Today on the show, we're going to talk about retirement. I warn you right now, if you're an uptight, obsessive, compulsive planner like I am, today's show is probably going to make you a little bit uncomfortable, which probably means it's a show you should listen to. We're talking today about radical immediate retirement.

My guest was an attorney, middle of his career, kind of the height of his career, and then just decided he was done. Chucked it all and wandered off without a plan, going on walkabout. Welcome to the Radical Personal Finance Podcast. My name is Joshua Sheets. Thank you for being here.

Today is Friday, November 21, 2014. Today I'm bringing you an interview with a man named David Downey. He's from Australia. He just decided to simply quit. Didn't worry too much about the planning or the details, but he just quit. Should be fun. My guest today sent me an email and he says, "I wrote this book called Radical Immediate Retirement.

I like some of the stuff that you talk about. Check it out and enjoy it." So I take his book and I read it, read his book, and I did enjoy it. Basically, the title says it all. It just simply says, "What if we adjusted our mindset and didn't worry too much about all the technical stuff?

We just adjusted our mindset. If in doing so, could we achieve something different?" I've got an interview with him today. He's a really interesting guy. He was an attorney, a high-ranking, high-class attorney living a high-spending lifestyle and just decided, "You know what? This isn't working," and decided to change and worked through the process of making some changes.

Did it fairly quickly. I think the Radical Immediate Retirement is probably a little bit of an overstatement. It wasn't quite immediate, but it was pretty quick. He basically just bailed on his job and in favor of another approach. Since then, he's written children's books. He's contributed to the book, "1,001 Best Beers That You Have to Taste Before You Die." He kind of helps people with publishing projects and he travels.

He does all these interesting projects. So give this show a listen. It was definitely an interesting interview. I think that I always need a little bit of that kind of loose and flexible approach in my life. It helps me to keep balance. Before we get to that, a couple of quick announcements.

I hope you guys enjoyed yesterday's show. It was pretty hardcore and pretty in-depth. I'm skipping the Friday Q&A today just because yesterday's show was so long and I thought that this would be a fun way to go into the interview. But please keep sending me your questions and keep sending me those on the website with the "Leave Me a Voicemail" function that's right on the website and also on your phone via email.

On note, however, if you want, you can just record a nice audio file for me on a phone. Keep it short. Keep it a minute or two long and send me the audio file that you have for me on the phone and I can use that as well. So that would be fine if you don't want to use the app on the website.

That doesn't matter to me. Next week, I've got a great week of shows lined up. Quick reminder for those of you who are subscribed in iTunes, make sure to, if you're not receiving updates on the show, just simply unsubscribe, search for the show and then subscribe. And I'll fix that for you.

Real quick, request for help from you. This is the major input that I wanted to say. I would love you guys' input on show topics and guests. I've gotten several great ideas from many of you. But I want you to know that every time you send me an email, which is joshua@radicalpersonalfinance.com, every time you send me an email, I make a note of that.

And if you have an idea for a show topic or if you have an idea for a guest, what would be most helpful is if you think there's an interesting guest, have the guest respond to me with their story and just have them tell me that it was a listener and request the interview and then that can help me to set it up and save me from having to go and find them.

But that would help the most. But I'm still willing if there's somebody that you think is great and you say, "Hey, check this person out. I'd love to interview them." And I'm very sensitive to the topics that you guys are suggesting. Real quick, how I think about the way that I approach the show.

I just simply do shows about things that I'm interested in or that I think are helpful and are valuable. And I don't really know what other model I would apply to it at least at this time. So when I do a show, it's a topic that I'm interested in.

It's often a book I've read or something I'm interested in talking about. But what I'm learning is now that the audience is growing, I'm learning that there are subjects that are of interest to you, the audience. And there are things I hadn't thought about. I'll give you some examples.

I had never thought about necessarily doing shows on international topics, shows on finance from a Canadian perspective or from a German perspective. But I've had several listeners email me and say, "Hey, could you bring somebody on?" So this week I've been working on a reach out to several Canadian personal finance people that are active in that community and they were based upon your suggestions.

And I think a couple of them are going to be coming on the show. I'm happy to do that about anything. Another one that listeners have asked about is to have more women on the show. Frankly, I never even thought about, I don't think about gender, what gender somebody is.

It doesn't even cross my mind. I just think, am I interested in this person's topic? But I got some comments and people saying, "Hey, could you have some women on the show?" I would love to. So if you have something that you think would be a benefit for the show, if you're a listener, I love to bring listeners on because I despise the idea that we're just going to get experts and I'm going to go and bring in all these experts.

Experts are great, but you know what? Sometimes they're really unrelatable. So I'd be happy to talk with listeners. I like talking with listeners. I think that's really useful content. It keeps the more humble approach to the show that I think is important. I love talking to experts as well.

But if you would like to come on the show, feel free to send me an email. Just share with me a little bit about what you think would be of interest to the show. I take a lot of those emails and many people that I've had on have been because they've reached out to me.

I'm happy to do that. And then if you have somebody that you know has an interesting story, if you see a hole in some of the content that I've been bringing, if you see that I don't have enough Canadians on or I don't have enough women on or something like that, just let me know and suggest somebody for me.

It's the first time I've ever done this as far as designing programming and trying to figure out how do I set this up. So I'm winging it and I'm figuring it out as I go. I don't sit down. My brain doesn't work at saying, "Let me sit down and create a balanced approach to all these things." I do that, I guess, with the financial content.

I jump around to these different areas, estate, insurance, investments. I try to keep that varied. But with regard to maybe things like what country are you from or, "Josh, will you just have all these men on the show?" I don't even think about that stuff. So if there's somebody that you would like to have on the show, let me know and I would be glad to do that.

Because I do want to be sensitive to what you as the audience request. I read all the emails. I have a notebook with all of the topics that you have suggested. Some of them I'm able to do just right off the top of my head. Some of them require a lot of research and they're on there on my research list.

Some of them I just think, "Well, I'll figure out how to do this when I can figure it out." So I just wanted you to know if you would like to see some sort of content covered on the show, you can help. I will ask for your help and I'm listening to you, the audience, as it grows.

So I hope you take me up on that. I appreciate the help. I really do. So here's the interview with David, a really great guy. Enjoy. So David, welcome to the Radical Personal Finance Podcast. I appreciate you being with me. It's a pleasure to be here. I am excited to talk to you because I think the concepts that we are going to talk about, the concepts of your book, are going to provide a really radical departure from how financial advice is usually given.

But I think it's going to really enhance people's perspectives. So let's start with your story. Share with me a little bit about your story and your own personal retirement plan. Okay. Well, I think the main observation on my story is that I didn't really have a retirement plan, which I think is pretty well the same as most other people out there in the workforce.

I was a young, keen student. I guess I followed the same system that a lot of Western young achievers do. I was in a framework that someone else invented. I was told which ladder to climb. I did really well at school, went to university here in Australia, focused on getting the marks, was at university for a long time, got a great job in a big law firm and worked in the law firm for over 10 years, probably 15 years, became partner at a law firm, was finally on the money.

And then I thought, you know what, I don't want to be spending my time this way. I want to radically and immediately stop this, really with no retirement plan. I stopped it. This is probably about a year and a half ago. And I've gone through a period of enormous transformation, I guess, during that time of sort of seeing the light financially.

I've seen what's important and I've developed this sort of collection of concepts which has really helped me mentally, financially, in terms of enjoying my life, which is the goal. And I've just scratched them down in this little collection and I hope it's motivating for people and I guess demonstrates that there can be another way and inspires people in the way I've been inspired by the sort of writers out there who have shared their story.

It's interesting just simply because it seems like we all need a system and we usually just kind of take on the system that our society gives to us and then some people at some point stop and say, "Wait a minute, am I really in favor of this system or not?

Or am I really going to continue following it or not?" And you have a quote in your book. Go ahead. Sorry, you just cut out there. Okay. You're back now. Yeah, we're back now. So, saying like we need a system to follow. You have a quote in your book, two of them really stood out to me and they're in your chapter on freedom.

And the first quote was by Voltaire and the quote is, "Man is free at the moment he wishes to be." And then the second quote was by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and he said, "None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." And to me that kind of sums up the paradox of the Western culture better than anything else that you read is that we all believe we're free but in reality the question is, are we?

Well, that's right. I think we're free really to buy people's products and pay taxes. That seems to be what the system's geared towards. And if you want to spend your time differently, you have to behave differently and I guess turn off your mind to those messages and start thinking for yourself or following other messages which result in you leading a better life.

What were the series of events and what were the influences that led to your deciding to make such a radical change in your lifestyle? Well, I guess I was increasingly unhappy with spending my time in an office and I think a lot of people have observed that humans are happiest, at least a lot of us are happiest, when we're acquiring new skills and doing what we enjoy and exercising control over how we spend our time.

And I was in a highly specialized area that took a long time to become competent in. I was a partner in intellectual property and commercial contracts in a large law firm. But to be honest, I became good at that some time ago. And so I was spending day after day, month after month, year after year effectively solving the same problems.

And by then I was an autopilot and I was just, I guess, going a bit crazy doing the same job over and over. I'm sure dentists and accountants and financial planners suffer the same fate. Absolutely. Situations. And I mean, a lot of us in law firms and in many occupations are quite creative, interested people, and this drudgery just sucks the life out of you over time.

So I knew I wasn't happy doing that. But when you're in that system, and I think like a lot of people, I suffered from a bit of lifestyle creep. You start off as a student and a lot of us are happiest when we're a student, but then we forget that we're happiest when we're a student and we're not sure why.

But we acquire cars and houses or other investments or drinking fancy beers or wines or going out to expensive restaurants and all of a sudden the income that you're on, which seemed like a luxury when you first obtained it, is now a necessity. And a lot of my coworkers, even those who have been on a lot of money for a long time, are still in debt.

And so it seems impossible to live any sort of other life. And you pity people who aren't earning as much cash. But I knew something was missing and I wanted out. In terms of the influences on me, Jacob, who I know you've interviewed from earlier time and extreme, I found him as a lot do and I think probably as a lot do.

I was angry and outraged by his assertions and I saw him as advocating homelessness and I saw him as a perpetual student. And I'd worked so hard for so long to not be a student. And I actually was so angry. I think I left him a two star review on Amazon and an angry rant that all his followers jumped in and attacked me about and I attacked them.

And then he came in and I attacked him not knowing it was him. Then I apologized knowing it was him and said, look, you're even back at work. You know, I've got a good job. You've got a good job. What's the point? You can just say be a student forever.

So that happened. But then I just kept returning to the book, his book, Early Retirement Extreme. I recommend it. I recommend his blog. He's an extremely influential character. I kept returning to it and some of his concepts just really sort of spoke to me about how about the choices that you have and how do you want to spend your time.

And you've spoken at length about what he said, but he was an influence. A second character who was a major influence, although I'm different to each of these people, obviously I've taken my own path and that's written about in the book, was Tim Ferriss. He's a well-known name amongst our community with his four-hour work week.

You know, I think the guy just had insight that was incredible for such a young man. He must have only 25 or 26 when he wrote the book and it's brilliantly written. At the time, it was completely radical and he, I think, Ferriss at the end of the day, he can see trends slightly ahead of the curve.

He can translate it into language that people understand and he's a fabulous motivator. And I found his book motivating. I think my philosophy now is a bit different to his and I guess with Jacob's influence and my own thinking, Ferriss speaks about, it's a great line and it's an observation that you don't want to be a millionaire, you want to live like a millionaire.

And so where if you can use your brain to solve, I guess, your problems and if problems or outcomes you want to say be skiing and living, not going to work every day, you don't necessarily have to use millions of dollars to solve that problem. You can solve that problem using geo-arbitrage, living in different countries, taking advantage of exchange rates.

You can solve that problem by having cash flow rather than wealth. And you can solve the problem by observing that if we are interested in active people, then we're not really going to retire and sit around, are we? We're always going to be doing something. And if you don't need to plan for retirement so much, knowing that you're going to be active and interested, then you don't need the cash.

And that's a pretty powerful observation. Although in my case, I think, and this is where Jacob comes into it, it's not you don't want to be a millionaire, you want to live like a millionaire. I don't want to live like a millionaire with all the fancy stuff. I think Ferriss is a bit of an extrovert rock star.

He says in his book, I live like a rock star. I don't want to live like a rock star. And I don't think you have to live like a rock star. I want to live efficiently. And that's something I think is worth talking about as well. I know there's a word going around in all of the old days, people used to talk about voluntary simplicity.

And there's great books out there that talk about voluntarily living in a simple fashion and being quite frugal. And I guess if you've read a lot of that stuff, frugality sounds fine. But to most people, if you talk about frugality, it sounds like something your grandma's grandpa would get up to.

And it sounds pretty horrible. But one concept I got from Jacob, which I've really run with in my own mind, is that of being efficient rather than frugal. And I think it's a much better word to use. And mentally, who wouldn't want to be efficient? And I think of someone walking past a beer tap running out onto the ground.

I mean, it's not an outcome anyone would want. And I think all of us would run over with the greatest urgency and turn that beer tap off. Right. And I think a lot of people's lives are like that running beer tap, just wasting money. They're driving a car that uses 10 times the petrol of a normal car.

And it's crazy. And when you look at it that way, in terms of waste and inefficiency, and you'd much prefer to be a well-oiled machine, you'd much prefer to be the beer tap that just turns on when someone wants a beer, then that empowers you, I think, to live a different lifestyle and one that doesn't involve waste.

And that's an extremely powerful concept, because the less wasteful you are, the more efficient you are, then the less of this stuff we call money you need to live your life. And if the goal is to live the life of being free, doing what you want to do, then one way to get there is not to have millions and live like a rock star, but to live efficiently and just have as much cash as you need to live the way you want to live.

Yeah. I think your story about being angry at Jacob is a valuable story, because I think many people have the same perspective, especially when they read him. I mean, he's rather extreme in the way that we say it, in comparison to our modern culture. But when you get down to it, you find that the concepts that he shares really just make sense.

And you say, "Wait, why do I do that?" And I think we get a little frustrated, because, at least for me, when I read his book, I felt like I had been bamboozled prior to that. I felt like I had been following somebody else's plan of, instead of thinking rationally and making my own plan, I felt like I had just wasted time following somebody else's plan.

And frankly, I think I did. But yet, it's unusual that it would be a remarkable demonstration of character to be able to recognize that you've wasted days, months, weeks, years of your life, tens, hundreds, thousands, hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions of dollars on something that ultimately wasn't serving you well.

That's a very difficult emotional transition to make. Well, I must admit, it took me years to get the courage to walk away from the system, because I was a very good player in the system. And it turns out that, for me, I was climbing the wrong ladder or participating in the wrong game.

And going back to Ferris's insight, I think a lot of his insight and his book outraged a lot of people at the time as well, I think, at least the older people, came from the fact that he had lived in Japan. And he lived in other countries. And there's no better way to obtain perspective.

And Jacob, no doubt, has done this as well, about your own culture than living in others. And Ferris says reality is negotiable. And he sees life as a series of culturally reinforced rules that aren't really based on object reality. And yeah, I think a lot of our education-- Jacob talks about this a little bit as well.

And others have spoken about it. Our education system, it's geared towards the Industrial Revolution, churning out people for a factory line. And then as we become more sophisticated, more sophisticated specializations. And yeah, as children, what do we do? We do what our parents tell us to do. We do what our teachers tell us to do.

If I had my time over, and I don't have children-- and we probably should chat about that briefly, I think, kids, because I can change the equation a little bit. I'd like-- I mean, imagine if we taught all our kids from age 12 how to be independent and entrepreneurial.

What would happen if you did that across the whole culture? And I think particularly for isolated economies, a good internet connection and a revolution in schools, where everyone had to come up with three businesses every semester from age 12, wouldn't it just change the whole country? It would. It wouldn't.

It won't happen with the permission of the forces that be. Right before we're recording this, I've released two series on the history of schooling. And it wasn't until I actually started studying the actual history of schooling and some of the academic documents on it. Because you can look. And the two things that always look to me as I said, look, you've got a system that's designed to create good, obedient little factory workers.

It's an industrial revolution system. That's fairly apparent if you just simply look and say, well, the desks all point to the front of the room. The teacher stands in the front of the room. And there's a bell that goes off to tell people to move to another room. And then you go to some historical place.

And you see the picture of the black and white photo of the factory workers. And the desks are all pointed the same way. And they're working on an assembly line. And there's a foreman or a forewoman or something there with the whip. Probably not a physical whip, but basically in charge.

And there's a factory bell in a factory town. You say, oh, interesting. I can draw that comparison. But it's not until you actually go and you start studying some of the academic history and you get into some of the philosophy and you recognize that throughout time, and this is where it's so wacky, throughout time people have tried to figure out, great thinkers have tried to figure out, how do we control a population?

How do we keep the population from actually, how do we control them together? And then you go and you see, ah, school was designed as a system of control, a system especially with the heavy Prussian influence. And you find out that the major factor here was controlling people and eliminating individual thought.

And so in our modern system, and it's very easy for people to block this out because it's really a dramatic, it takes time. It took me a long time to come to terms with it. Just like you said, it took you time to come to terms with it. It's easy to cut this information out and say, oh, that can't be true.

But if you think about it, that we as the individuals who are the workers are indeed the, in a sense, we're what creates the money that funds the machine that keeps everything going. When I had the war tax protester on the show, I forget his name right now, but he wrote the book on tax protesting.

Without your and my going to work and earning income, which is then taxed, then our respective governments cannot fund their activities. And if they do not go and keep a constant war going, then that cannot fund the owners of the companies that create the war machines that are used to fight the war.

So whether it's designed that way or it just happens that way, that's the practical result. Doesn't really matter the cause. I mean, maybe it matters a little bit, but it doesn't really matter the cause because you can look at it and say, oh, that's the system I'm involved in.

And if everybody, it's easy to go back, Thoreau is always the example. And Thoreau, I think, is rightly lauded in some ways and wrongfully lauded in other ways because he makes excellent points, but then he's also, there's some major problems in his work, in my opinion. But if you go back to it, if we went back to a self-sufficient lifestyle, we went back to less of a division of labor where each person is working in this very specialized business, then the economy would fundamentally transform and it would not be nearly as efficient as creating, at creating tax revenue.

So when you look at the effects of it and you say, ah, here's just simply how the system works, wait a second, I really am in many ways a battery pack that's providing energy that keeps everything just flowing forward. And as long as I'm comfortable enough, as long as there's not too much dissatisfaction, too much discomfort, then I as a human being, it's pretty comfortable, change is uncomfortable, so I'll just continue doing it and it's good enough.

Yeah, that's true. And I think there are parallels with other sectors of the economy as well, including food, food and diet. I mean, you just follow the money and the money is what ultimately influences the system and the culture. And we've got a fight here in Australia at the moment between our head sort of dietitians association who of course are staunchly defending the ancient food pyramid, which many countries are looking at shifting.

And who are they sponsored by? They're sponsored by the big multinationals who peddle the stuff that doesn't make you so healthy. Right. And so it's sort of following the money. And I think the system's so big now that I mean, there's not one mastermind behind it. It's just sort of companies acting rationally in the system in which that exists.

But I mean, I'm not trying to change society. I'm just trying to make my life better. Exactly. Which is, you know, I talk about freedom in the book. It's a concept Americans have championed for centuries. But for me personally, you know, freedom is just having the ability to choose how I spend my time.

Right. And and I think, you know, both Ferris and Jacob on your show spoke about the sort of myth of just following your passion for 40 years. And the example there, I think, is of someone who loves preparing a nice meal. I love preparing a nice meal for a few people.

And there's a big difference between that and going into a massive kitchen, preparing 400 nice meals for 40 years. Massively. And so that's why I talk about, I guess, going to the book that sort of slightly outrageous assertion that anyone can retire immediately and radically. And I guess that's to challenge in the way Jacob and Tim have challenged.

But for me, it's about assessing your situation. And I was sort of approaching middle age. I had some assets, but not an enormous amount of assets. I had a great big brain, which a lot of us have. And surely it could do more than just this. And I think it's just about stopping work, taking a really hard, good look at yourself, including you might, for example, have a home with some equity in the home.

At the moment, it's not doing anything. It's sitting there in the house. The thought of not having a house or your house, it can drive people crazy. But I've got to say, I've moved out of mine and I'm now renting it out, which helps deal with that sort of debt, if there's any debt.

And it provides an income source that might let you kickstart yourself in this new, amazing life. Spending your time doing things that you find fun. And I guess this is where I'm a little bit different to Tim. Tim talks about creating a muse. He says, I'm proceeding on the assumption that the best business is the one that takes the shortest amount of time.

And then so he proceeds on seeing a niche, minimizing it, outsourcing it, getting cash flow in from it. That's his sort of model, which he doesn't talk a lot about, even though that's the hardest bit, I think, in what he discusses. I sort of think if you become as efficient as possible, sort of radically, even if-- and it helps if you've got a partner.

You and your partner live in a tent somewhere by the beach. That's fantastic. It costs you almost nothing. And so you become as efficient as possible. Maybe you're getting vegetables from somewhere, you've ticked all the boxes. I mean, straight away, your happiness, particularly if you've stopped going into some sort of grudgery or hellhole, your happiness is about a million times more.

And that in itself is such a powerful thing. Because when I was the partner of the firm doing this, doing that, the thought of living in a tent, what? It's crazy. At the moment, we've just spent the last eight months sort of in a small RV type car traveling around Australia.

And I've got to tell you, it's been the happiest time of my life. And it's so far removed from the fancy alcohol and the fancy house and the big law business and so on. And yet, it's so much more pleasurable. But going back to what I was saying, you become as efficient as you can cost-wise, which gives you options.

And then I think you look for-- you do what you want to do. My sister's into llamas. I've had interest in children's books. I did some crazy children's books. I just wanted to do those things. They're fun. And then I think commercialization opportunities in whatever fun activity you engage in will present themselves.

And I guess you'd be an example of that. You've obviously got a real passion for this radical personal finance. And no doubt, every day you wake up and go, this is fun. I'm talking to all these cool people. It's radical. No one else is doing it. And so if you do what's fun, I think commercialization opportunities will present themselves.

You take advantage of those opportunities. But I guess rather than following your passion forever, you don't leverage up, assuming that that's always going to be there. But commercialization opportunities will present themselves, preferably in a way that provides you with an ongoing passive income. And then I think from time to time-- and for a lot of us, it might be every couple of years-- you change focus.

And again, we saw that with Jacob. He went through, I guess as I'm going through now, this awareness and awakening on the ability to retire effectively from your career and do fun things. And so he focused on that. And now he's focusing on something else that takes his interest.

He's a quant trader or some sort of advanced mathematics in the stock exchange, which caused some people to say, oh, no. He dubbed them the retirement police. Retirement police said, you're not retired anymore. You're a hypocrite. But the guy was only 33. He's not going to sit like a vegetable for 50 years, is he?

Of course he's going to do things that he finds interesting. And some of those things might provide him with cash. And I think that's true of take llamas. I was just helping my sister with her llama magazine. She's volunteered to be an editor. And there's one fellow in there.

And she pointed to him. See, that guy, he was an engineer fixing planes, only about late 30s, 40, perhaps. And he'd had enough. He'd somehow acquired this small little farm with llamas on it. And he now takes people on little llama tours. And so he's reduced his costs down to very little.

And he loves llamas. And he's taking people on a llama tour. And I think that's an example of how commercialization opportunities present themselves. It's such a world apart from the heavy-hitting career and having to go into the kitchen all day for 40 years. And I'm sure he could also have a llama blog.

He could write little llama books. And he's not trying to exploit people. He's just following his passion and almost helping people if they're interested in llamas. And a few bucks comes his way. He's efficient. It's enough to get by. And he's got a huge smile on his face. And in a few years' time, it might be something else he's interested in.

People talk and write about their travel. I mean, that's harder. But I think whatever you're interested in, whatever your passion is, without trying all that hard, these commercialization activities will present themselves. And in taking advantage of them, you're actually providing something fun and interesting to other people because you're not being cynical about it.

It is your passion. You're really interested in it. You want to help people. You want to give them a ride on a llama. You want to tell them a funny story in a book. And it all works. And it works in a way that means that you spend-- I mean, what is life but a series of moments?

And sort of every moment when you're pursuing something you're really interested in, in that moment, it's fun. And it sounds almost childish. But I've gone from this very serious, intense, competitive life in which cash was the measure of success. He's earning x hundred thousand dollars. Oh, that bastard. And so on.

And now my life, it consists of a series of beautiful moments, really. And cash is just a tool. It's a tool. And I think if you had to look at the most important things in your life, like cash is it even in the top 10? Like if you look at your health, your relationships, enjoying nature, experiences, really, what's cash?

And I think a lot of older people, I mean, they don't talk about being young and being able to run down a beach or seduce a man or a woman for pleasure and have a relationship and all that sort of stuff. Because all that stuff is diminishing for them.

And so, of course, they want to reinforce that they're kings of the castle. And the fact they're worth $10 million makes them very important and successful people. But I make this point in the book. I'm sure any one of them would give every cent of it up if they could be 20 again.

And enjoying their time in the sun with a group of friends and for their parents to be alive. And that's what life is, I think. And the focus just on money. I mean, you become-- it's not just try it. Your life really is extremely limited if you spend all day just pursuing cash in the highest paying specialized industry.

And you might do it-- people talk about deferred gratification. And look, you've got a big brain. It's all about solving problems. And I mentioned that as well, I think. And Jacob has made this point. If you look at-- if your goal is having this wonderful life, or treat that as the biggest problem for you to solve, putting everything on the table, most people save their brains for their job.

And you get the most successful analysts with-- it's just lives. What's going on? And I saw a comic, the paper a day or so, that was just that. Some sort of management consultant. And we all know them. They're all around the world. They haven't slept in six months. And they're the biggest brains and advise the biggest companies.

And yet their lives are shit. And the bloke who works at the fish and chip shop three nights a week, living on the coast and surfing every day, his life's a million times better with a relaxed girlfriend. So if you treat your life as a problem to be solved using the same brainpower that you apply to your work, and put everything on the table, including the country you live in, what you do with your time all day, where you live, you can really make a difference.

And if you enjoy being free-- and most people are scared by the idea of it-- if you enjoy it-- and for me, it's a million times better than the drudgery-- if you enjoy it, then once you cross over, you'll do anything to stay there. I don't know if that was your experience.

No, absolutely. I tell you, a month after I left the firm I was with, I was sitting at the breakfast table with my wife one day. And I was just saying-- and I was telling her-- I said, I just realized that for my entire life, I don't think I have ever been free.

I think I now am experiencing the sensation of being free more than I ever have in the history of my life. And it didn't have to do with my time. For me, it had to do with my freedom of speech. And I realized that throughout my entire lifetime-- and this is not some-- what's the term?

It's not-- it wasn't some hardcore crime that was foisted on me. But I realized that throughout my entire lifetime, I really had never had freedom of speech and freedom to live and do what I wanted to do in this way. When I was in high school, if I said the wrong thing or did the wrong thing, I'd be expelled from high school.

When I was in college, if I said the wrong thing and did the wrong thing, I'd be expelled from college. After college, I worked for a corporate marketing company. Then I needed to represent the company well. Then after that, I started my financial planning firm. And I had both the industry regulations under which I agreed to-- I voluntarily chose to abide-- and then also the rules, the corporate image of the company, and the internal regulations and rules.

So all of those things, however, limit what you're able to say and what you're able to do. And then combined with those things, the general peer pressure of my reference group. If my reference group is other financial advisors or my clients or something like that, I have to live in such a way that is acceptable to them.

I don't have to live in that way, but I am societally accustomed to living in a way that's acceptable to other people. And then it was after being away-- and I had a wonderful group of coworkers. But after being away for a month, I forgot about what they cared about and got in touch with what I cared about.

And then also just the ability to say what I wanted to say and do what I wanted to do. I could, in a moment, I could destroy this show by saying the wrong thing. But that's my choice to do it. And I have that choice and that prerogative. And it's just a really freeing sensation.

And once you come out of it, you look back. I mean, I told my wife, I said, "There is no chance. Let me not be quite so extreme." I tell her, I mean, I could do anything if I need to do it. And so if my family were hungry, I would go and do whatever needs to be done in order to make sure that my family is not hungry.

I mean, I have chosen to take on to myself responsibility. And that's extremely important to me. But in an idealized world, I would simply say, I'm not going to go back and take a corporate job just simply to fit someone else's agenda for me. I would rather start a hot dog cart.

I would rather rent our house out and go and be a farm worker and live-- I just don't want to live it. I don't want to sit in rush hour traffic. And I don't want to have this expensive food that has made me fat. And I don't want to live it.

I would rather farm my backyard. There's so many things that I would rather do. And now, I mean, I've got ideals left and right. I've got lists of things that are backup plans to the backup plans to the backup plans. And the cool thing is, is that I'm excited about all the different potential options.

I don't have time to do them. And I want to do them because they seem fun to me. And I don't have time to do them all. And I might make an observation, I guess, about one family. And that is extremely important. And as providers, you've got to get that right.

And that trumps everything. But you also said, if they're hungry, I'll do whatever I have to do. And that's where I think it is a powerful observation in the book, which, of course, others have made, is that we're living in a time now in which the essentials of human life are such, I guess, are provided for in such a way that we're living better now than any king lived in the past.

And I mentioned a YouTube clip that I saw where John Lennon was being interviewed, I think, in the '60s. And the olden day voice said, only a beetle could have a television in his car. And there was John Lennon sitting in the back of his car with this big old black and white TV.

And he was looking pretty pleased with himself. I thought, jeez, they're the biggest rock band that's ever been. And this guy's a millionaire many times over. And what's he got? A big, stinking black and white TV in the back of his car. And the penny sort of dropped. I've got in my pocket something that's 20 million times better than that TV.

And yet, I'd say it as a 17-year-old kid. And yet, we're greedy for more. We're sort of richer. The poorest of us in the lucky countries that we both live in, almost the poorest of us, at least the poorest of us that are contemplating an exit, have more stuff than the richest human really for the last 100,000 years.

And so if you want more than that, you've really got to query your motivation. How can you not be happy with the baseline stuff that's pretty well available to everyone if that baseline stuff through science and advancement is far more than the richest person had even 20 years ago?

I mean, 20 years ago, the richest man in the world didn't have access to the stuff that we have access to. They didn't have the medicine. They didn't have the technology, the cars. It's all-- we are the richest people in the world at any time except the current time.

And you want more? You want more? It's really got to be quite special for you to trade your precious life to get more than the richest person in the world 10 years ago. And I guess that's about being grateful for what we have and recognizing the cold, hard fact that we, through base technology, just catching up with the everyday man, we have more, more, more, more than the richest person in the world not that long ago.

And so for you to be thinking, I need more again, I mean, what does that say about you once you realize it? Right. So it's all these things combined, I guess, that enabled me to be the happiest I've ever been and earning the least that I've ever earned. But my life is so wonderful compared to how it was before.

And I mean, I can't compare the earnings from the past to the earnings now. But I think I was confused about what money was because you talk about your peer group setting standards and they try hanging out with lawyers for 20 years. They're the most conservative bunch out there.

And if you look at the envy they had between themselves, it's extraordinary. And their whole life might be turning to custard. But if they have the cash, they sort of strut around. What does it mean? I mean, they look 50 at 30. And Ferris talks about that in his book as well.

He talks about people being a cross between, his 30-year-old friends look like a cross between Donald Trump and Joan Rivers, I think he said. It's horrendous. And I mean, the same as me. I hung out with people who really were quite-- by any normal standard, they weren't ordinary human beings.

I mean, the greed was insatiable with some of them. And I mean, why? What are they going to do with it? I mean, are they just going to die with it? Are they going to drink $1,000 bottles of wine? I mean, it's got to serve a purpose. And the most important for me, important things for me, as I said, are health.

And you mentioned eating the food that makes you fat. Well, again, being a professional service provider in the legal industry is similar. You're professionally drinking twice a week. You're going out to fancy lunches. And in your own mind, I think we can all fall trap to wanting to be special in some way.

And you've got all this cash flow coming through. And everyone else is doing it. Why not go to the fancy restaurant? And it's this sort of spiral into madness and poor health over time. But health, surely it's your number one priority. And people don't talk about it, really. They just talk about cash.

But for some of us, I think a lot of people-- if you are overweight, the best thing you could do is take a year off, if nothing else. Take a year off. Fix that. You'll be 50 times happier. Go back to your career. And that's something else that I first read in Ferris's book.

But it's something I think is very true. And that's that fear-setting exercise where you imagine the absolute worst thing that could happen to you if you take the plunge you're considering. And then look at how difficult it would be to restore the position you're in at the moment. And for most people, if it all went pear-shaped, if-- whereas people less capable than you have made this work, that if for whatever reason you got unlucky, it was all a terrible tragedy, how hard would it be for you to restore your current position?

And in many cases, you just get another job. It's not that hard. And so that fear-setting exercise makes it-- it gives you confidence to take the plunge. And I knew that whilst I wouldn't be able to jump straight away in the same money that I was on, which was high because I'd been in the industry for so long, I could certainly get an extremely well-paying job anywhere in the world if I wanted to.

And so what did I have to lose? It just turned out I had an enormous amount to gain. And I think many of the listeners would as well. And what's funny is I'll bet you either have found or will find that just simply by being off of the beaten track, you'll get exposed to opportunities you never would have known existed.

I've gotten exposed-- even in the four months that I've been doing this show, I've gotten exposed to a bunch of opportunities. And I've had the choice, you know, at any one of them I could have said, "Yeah, I'll take it." But I haven't been interested because I've still got this crazy idea about the thing that I want to build, my contribution to the world.

And it's funny because it seems so scary until you take the step. And then once you take the step, you're like, "Huh, that was it? Wow, interesting." Yeah. And every day is wonderful compared to the past. One favorite story I have on people who escaped was a baker in Sydney.

And baking is a pretty hard job, and you've got to get up really early, and you're not really paid a whole lot. And he started baking cakes on YouTube. That's his job. Really? Wow. He's a photographer, he's the cake guy on YouTube. And I remember him saying, "Yeah, I feel a bit guilty because all my mates are getting up at 3 o'clock and they're off to the bakery." And his big hit that got in the media at that time is that he'd made a Spider-Man cake to coincide with the release of the Spider-Man movie.

And I guess kids are into Spider-Man, and parents go to YouTube, look for a Spider-Man cake, and there he is. And the revenue from the advertising freed him from the bakery. And he probably serves half the time, makes cakes, and he does whatever he wants to do. And I think in terms of a process, when people, particularly if you've been really working hard for over a decade, there's definitely an unwind period.

And you might get sick, you might be scared, "What do I do?" But then you go crazy. I think you go crazy with travel, you go crazy with freedom, doing pretty well nothing, I think. And you might have to recover mentally and physically. It's almost like a recovery from burnout for a lot of people.

But ultimately, and again, Ferris talks about this filling the void, I think it's like, "I do want to give back. I want to do something. I'm a young, capable, intelligent person. Of course I'm going to do something. What's in the next project?" And the difference is the project is your project, and any pressure is pressure imposed by you.

There's not people really assessing your work unless you're trying to sell it. And the project needn't be for cash. I think the first priority is the fun or the passion at that moment. You follow that, and then these commercialization opportunities present themselves. But you do end up filling your time with something.

I think it's human nature. A lot of people, including Jacob and Tim, talk about the acquisition of skills as being a really rewarding thing. I know Jacob was big into sailing and woodworking. And Tim is famous for his rapid learning. And I think he's learned a million skills, including most recently, he obviously got into investing.

I think he started hanging around very rich people and thought, "Oh, why don't I learn how to do angel investing?" But I think it'd be unfair to say he's just chasing a coin because he's acquired many other skills. And I think your skills and your dreams atrophy when you're locked in the specialized business, except in that area.

I'm highly expert at commercial contracts and risk allocation and intellectual property aspects of that as well. But, geez, I'd much prefer to be able to make a bowl out of wood. Doesn't mean I want to spend 40 years in a bowl factory, but I wouldn't mind spending a few months or a couple of years getting really good at that.

And then when you do get really good at something, you're into what they talk about as the flow, being really immersed in the moment, enjoying your specialized skills, but only having the ability to learn another skill and another skill, particularly if you're living a long life. We're looking at a long life, hopefully, as part of lower stress and better health and all the rest of it.

And so I think skill acquisition, pursuing projects, it's all there and you've got the time to do it. And as I said, without being greedy or deliberate, commercialization opportunities will just present themselves. And the more efficient you are and the more skilled you are at living, the less you'll have to think about the commercialization opportunities.

And if you get really efficient at living, just doing fun things like making cakes or doing llama rides or writing crazy kids books, which is what I've done, the money coming in from that will see you through, particularly if, and again, if you don't have the kids, the options are really open to almost like a camping lifestyle.

Sounds crazy, but it's really fun. Traveling on a budget around the world, the geo-arbitrage, taking advantage of different exchange rates. I was recently in the north of Thailand and I know a lot of people talk about it, but I was up there sort of checking it out. And it really is cheap up there.

Like for a couple of bucks a month, you can get not a bad unit or apartment to live in. And the food is, street food's basically free. And I'm sure there are many countries around the world where you can really take advantage of cost of living. I know America, it's much cheaper to live in America than Australia.

Australia's got this mining boom going on and everyone thinks they're a millionaire now and we think we're getting rich by selling each other property, which I believe America played with in the mid 2000s. And so for a lot of people from Brisbane, which is where I'm from, even though I've been traveling for a little while, Brisbane people, their societal sort of structure and commands is to get a government job almost, a government job or a mining job, and then buy a house that's worth half a million dollars or more, and then spend 30 years paying it off.

That's it. And all their money goes into that and they have barbecues in their backyard. That's the formula for those guys. I know I'm looking at buying, my partner is looking at buying a house in Ireland because looking globally, and you can look globally, Irish houses there can be bought for under 100,000.

So it makes sense, doesn't it? And I know there are lovely Irish cottages, they might be 50,000 euro, 60,000 euro. Whereas here, the same lovely cottage would be half a million dollars or $600,000. And so I think you're looking, like really thinking outside, so you don't have to just spend all your time in the little or big town that you've grown up in.

I mean, people live all over the world at salaries that are extremely small in some cases. And you just got to be aware, travel, look at opportunities, look at cost of living. These Irish houses, Ireland suffered, they thought they got a bit too big for their boots and everyone was borrowing millions to buy property largely.

And then it all went bad, all their banks almost went broke, they had to be bailed out by the Europe. No one's lending and now property is extremely cheap. And so there's no reason why we can't buy there and live in Ireland for a while and have fun. And then get an upswing, rent it out, I mean there are a million options.

And having the time and the mental freedom to think about it, gives you a solution other than just the 30 years of paying off that suburban home and having barbecues on the weekend. The ability to be efficient, as you call it, is such a massive game changer. And that efficiency both in the amount of money that you need, and then the, maybe it's the same word, but I would say the ability to be flexible in your thinking allows you, if you're okay with a very potentially difficult situation, you may also have potentially a massively valuable situation, like a peak experience that you didn't get that you wouldn't have otherwise.

This flexibility of thought, I think is just one of the most valuable concepts that we don't often talk about. I remember one time I went to, well two trips stand out, one time I went to Columbia and I didn't want to spend much money and I just kind of jumped on an airplane.

But I was totally cool with, I didn't have any reservations, I didn't know where I was going, I just decided I got a cheap plane ticket to go to Bogota and I flew into Bogota, but I was okay with just about anything, including sleeping on the airport floor. Well I wound up finding an amazing hostel to stay in, then I asked the people at the hostel what I should do, they told me to go to another town, it's a town called Villa de Leyva, and I jumped on a bus and I went there, I didn't have any accommodations, I got there, I asked somebody, I wound up being shown to this amazing hostel and it's $11 a night for a beautiful room in the mountains overlooking the hills and the mountains.

Now it was this amazing peak experience, but it was open to me because I was able to actually do it because I was okay with having a really disastrous experience. I never had a disastrous experience, but I would have been completely fine with it. But if I were requiring and said no matter what, I'm not willing to run the risk of not having a place to stay, so I've got to sit at home on the computer and I've got to sketch out like here I'm going to stay here, and that's $98 a night, I wouldn't have had the money to go at that point in time probably.

And that's the thing, I think a huge amount of pleasure can be obtained by having these adventures and by solving problems and you probably felt quite chuffed with yourself, you still are. Right, I still tell the stories, it was an awesome trip. And that's how I've been living with my girlfriend for the last seven months, just driving around Australia like we didn't really have a plan and then just on a whim we flew to Thailand.

Every day we had no plan, it was what do we want to do, what do we want to do, and that's freedom. We almost were in the middle of a bushfire, a wildfire, one side of the road and the lights shine, it's a beautiful sunset, someone must be frying some food.

No, it was a bushfire coming to get us and driving off, but that's a wonderful story now. Right. That's the thing, you can turn really just about any horrible experience, and I'm sure there are exceptions, but you can turn many really tough experiences into just kind of fun by just viewing it as an adventure.

And I'll give two simple examples. When I was growing up, purely because he was an adventurous guy, Teddy Roosevelt in the United States was one of my favorite presidents. Now, I didn't know anything about his politics at the time, now I'm not such a huge fan, but when I was a kid I just thought he was cool because he was a president who went to Africa and hunted lions, and he was leading the rough riders, he's kind of a folk hero in American history.

But the thing is, you think about him, sitting here, what was it, the 19th, 18th, a long time ago, I can't place the date off the top of my head, a long time ago he's sitting there in Africa, living in a tent, on a very basic cot, and eating food that's cooked over a fire somewhere.

Now, yes, he has a number of servants, he has a number of people that are serving him, he's got plenty of money to do this, but what's he doing? He's living in a tent, in a beautiful place, hunting lions every day. Now question, that was what one of the richest, most powerful former presidents of the United States was able to do at that point in time.

If I wanted to go and have an adventure like that, A, I could go do it in Africa, and that wouldn't actually be that big of a deal, but I can also do that wherever I happen to be, whether that's in Australia or the United States or Brazil or wherever, I can go and I can buy a nice big fancy canvas wall tent, I can get a very comfortable cot, and even better, I can get a cooking stove that doesn't require me to start a fire from wood to cook on, for 10 or 15 bucks I can get a Coleman camp stove from the local Walmart, I can have an internet connection and stream Netflix while I'm lying in my comfortable, what's the foam stuff, tempur-pedic pad on my cot in a beautiful part of the world for free.

There's land all over the world that I can do it for free. But in order to be able to do that, I would have to be able to cut the mental chains, and that's what's challenging. Yeah, and it's the very lifestyle I've been living the last seven or eight months, just that on the road thing, and it's never been easier, and with technology, you're able to continue to run your affairs back home and get access to entertainment and all that sort of stuff, it's never been easier, and indeed the radical immediate retirement book I wrote in the monkey mire, watching the dolphins swim up and down the beach.

You can get these little projects going even when living in that very simple way. What's interesting psychologically, and I've thought a bit about this, is if you're thinking about taking the plunge, it's much easier to do it in a very different situation, and I think that goes to our conditioning, even if you're aware of it.

I'm perfectly happy living in a tent while I'm on this crazy adventure, but could I live in a tent in the suburb I grew up in under the bridge? Right. That's a very different thing. It is. It would do my head in, but if I was in a tent on the plains of Africa, it'd be amazing.

I think that's why travel frees you. It changes those very strong restrictions that society places on you, and even from your family, from your neighbors, from culture, from all your workmates. My greatest fear, I must admit, would be me with a beard living in my car or in a tent or something, and then my old client or co-worker walks past and goes, "David, is that you?" Right, exactly.

Isn't it amazing how deep those ties go? Or if I posted it on Facebook, "Here I am at the local bridge." Right. "Come on in, what's happened?" But if I posted the same picture from Africa or Sweden or Australia, I guess, for a minute, "Oh, look at that guy, I'm jealous." Exactly.

Here he is living his adventure. I've got to do the same thing. I think at the start, anyway, it's much easier to travel, buy a ticket anywhere, go there, live a crazier life. You might just find that some of it slips into your life back home. It's been recommended by others before, but I think it's Ralph Potts and his Vagabonding Book.

Yep, excellent book. Beautiful expression on the joys of crazy adventures on the road. I think he quotes a line from, is it Wall Street? And Martin Sheen or whoever the actor was, is saying, "Oh, I'm going to make my millions by the time I'm 30, and then I'm going to retire and ride across China with a bicycle." Or ride across China on a motorcycle.

And Potts says, "You could do that after working as a cleaner for two months." All this stuff's really open to anyone right now, and it can change the way you think because you are less at risk of being controlled by these societal and cultural norms that affect us all, even if we're aware of them.

I've been living in my car for seven and a half months, having the time of my life, absolutely. But could I live in a car in my suburb that I grew up in? No, I wouldn't want to. I wouldn't want to, even though I know it's silly. But we're off to Ireland shortly.

I'd love to ride a bicycle across Europe in summer. Can you imagine a more wonderful adventure? But I'm not going to live in my bike in Brisbane any time soon. Absolutely. That's an excellent point. Let's wind down with, I'd love for you to just simply, because we've talked a lot of philosophy and it's funny, this show, my bet is that this show will either strike someone as utterly ludicrous or it'll strike someone as an entirely radical concept that they love.

And I think it probably depends upon where they're at, because many people are perfectly content and I think legitimately so, perfectly content. They love their life, they love everything, they're thrilled with what they're doing. And so a show like this would stand out to them saying like, "That's crazy.

How can you be that way?" But there are lots of people who are oftentimes stuck without, feelings trapped and don't have a lot of money, don't have $2 million sitting in the bank, haven't created a muse that pays them 8,000 a month so they can dance the tango in Buenos Aires and lease a Ferrari.

So this show can be a kind of a breath of fresh air to say, "Wow, I can do something." And it can meet people where they are. What specifically over the last year and a half, what were the specific steps that you went through once you decided to do something?

What did you do specifically and then how have you specifically filled, you mentioned traveling for the last eight months, but how have you paid, how much are you spending, things like that? Yeah, well I think the first thing that I had to do was to clear my debt. Like a lot of people, I had investments and you build wealth through property investment shares, that sort of thing.

And I cleared a lot of debt quite quickly and that was extremely liberating. Did you sell stuff or did you sell investments or what did you do? I sold, well between my girlfriend and myself, we sold three houses. And we just got rid of them. And so it really was a massive change.

I think we're paying over $10,000 a month in interest. And how can you do anything? What sort of crazy life could you lead if you need to come up with that cash plus the cost of living? You know, sort of let alone pay any of that debt down. So yeah, we sold down and became debt free.

So that was a practical thing. In terms of, I guess how I survived back when I was sort of transitioning, and this is, if you don't want to sort of go feral from day one, there's no reason why you can't build up some of this stuff on the side.

And I, not for money because I had no intention of quitting, but for fun, I wrote children's books for, really for my nephews and nieces. But I was also really fascinated by online contracting. And I had read Tim Ferriss' book, I heard other people talk about elance.com, I know that you've used some contractors to set up your own activities.

And so I was just having complete fun. I'd written these children's books and then through elance, I sourced a magnificent illustrator out of Indonesia, who was very cheap, and he did these wonderful illustrations. I got an editor out of Canada, who, you know, a lot of people sort of get thrown on the scrap heap at around 50, particularly in the media.

And of course, they've got wonderful opportunities ahead of themselves. And now through elance, they can sell their time in little niche spots. And I got a very cheap editor, just to proofread my stuff. And I got a layout expert from the Philippines, who spent all day working for a book company, laying out professionally, and then at night was freelancing, moonlighting.

And so I got this sort of crack team assembled extremely cheaply. And I find the print on demand technology thing is completely mind blowing, along with books. And for those who aren't familiar with print on demand, I know in the 80s, I heard stories through my parents of people who had delusions of grandeur with self publishing and that go broke because they spent tens of thousands of dollars printing their books.

And of course, no one bought the books and they're sitting there in the garage, gathering mold. But now, with print on demand technology, someone orders the book, and then Amazon prints it and posts it. So it's incredible. And at the moment, at least once a day, a child around the world opens up a package and has my book in it with all the pictures.

How cool is that? They were extremely gratifying. And I wasn't doing this for the cash. I did it for nieces and nephews and to explore online contracting. And I certainly didn't want commercial books. I mean, they're sort of crazy, crazy books with the stuff I would have enjoyed when I was a kid, but probably would never have been published.

And then it occurred to me, I thought, what about all those kids out there who don't have books published in their language because they're not commercial? And we talk about the system, the system at the moment is making everyone speak English or French or one of the major languages.

But what about those kids who speak one of the Indonesian languages closer to us or any of these smaller languages that aren't commercial? I thought it was really sad that they'd never hear their mother reading to them a kid's book. And so I really went out to the internet and said, look, would anyone out there like to translate my book into your language?

Even though it's not a commercial language, I'll get it up. I'll pay for it to be up and I'll make it available if I can for free on YouTube with professional scrolling. And I also put out a cry for professional voiceover people to read it. With my thought was a little kid, assuming they had access to the internet, could sit there in Africa or wherever they are and listen to this story being read to them in their own language.

And it may be the only book they've ever heard read to them in their own language for free. And I was amazed by the response. And this is just one of these projects you might do other than for cash. And I ended up with about 130 people helping me.

I'm trying to be a partner at the same time, right? You know, pretty busy, busy practice and all the rest of it. So I ended up hiring, you know, for not a lot of money, a fantastic project manager who was also an ex lawyer working out of Canada. And so she managed these 130 effectively volunteers.

And there was this enormous project and there were voiceovers being read. I had this Greek guy who was a celebrity doing it and many others. And I ended up with over 150 books up on Amazon in all these different languages. And every day, mainly in languages other than English, a child opens the book and they can buy it in the e-book.

And also in many cases where I've been able to get people to help with the reading, they're read for free on YouTube. And so I do get a small income from those sales. And I haven't recovered the money that I put in, but I spent that money when I had a job.

And so now I have a small bit of cash flow coming in and some losses to offset any tax problems for the next number of years. I guess that's just an example. One of my friends worked for a publisher and I said, you know, what would it take for you to publish someone's book in over 40 languages, which is where my book is.

And if you go to Wikipedia, the most translated books in the world are pretty well behind the list, which is crazy. That's the internet. Everything's changing. And my books probably count all the languages would be in maybe 40, 45 languages. I haven't really counted because I'm not keeping track, but it's an amazing feat.

And I said to him, how much would it cost? And could you do it? He said, mate, we just wouldn't even consider doing it. It would be impossible. So here I am with I'm not really doing it. My project manager is handling it and all the rest of it.

I'm through the internet doing a project that a big publishing company couldn't do and wouldn't do. And that's just completely mind blowing. And I deliberately went as uncommercial as possible, deliberately to get the outcome of children and be able to hear a book being read to them in their own language.

And yet I'm still getting an income from it, from, you know, not the YouTube stuff, but from people who want a hard copy and they buy it. And geez, if I'd made it slightly more commercial, I'd be making more money, you know. And so I think that just shows you can do anything.

You really can do anything. We're living in this amazing, incredible time where a person who's not even devoting much time to it can undertake projects that corporations can't undertake with traditional structures of employees and having to pay $5,000 for a translation or 10 and layout and printing and distribution.

It's all changed. And the world's sort of 20 or 30 years behind, but you don't have to be. So I get a little bit of money from that. And also looking at commercialization opportunities. I had all these fantastic and still do these fantastic people who can help me through eLance and I have long term relationships with them and we trust each other.

I thought, well, this is looking at the fairer side of things, the potential for a muse. And so I set up an online publishing service really to let people take advantage of this amazing revolution in publishing. Interalia publishing dot com is the name of that. And you know, I with that again, I haven't really pushed me.

This is I haven't had to. But I've got a few clients just from word of mouth really at work. And that works still happening. I don't touch any of it. I have incredibly gifted people doing it all. And it's really is like a Tim Ferriss muse that one. And so I you know, if I get involved at all, it might be to send an invoice.

But that that is often done by my helpers as well. So I guess to answer it, I've got directing come in from from books, even though that was an on commercial project. And you can read about that at David J. Downey dot com with the volunteering and all the books you can see a link to YouTube to.

And I've set up this muse, Interalia Publishing, and that brings in a small amount of income. And I do have a small amount of income coming in from investments as well. So that's where I am. And I'm looking but I'm not rich by any means. But I think that's the point.

You don't have to be. And I see money as a very small part of my life. And I'm not driven by money now. I'm driven by experiences and just enjoying my relative youth. I'm I'm 39, I was 38 when I pulled the pin. You know, if I look at the next 12 months in a cash is the least of it.

I'm just going to have crazy adventures while I still can. And with my with my partner and and why not spend this time doing fun, adventurous, outrageous things. Now is the time. What a story. What an amazing world we live in. Absolutely. I mean, we're talking now by Skype.

You know, I found you through your tweets or Jacob got involved and we're talking free with for free. Right. Incredible. And I give an example in the book about an Australian prime minister, our most famous prime minister, Menzies, who's prime minister for 20 years or something like that. And he was so intimidated by his first international phone call.

He planned it for weeks and then he didn't know what to say. And it was because it was such an incredible thing. You talk, he's talking to someone in England. Imagine it. You know, it used to take months by ship. And this is just in the 60s, mind you.

And so, you know, we are more capable and more powerful and richer than Australia's most successful prime minister who who spent weeks planning for his extremely expensive call. And that should blow your mind. It's amazing. The world's full of this amazing technological advancement that if you're smart and we're all smart, everyone's smarter than they think, more capable than they think.

There's so many tools out there now. You just spend some time thinking about your options, you know, mimic other people just to have a crack, do something fun just to learn, learn how to do these things. You know, really, there's amazing opportunities and going to university for six years and then spending 40 years on the treadmill is the least of it.

Right. And there's really no excuse other than a mental issue. I just look in today's world. You can go and every one of us listening to this, I'm sure, has a public library that is relatively easily accessible. And that public library has free internet connections, has free computers to use, can connect you with Elance, with email, with everything, with YouTube, with all of the things that you need to create something and can give you space to work for eight, you know, ten hours a day for as long as they are open.

Every single one of us lives in some kind of Western society where there's either, you know, guaranteed health insurance coverage for poor people or there's just simply organizations that will pay the bill if you get sick and you need help. Every one of us lives in a society where either there are official programs built by the government to provide food for free for those who don't have the money and/or there are individuals who would be charitable.

I mean, if somebody came to me and they said, "I don't have any food, but I'm building this business," man, I'd give them all the food they need. Plus, in all of our societies, you can get calories so cheaply you can live on a buck or two a day and get the calories that you need to live on.

It's not going to... Yeah, and look, if jobs are available, it might be you build something up on the side or you work part time. I mean, I remember I was working full time in the horror as I saw it and I was down the Gold Coast in Australia and there was this very chilled lady.

For some reason, I wasn't at work and she was just fishing in the river and she was just a young lady. I said, "Oh, how have you managed this?" And she goes, "Oh, I just work part time at the fish and chip shop." Her life's better than mine. If you just become more efficient, get interested in being efficient rather than seeing the beer spill out, then get a part time job one day a week.

You've got all the other days and you don't have to beg for food or anything. You can pay for your food, learn how to cook. It's fun. And then you fish. You fish, catch food. I saw a guy with these two massive salmon. I couldn't believe it. And I don't know.

I assume it's in Australia. It's the same, although I don't know this. But in the US, we have a progressive income tax system. The more you make, the more you pay. So there's a very... There's a strong disincentive to make more money. So once you pass that basic level of living a lifestyle that's enough for you, the reality is none of us get more time.

And money can always be replaced. You can't replace time. So think it through. Nor youth. Yeah, nor youth. This is the next... Depending on how old your listener is, but assuming they're under 45 or under 50, now is the time. Old age is horrific. And there's plenty of time to be sitting around not able to do the things that you used to be able to do.

Don't waste this time. Now is the time to explore, to do crazy things, and to take risks. I only disagree with you about that last point. I don't think... If old age is horrific and I'm dreading it, then I'm not going to look forward to it. I'm excited about growing older because I'm...

It's just going to be better and better and better. And the key is, is that how can I build a life that I don't ever want to retire from, such that when I'm 100 years old, I'm still rocking and rolling. One of my heroes was there was a doctor, I don't remember her name, but there was a doctor in Georgia in the United States here.

And she was a pediatrician. She retired from active practice at, I think, 103, and she died at 114. And she had an amazing story. And you don't work at 103. There are doctors who are stuck in the grind that you were stuck in, and those doctors need to get out at 38 like you did.

But there are also doctors who figured out a way to really enjoy their business and their life. You don't work till 103 if you don't really love doing it. It's not about being idle, is it? It's about doing really what you want to do, knowing your options. And she obviously...

I mean, you must love that to be working that long. Absolutely. Well, David, thank you so much for coming on. I appreciate it. DavidJDowney.com. And I couldn't... What was the first word before publishing? I couldn't get it. Inter Alia. It's a pretentious Latin from my legal side of it.

Inter Alia Publishing. Inter Alia Publishing.com. And then your book is on Kindle, and it's entitled Radical Immediate Retirement, right? That's right. And there will be a blog by the same entry. There's nothing there now because I'm not going to madly try and sell anything to anyone who goes there.

But over time, I will be just posting my thoughts on things that interest me. Very cool. Well, I thank you for coming on. I thank you for writing it. I think this is properly radical, and I'm glad to share it with the audience. Thanks for coming on today. Thanks.

Thanks for the call. A fun and challenging philosophy, eh? I find it's hard to argue with just the reality that he talks about in terms of a lot of the stuff being mental. Once you're free mentally, once you're willing to take a different approach, a different lifestyle, then it just affects what you can do.

So check out David's book. It's a good little book. It's pretty short, but it's very good. It's one of those kind of nice slaps in the face that's pretty cool that can be a transformative event. Check out his websites. All of his websites and everything, all of those are linked in the show notes.

So you can find his books, you can find his children's books, and check out the YouTube videos. All of that stuff is in the show notes for today's show. That's it for today for Friday. Thank you all so much for being here. I really appreciate it. Next week is Thanksgiving Day week in the United States, and I think at this point I will do shows on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.

I'm not sure exactly which shows I will do. I have several interviews that I've recorded already, and I may release one or two of those, and I may do some other shows. So check back next week, and you'll see I will be taking Thursday and Friday off, and then I'll be back with you on the 1st of December, which will be the following Monday.

I don't know. I don't know whether to do a Thanksgiving show or not. Sometimes those things are corny, or sometimes they're not. I'll have to give that a little bit more thought and see if I can do something that is Thanksgiving themed but that ties in. If it's just corny, I'll skip it.

Thank you all so much for listening. If you like the show, we'd be thrilled if you'd check out the Irregular's Podcast. It's my membership program. This show is entirely listener supported. That's the way that I pay my bills. So if this has brought value to you, if you found a way that could save you a little bit of money, I'd be thrilled if you would support the show.

If you're interested in more details, go to RadicalPersonalFinance.com/membership, and you'll find the details there. Incidentally, I'm still working on building that out. I haven't been able to get any more benefits. Those of you who have signed up so far, it's been primarily for just basically to support the show from all of the audio content.

I've got all my list to do to start getting some additional benefits in there. I really do mean for that to pay for itself more than anything else. So that's coming soon. And that's for today. Have a great weekend, everybody. Thank you for listening to today's show. This show is intended to provide entertainment, education, and financial enlightenment.

Your situation is unique, and I cannot deliver any actionable advice without knowing anything about you. This show is not, and is not intended to be any form of financial advice. Please, develop a team of professional advisors who you find to be caring, competent, and trustworthy, and consult them because they are the ones who can understand your specific needs, your specific goals, and provide specific answers to your questions.

Hold them accountable for your results. I've done my absolute best to be clear and accurate in today's show, but I'm one person and I make mistakes. If you spot a mistake in something I've said, please come by the show page and comment so we can all learn together. Until tomorrow, thanks for being here.

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