for everyone, although that seems to be Ferriss' intention.

I am very impressed with Ferriss' experience within the business world thus far in his career. It is not that he has extensive knowledge on mergers and acquisitions or on large-scale management. But he does have a broad amount of tips for organizing a small operation or a young employee's lifestyle. Ferriss is an organizer and type-A personality and thus this broad array of tips are also well organized throughout the book. But in my opinion, a full read is necessary to get the solid ideas on how to improve your life and work.

Having taken High-Tech Entrepreneurship from Professor Ed Zschau in my final year of Princeton, and probably just a year or two after Ferriss, I do understand his inspiration for many of his life and work decisions since then. Professor Zschau's class changed my life. First, he opened my eyes to first the world of business in general. Princeton offers very few real-life business courses and this one gave me the opportunity see how interesting business decisions can be by working through HBR case-studies and his past experiences. Beyond that, he inspires his students to not only take these decision making skills into the workforce, but also to create a workforce on our own through entrepreneurial ventures within this high-tech world. He preaches thinking outside the box and taking action on those thoughts and he is a real life example of his words. Ferriss and his book is not the first of Professor Zschau's students to succeed in ventures and lifestyle inspired by his teachings, but he may now me the most influential with this widely popular book.

Within the book, Ferriss pushes many buttons of mine that individually are too many to debate. In general, however, I feel he unsuccessfully tried to combine two books into one. First, he wrote a book about efficiently starting up a new business venture and organizing and optimizing the effort the entrepreneur must put into this new business. This half of the book I found extremely useful, although not perfect. Secondly, he wrote a book about travel and lifestyle for these entrepreneurs. I feel he incorrectly assumes that everyone has these same desires as he implies. While he does begin by suggesting the lifestyle can be whatever your dreams may be, in the end he uses far too many of his personal choices for this lifestyle to be as broad reaching as he intends. I think he spends too much time discussing the strategy for quitting your current job. He even dabbles into the "meaning of life", a topic I feel is a bit ridiculous for this type of book. This other half of the book offers some great travel tips and ideas for expanding the culture of your life, but in my opinion fails to offer broad reaching lessons that one can take away for improving one's life. Thus the combining of these two sections makes for an awkward all-encompassing book.

The good part about this book is that is really can help almost everyone...at least everyone under the age of 50. I doubt there are many who would read this book and not be able to take away at least a few pointers. Unfortunately, I think he understands this mass-market potential and dumbed down the book a bit to appeal to a broader range of readers. He succeeded in that regard and will surely get paid for it, but it also prevented him from creating a solid masterpiece of entrepreneurial and literary work.

This book is full of quirky but practical ideas, I love the style of writing and even if you don't get to put all the ideas into action reading it is a therapy in itself!

There are a lot of books that make big promises. This is one of them that actually fulfills its promise. It's a perfect mix of conceptual theory and specific "how to" exercises that align with your existing skill set and challenge you to the next level. What I liked best is that it's not a get rich-quick scheme. It's a get rich "smart" scheme. There is some real work to be done, but Timothy Ferriss lays it out in simple, logical steps that provide all manner of rewards. The principles in this book have inspired me to review my life/career direction and take the necessary steps to redesign my life the way I want it. It's early days, but I'm already seeing the benefits: more time, more focus, more mojo. Read it!

Tim's writing style is encouraging and informative; the book deserves to be read just to show others how to communicate! Whether or not you fully agree with the tools or concepts, read the entire book and do a little self-examination as you go. Can you stand to gain a few hours of loving family time each week and maybe lose a few pointless worries along the way? I really got a slap in the face realizing how much my loved ones lost out to boring e-mails and mind-numbing work for work's sake. Find your focus with THE 7 HABITS OF HIGHLY EFFECTIVE PEOPLE : POWERFUL LESSONS IN PERSONAL CHANGE and your niche in the vocational eco-system with What Color Is Your Parachute? 2009: A Practical Manual for Job-Hunters and Career-Changers (What Color Is Your Parachute?). Then read "The 4-hour work week" when you're ready to go beyond shallow and really live a productive life.

What I loved most about Tim's book, 4 hour Workweek are the practical applications of his relatively extreme viewpoints on living and retiring at the same time. While to many this may seem ludicrous, I felt that he really broke it down into something I could sink my teeth in. It really has changed the way I look at building my business and how I intend to integrate joy and experiences into my daily life.

His resource section was fabulous. I have used several of his ideas and sources beginning with outsourcing via elance, with great results.

This book is not just fluff or inspiration. It truly is a practical guide for what to do, how to do it and even who to do it with.

Thanks Tim!
Ann

There is good stuff in Timothy Ferriss's anti-job self-help book The 4-Hour Workweek. Unfortunately, it's drowned out by the piles of bad and useless advice that pervade much of the book. But let's start with the good. The first two sections of T4HWW make some very valid points. Ferriss argues that, for most, the ideal life is much cheaper than it might seem. He rails against the "deferred life plan"--working a decade (or three) doing something you don't like to save money for retirement, where you'll (supposedly) do what you've always wanted. Ferriss gives some good time-management advice as well. I liked his emphasis on thinking about what you are doing and dropping the things that aren't important. That may sound obvious, but many people confuse busyness with productivity. I liked Ferriss's "comfort challenges," which are designed to get readers accustomed to facing their fears. Ferriss gives some good advice on quitting a bad job, and he might inspire some to do just that.

Now for the bad. Unfortunately, there's a lot of bad. Ferriss projects an overconfidence and arrogance that is sometimes-patronizing and often-irritating (I don't need to be told that a chapter will "put [me] on the real breakfast of champions"). Many of his claims are far-fetched. For example, he confidently states that, by reading his chapter on time management, you will experience "an increase in personal productivity between 100 and 500%." Blech.

It's glaringly obvious that Ferriss is a style-over-substance kind of guy. He begins T4HWW with a litany of his accomplishments: he's been a "no-holds-barred cage fighter," a "Princeton University guest lecturer," a "Glycemic Index researcher," an "MTV break-dancer," a "political asylum activist," a "TV host in Thailand," and so on. The legitimacy of these credentials is unclear, and, perhaps tellingly, Ferriss later gives readers advice on how to embellish their own resumes. It's clear that looking good on paper is very important to Ferriss. Did he write this book to help readers, or merely to add another bullet point to his resume?

If Ferriss's advice were good, that question might not matter (much). But most of it isn't. The second part of T4HWW--the most-practical, most-specific part--is at its core a get-rich-quick scheme. Ferriss advises readers to design a product--whatever crap is likely to make money, it seems--and then to have third parties handle the manufacturing, order fulfillment, and customer service. The idea is to sit back, do (almost) nothing, and watch the checks come in.

Ferriss's cynicism is alarming. He doesn't seem to acknowledge the possibility of making money in a fun and meaningful way, and he certainly doesn't give advice in that vein. The guiding principle of T4HWW is to do what it takes to make as much money as possible with as little effort as possible. Ferriss's own business is a shining example of this philosophy: he sells a sports supplement ("the world's first neural accelerator"!) on a website replete with testimonials, "110% guarantees," and other infomercial-esque gimmicks. I'll let you decide how much value you think his business is adding.

So Ferriss is cynical, but does his approach work? I would guess that, for most people, the answer is no. Many of Ferriss's business ideas exploit easily-duplicable arbitrage opportunities. In chapter 9, Ferriss describes his friend Doug, who resells sound effects libraries on the internet. Well, "resells" is too strong a word: Doug merely forwards orders to the manufacturers, who then ship directly to his customers. In another example, Ferriss describes a man who ships shirts from France to the U.S., where he sells them at a (large) profit.

Is it possible to make a lot of money with such an approach? Yes. Is it likely? I doubt it. If you're as wily as Ferriss, you might find something that works--but, then again, you could probably also find success in a more-legitimate (and probably more-enjoyable) pursuit.

While I did like Ferriss's thoughts on handling a bad job, his advice on working remotely is not applicable to the many--if not most--who don't sit in front of a computer all day. And even if you're a computer jockey, I doubt his approach is all it's cracked up to be. In a hypothetical example, Ferriss describes a man who works remotely (on his computer) while in Munich during Oktoberfest. The thing is, Ferriss suggests being substantially more productive outside the office to show your boss that working remotely makes good business sense. Trying to be extra-productive during Oktoberfest is not my idea of a good time.

I could go on, but I won't. Though I did like parts of T4HWW, there's a lot to dislike about Ferriss's book. It would have been better without the 100-page get-rich-quick scheme. (And had Ferriss toned things down a bit, but let's not get greedy.) Nonetheless, there is good content, and the good parts might have a meaningful impact on the right reader. I don't recommend this book, but you could certainly do worse.

Worthwhile read. He's figured out a great system for being really effective in small amounts of time. A lot of his tips for eliminating wastes of time have worked well for me.
On the flip side, the author is a little bit of an egoist a-hole with a value system where he thinks mostly of himself. He puts you on confidence-building exercises such as staring down people when you walk by them and going up to attractive women and getting their digits, just to see that you can. So lot of good tips to be learned from the book, but take the rest with a grain of salt.

How's that for a title that grabs your attention? At times, the ideas championed in this book seemed terribly impractical and even ludicrous. At times, I found myself imagining a life of mini-retirements, vacationing in Europe, learning to play the Flamenco guitar, all while my $50 product is selling like hotcakes online. I'm just not sure how comfortable I am about hiring a personal assistant that lives in India and letting my employee make any decision that doesn't involve at least $500 without consulting me first. The book does have its share of valid points, if you're willing to "think outside the box", and I would agree that any automation of my current order processing would benefit me tremendously. It might take a few readings of this one before I am converted, but I have resolved to stop checking my email Inbox several hundred times a day. BTW, Ferris' life story/autobiography is worth reading on its own. Is he the guy who wrote the college application essay about making minute rice in fifteen seconds that got him into Princeton?

Kristian Strom