You don’t need a job.
You don’t need your cell phone.
You don’t need to be happy.

You don’t even need to breathe.

- Unless of course you want to live, then I’d recommend breathing as one of the most important things to do!

You choose to breathe because it is a requirement for living and most people want to live.  It’s an extreme example, but how many things do you assume you “need” to do?

You don’t need to, you choose to do it because it seems to be the preferred option.  You choose to breathe because you think it’s better than asphyxiation.

But what if we could survive without breathing?  Far too often we make false assumptions that lead us to believe we “need” something, because we are only aware of limited alternatives…

Imagine youre in a restaurant, with only two things on the menu:

Crude Oil Soup …………………..£4.99
Chernobyl Cement Pie ………..£4.99

Neither sound particluarly appealing, unless you have very strange tastes (or you’re French).  So which do you choose?

How about “none of the above”?  You could leave and go to another resteraunt, order a takeaway, cook for yourself or just go hungry.  When you are aware of other options something else may seem more appealing and you’ll make another choice.

How often do we do this, and only see the obvious choices?

We assume that we “need” a job, because the alternative is poverty, probable homelessness and starvation.  These are not appealing alternatives.  But what if there were other options?

The Problem with Working for a Living

In order to keep our hearts beating we must meet the cost of living.  Every day you must spend a certain amount of money on necessities such as water, food and shelter.  Unless you have an income, or a reserve of money to draw upon, you will fail to meet these costs and struggle to survive.

But the majority don’t want to simply “survive”, we want to “live” and appreciate existence.  We want more than to just keep breathing, we want to enjoy it!

Think about what you spend your money on, how much of it is truly essential?  Have you noticed that whenever you get a pay rise, you move to a nicer home or find a hobby to reward yourself?

We live as comfortably as we can on the income we have, which is why JOB is said to stand for “Just Over Broke”.  We burden ourselves with extra costs for the comforts we choose to enjoy.

You earn more, you spend more.  We tend to increase our spending in line with our earnings.  This keeps us trapped, relying on our wage to maintain the lifestyle to which we’ve become accustomed.

There is nothing wrong with living an extravagant lifestyle if you can afford to do it.  But most of us spend our time doing things we don’t enjoy to buy things we don’t need.  We forget that the only reason we took the job was to meet the costs of living and end up increasing our costs because of it.

The default method of generating income is to get a job.  This is often the easiest method, but the highest reward does not come from taking the easy option.  The problem is that selling our time usually involves doing things we don’t want to do. Because if it was something we wanted to do, we wouldn’t get paid to do it, we’d have to pay for the privilege.

So What’s The Alternative?

I’m not saying you should quit your job.  I’m not saying that you should try to survive on $10 per day.  But I am saying you should be happy.  Why do something if you don’t enjoy it?

Use your imagination.  How can you generate enough income to meet your costs without doing a job you dislike?

It’s all about assets.  An asset is something that creates income.  Your most valuable asset is your time.  Imagine yourself on your deathbed moments before the end.  The doctor leans over to you and whispers “I have a magic pill, that will grant you one extra hour of life, fully fit and healthy, but it’s expensive…”  How much would you pay?  Everything?  (Why not, you can’t take it with you!)

So why sell your time for a measly $10 an hour?

A few decades ago, only the rich could have assets other than time.  Land, money, titles and businesses were beyond the means of the majority, but time was shared equally.  Those with assets would trade money for others time, and use that time to generate more money, with which they could buy more time.  Soon they had magnificent incomes, and if they were smart, lots of free time.

Now, things are different.  People can start developing assets for themselves.

How about creating something that pays royalties?
How about starting a business doing something you love?
How about reducing your spending, saving excess money and living off the interest?

Here’s an idea.  Let’s imagine you need $10,000 per year to live a comfortable lifestyle.  If you get paid $20,000 per year, that’s twice as much as you need.  How about reducing your working hours?  Doing three days instead of five?  Is the increase in freedom worth the cost in income?

Here’s another idea.  Keep the job, earn $20,000 each year but have the discipline to save $10,000 that you don’t need to spend.  If you can find a decent low risk bank account paying 5% interest and the discipline to keep saving, you’ll be earning over $10,000 per year in interest within 15 years and you’ll never have to work again.  I am suggesting you do this? No! 15 years of scrimping and saving doesn’t sound like fun, but it is a safe option.

Use your imagination and I’m sure you can find a way to meet the costs of living doing something you enjoy.  There are no limits, a lack of options simply means you haven’t explored enough, keep going until you find something you like!

Or maybe all the alternatives still don’t seem as appealing as your job.  Perhaps you like your job, and why not, there is a lot to enjoy about working.  The sense of acheivement, the respect, the social scene, that feeling of security.  In which case, realise you choose to work because you enjoy it most out of the alternatives!

It all comes down to two simple options with anything you don’t like (especially things you feel you “need”):

Either;

Realise why you choose that option and learn to appreciate it.

Or;

Find a better alternative!

What will you chose to do now?