Not long ago, I received the following comment — edited for length — from Ryan N.:

I hate you Tim. I had a secure future ahead of me, and I left my job, my reasonably well paying professional career all because of your book. Best thing I’ve ever done!!

I was wondering if you might be able to put up a blog post where people could post their ideas or muses as case studies. I’m sure there are a lot of people like me who would like to share their stories and listen to others living the 4HWW.

Here’s to 2010 being the year everything changes.

Indeed. Here’s to 2010 being the year everything changes.

I decided to take Ryan’s advice. Below is a post of just a few select video case studies. This is also where you can win a round-trip ticket anywhere in the world.

That would be a nice way to start 2010 with a bang, right?…

I’m sure you’ve dreamed of taking that big trip, but it’s been put off due to the million things that interrupt and overload all of our lives. The fact is this: there is never a convenient time to do the most impactful things, whether having a baby, quitting your job, or taking a dream trip overseas. It’s something you pull the trigger for despite imperfect circumstances, not because of perfect circumstances.

Let’s end the wait.

Here’s how it works – simplicity itself:

1) Upload a video to YouTube of 5 minutes or less where you describe how you’ve most successfully applied techniques or tools from The 4-Hour Workweek to your life or business. Be sure to tag your video with “4hww success” in quotation marks. Click here to see what it should look like when you are uploading your video.

2) Leave a comment on this post with a link to your video and a brief description of what worked for you (no need for more than 1-2 short paragraphs). Do all of this no later than 5pm PT this Saturday, December 26th. Early responses get bonus points.

3) I and a few secret judges will select our top favorites, and then you all will vote for the winner.

4) I will then provide a roundtrip ticket anywhere in the world that the 25+ airlines in the Star Alliance fly.

In the meantime, find below some fun examples to get your juices flowing. Included are:

- Electra, a mother who uses batching to run her business while making time for the kids
- Michael, a father of two who’s lived in Argentina and explored both international and home schooling while earning full-time income.
- Harris, a father who can take his kids to the zoo on a Wednesday or take the entire family to Barcelona for a month.
- Jed and Chelsea, who quit their previous jobs, moved to another city, and are reinventing themselves one step at a time.

Last but not least, we have Aaron Carotta, who was diagnosed with cancer but still achieved the four-hour workweek in 60 days and documented it all on video. Here is the cliff notes version, in his words:

-Diagnosed with cancer
-Lost wages
-Accumulated medical bills
-Received the book as a gift
-Documented his interpretation of the book
-Achieved goals to free up his lifestyle
-Successfully opened and sold a business in another country
-Generated automated money
-Now successfully runs a company that allows his to travel for a living, The Seven Wonders Tour [with sponsors, Vibrams!].
-Continues to live healthy, travel the world, and be happy

I’ve included a 3-part video diary compilation of Aaron’s experience at the end of this post after the other case studies. Total viewing time is just around 20 minutes.

Enjoy these wonderful examples and don’t forget — your own video submission and comment on this post must be up no later than 5pm PT this Saturday!

Question of the day: where would you travel if you had a free round-trip anywhere in the world?

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Get the brand-new Expanded and Updated 4-Hour Workweek, published 12/15, which includes more than 50 new case studies (including families) of luxury lifestyle design, muse creation, and world travel. Make 2010 the year when you make the leap.

Recommended and Related:
Tim Ferriss on Twitter – what adventures and mischief am I up to this instant?
Tim Ferriss on Huffington Post – marketing case studies, travel how-to, and more

“Cevallos told Zobrist [Tampa Bay Rays MVP] he could turn him into a power hitter…The results have been remarkable.”
- ESPN The Magazine

This article will tell the inspiring story of Jaime Cevallos, who went from $7 an hour to coaching MVPs in Major League Baseball, automating his income in the process.

Jaime is now — in many respects — set. But how did he do it?

Some of the questions I asked Jaime include:

1) What is your muse [automated business]?
2) How did you contact the initial MLB players, and what exact wording did you use?
3) What things were much easier than expected, and which things were much harder?
4) To those people who haven’t yet tried to create a muse, what 3-5 pieces of advice would you give them?
5) What mistakes did you make, and what did you learn from them?…

The Beginning: An E-mail

Our interaction started with an e-mail to one of my assistants in August, 2008:

Amy:

I just thought I would let you guys know that three years ago, I was making $7 an hour. I read 4 hour work week and now I am one of the most sought after swing coaches in Major League Baseball.

If you google my name, you will see the headway that I have made. I really have to say that I owe a lot of my success to FHWW.

After reading the book. I began approaching MLB players and offering them my assistance. I always knew I was an expert on the baseball swing but didn’t know how I would penetrate the MLB ranks. FHWW just showed how to do it.

I gave my company the name “the swing mechanic” and the rest is history.

Thanks again, Tim.

Jaime Cevallos
The Swing Mechanic
www.theswingmechanic.com

Then an update and elaboration:

Subject: update – The Swing Mechanic

Dear Tim and Amy:

Although I’m feeling like I should reread The Four Hour Workweek lately
(because I am quite busy and I know I need a refresher), I look back and
have to say that I’m still employing the principles quite well.

1. I was invited to speak at the American Baseball Coaches Convention, the largest baseball coaches convention in the world, on January 10th. It’s amazing what you get when you ask. I just found out who the guy in charge of speakers was and sent an email along with my accomplishments and followed up twice with phone calls. (4HWW chapters/principles – Becoming An Expert, Eustress Is Good).

2. My book, Positional Hitting, is being self published after the person that I hired to edit and format the text and design the cover (on Elance, LOVE ELANCE) is finished. Should be out February, 2010. (4HWW chapters/principles – Becoming an Expert, Outsourcing Life)

3. My second and third training aids are currently being designed. For one of my inventions, I had blueprints and prototypes made in China (on Elance) for $150 and then found a local manufacturer on Thomasnet.com to iron out the details and do the mass production. (4HWW principles – License A Product/Create A Product)

Doing quite a bit as you can see. But, as I said, it’s still time for a refresher :-)

I hope all is going well for you both. Keep in touch and let me know how everything is going.

Jaime

How have Jaime’s results in the majors turned out? Judge them for yourself. Here are just two examples:

In 303 plate appearances before working with Cevallos, Zobrist had 3 home runs and a .259 slugging percentage. In the 309 plate appearances after, Zobrist hit 17 home runs with a .520 slugging percentage. “The numbers before I worked with Jaime compared to after speak for themselves,” said Zobrist. In 2009, Zobrist won the team MVP award for the Rays, finishing the season with a .297 batting average and 27 home runs.

Before working with Cevallos in 2007, Drew Sutton, playing professional baseball for the Corpus Christi Hooks, had 9 home runs and a .267 batting average. After working with Cevallos in 2008, Sutton improved his numbers to 20 home runs and a .317 batting average, earning team MVP honors. “(Cevallos) has made a huge difference,” said Sutton after the season.

Tips from a Pro

“Ted Williams once famously remarked, ‘Hitting a baseball is the hardest thing to do in sports’…Jaime Cevallos has made it his life’s mission to conquer the unconquerable.”
– Fort Worth Star Telegram

1) What is your muse [automated business]? Coaching is, of course, usually tethered to one location.

My muse is the MP30 baseball training bat. Having a muse allows me to “be in more places at one time.” I can be giving a lesson in Dallas while a player is receiving his MP30 training bat from UPS in New York. It’s a great feeling to know that thousands of hitters around the country are improving because of a training bat that I designed. Now my training bat is in the dugouts of six Major League teams and I get orders every week from hitting coaches of university and professional baseball teams, which is a great compliment. I can’t be everywhere to give instruction, but my bat serves as an instructional device that is almost as good as me being there.

2) How did you contact the initial MLB players, and what exact wording did you use?

After reading 4HWW, I understood that if I was really going to pursue my goal of being the best swing instructor, there would be many moments of discomfort and even embarrassment along the way. After I accepted that, I was left with nothing but excitement. I just started walking into hitting facilities around my home and introducing myself to the management. One day, I walked into Showtime Sports Academy in Franklin TN, and the manager, Tony Naile, must have seen the determination in my eyes when I told him that I was going to change baseball with my hitting methods. He said, “Come back here. I have someone I want you to meet.” He took me to the back of the facility where Ben Zobrist and Nevin Ashley, both MLB players in the Tampa Bay Rays organization, were taking batting practice in one of the cages. When they were done, I introduced myself to them and said, “I have a unique method of analyzing and training baseball swings that I’d like to share with you guys. Would you be willing to let me film your swings so I could offer my analysis?” They looked at each other and looked back at me and said, “Sure. Why not.” The rest is baseball history.

This was a huge step for me. I could have easily said to myself: “These guys have coaches. They aren’t looking for me.” At the time, it was unheard of for MLB players to receive instruction from a guy who never played in the Majors himself. I changed that. Without those real gutsy moves, especially in the beginning, I find that usually nothing great ever happens. One of the biggest things that helped me to just get out there in the beginning was really understanding the principle in 4HWW that “doing the unrealistic is easier than doing the realistic.”

3) What things were much easier than expected, and which things were much harder?

The technical things were much easier than I expected. For example, when designing my company logo, I was a little apprehensive about posting a project online (Elance.com), so I called a local provider to do the design. Despite her being thirty minutes late to our first meeting, I told her what I wanted, gave her a downpayment of $250, and she said she would have something for me within a week. Five weeks later she had a design that looked like it had been made by a first grader. I expressed my disappointment to her and never paid the second half. So I was only out $250.

I immediately posted the project on Elance, using the first designers logo as a rough sketch of what I wanted. The next morning I had six bids on the project. I immediately chose a designer and less than four hours later, the provider had a sample for me that was absolutely perfect. It’s still the logo that I use today. In one day and for $90 I had a perfect logo that a local provider couldn’t even do in 5 weeks for $500! I still use Elance today. In fact, most of the work in my book, Positional Hitting, coming out in February, was done on Elance.

As for the something that was much harder than expected, I must confess, I drove to a Starbucks 40 minutes from my house and sat there for an hour trying to muster the courage to lay down in public [Tim: this is an exercise in discomfort from 4HWW]. All the caffeine I could handle wouldn’t get me on that floor. I just couldn’t do it. I’ll do it one day. I don’t know what country I’ll be in, but I’ll do it.

4) To those people who haven’t yet tried to create a muse [automated business], what 3-5 pieces of advice would you give them?

a. Choose something within a subject with which you have some level of familiarity. You wouldn’t want to become a real estate agent if you never before had an interest in homes or interior design. The same is true of your muse. You should have a considerable amount of knowledge about the niche market that you are targeting.

b. Take your time in choosing your muse if it doesn’t hit you right away. If you just choose anything so you can get started, you may not have the full commitment necessary to stay the course. Make sure you believe in it enough that you can say, “There’s no doubt that I can do it, it’s just a matter of time.”

c. Keep an open mind. The market is always changing, which means new demands for brand new products and services. I invented a product. That obviously means that nobody else in the world had tried selling the product before me. If you choose this route, it will be a tougher road because you don’t have others to model, but the upside can be much better too.

5) What mistakes did you make, and what did you learn from them?

For me, when I start to make bad decisions, it’s usually because I’m afraid of making bad decisions.

For example, when sales started picking up for the training bat, I suddenly assumed I needed a partner. I desparately searched for someone who would take over some of the control of the business. It was a disaster. He would call me to tell me what I needed to be doing to run my company. The root of the problem was that I assumed that there was a “right way” to do things and I needed to do it that way.

There isn’t a “right way.” When it’s your company, there’s one way: your way. The lessons you learn along the way are yours alone and they are your most precious assets.

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Get the brand-new Expanded and Updated 4-Hour Workweek, published 12/15, which includes more than 50 new case studies (including families) of luxury lifestyle design, muse creation, and world travel.

Odds and Ends Elsewhere:
How to Tim Ferriss Your Love Life
Tim Ferriss – angel investments and start-ups

“So, do you have any ideas?”

“Well, if we’re going to do something, it should be big. It should make people sit up and say OMFG. Make people actually do something,” I responded.

The conversation continued in front of the Thai restaurant, me pacing on my cell phone in San Francisco — foregoing food in excitement — and Tobi in his offices in Ottawa, Canada.

We decided in the subsequent 10 minutes to offer $100,000 cash as a bribe to you all. The overview?

* $100,000 for the grand winner
* $120,000 total in prizes
* 6 months starting January 1 but you can (and should) get started now
* Even if you don’t win the prizes, you should end up with a viable business at the end of 6 months

The details make it even better…

Background

Randy and Nicola Wilburn in the above photo, featured in BusinessWeek’s “Mom-and-Pop Multinationals“, are just two of the thousands of people in 35 countries who have used the steps in The 4-Hour Workweek as a basis to create near- or fully-automated businesses. The principles of automation have been equally applied within both Fortune and Inc. 500 companies.

The problem?

Some things just aren’t as simple in execution as they appear on paper. If there is one place where readers fail or give up, it is on such automated “muses”, as such automated businesses are called in book to abbreviate.

It’s most often due to lack of technical skills, lack of testing abilities, or — much more often — simple intimidation and failure to attempt it at all. The truth: it’s easier to continue in the predictable and comfortable mediocrity of the 9-to-5 than to start a business. It seems too big and there is little perceived incentive to change.

Let’s change that.

Tobi Lutke is the CEO of Shopify. Several months ago, I polled more than 50,000 Twitter users about e-commerce platforms, and the near-unanimous response was that Shopify offered the easiest-to-use full-service platform in existence. I’d never heard of them.

It seems I was late to the party.

From Pixar to Tesla, Pamela Anderson to Amnesty International, I saw slick design after slick design, all of which could be set up in minutes. Even Google Website Optimizer is built-in for testing. I was so surprised and impressed that I became an advisor upon meeting Tobi at RailsConf.

I want to give you a reason to finally take the jump with full confidence. Here’s what we’re doing:

The Competition – More Than One Winner

Shopify and I are running a 6-month “Build Your Business” competition. The store with the most revenue for two consecutive months (we’ll use your best two) wins $100,000.

There are other runner-up prizes, and there will be worthwhile surprises. To support you with the tools and skills you need, there will be expert tutorials on critical subjects (like Google Adwords testing, design, etc.) on a monthly basis at minimum, posts on this blog with real-life examples, and more.

The bullets:

* $100,000 for the grand winner
* $120,000 total in prizes
* 6 months starting January 1 but you can (and should) get started now. Even two weeks of practice will give you a massive advantage. I strongly suggest playing with it now.
* The best two consecutive months of sales count
* Even if you don’t win the prizes, you should end up with a viable business at the end of 6 months
* The steps and details in the new, expanded 4-Hour Workweek will be used as ground-zero for instructions
* Contest open — unfortunately — to US residents only. Please see “Afterword” below for why you should do it regardless. The tools and guidance will be available to all entrants.

Outside the US? Perhaps you should just incorporate a US company online? But – I’m no lawyer. Speak with a professional first and read the fine print. Be sure to read the FAQ, which opens up even more opportunities.

[Update: there is a new forum on Shopify for questions and feedback about the contest]

Tens of thousands of online stores have been created with Shopify: everything from Nerdbots to CrossFit.

Will you be next? I know a Fortune 500 company employee who’s quitting in 2010 because his Shopify store makes more than $1,000,000 per year. Not bad for a side gig!

If you’ve thought of starting a muse but have put it off or given up, here are two reasons to make 2010 the year that changes everything:

$100,000 and know-how guidance from experts. Though I’m an advisor, I receive no commission or payment whatsoever for this competition. It’s to get more people to pull the trigger.

If you decide not to pull the trigger, ask yourself “why not?” If not now, then when?

This competition is intended as a benevolent and encouraging kick in the ass. This stuff isn’t rocket science, but it does require stepping outside your comfort zone for a bit to realize: this isn’t that hard. It’s just unfamiliar. If you do it now, a lot of people will be in the same boat and you’ll take the trip together.

No more excuses. Click here to learn how simple it can be.

[Update: there is a new forum on Shopify for questions and feedback about the contest]

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Frequently Asked Questions with Tobi

[The most up-to-date FAQ is on the contest page here]

> Rachel: Can you sell a combination of affiliate products and your own products through shopify?

Yes absolutely. In fact we highly encourage our customers to source extra products that round off the product offering. A lot of our customers started by selling just a single product and later on started cross selling related products between their stores for additional sales.

> BrianReid: Can we use a drop shipper like Doba for products?

Yes, Shopify even integrates directly with drop shippers and consignment warehouses such as Shipwire, Webgistix and Amazon fulfillment. These services are really the key to fully automate your online store because manual shipping is labor intensive. At Shopify we have something called the App Store (http://apps.shopify.com) which allows you to add extensions to your store (think a mix of wordpress plugins and facebook apps). I know there are a few developers currently working on Doba integration.

> Erica: I’m using 1ShoppingCart right now. Can I just move stuff over to Shopify and qualify, or does it have to be a new business?

The point of this competition is to encourage people to create new businesses. If you could simply move a million or multi million dollar business over to Shopify and take the pot then the entire thing would be fairly uninteresting. So in other words, moving an existing business over: no go. Creating a new, related business that you organically grow from the start without simply redirecting your old store: OK.

That being said, we would love to get your existing business on Shopify. If you want to talk more in depth about this, contact me at tobi[at]shopify.com.

> Erica: For the Shopify folks: Do you offer a 1-click post-sale upsell feature like Upsell Express from 1SC?

I’m not familiar with the 1-click post-sale product but marketing to prior clients is a big part of Shopify. We have great integration with Sendloop, Vertical Response, Campaign Monitor and all such services. Through the App Store that I mentioned earlier there are also some really exciting new apps being developed that help people find related products that go well with their current cart content. Shopify is a very flexible platform.

Afterword

Gross revenue and US residents only? A case study in technology and real-life lawyering…

First and foremost, the best prize we can offer is this: your own near-automated, cash-flow positive business at the end of six months. The $100,000 is just a catalyst, a push. The former is, as the proverb goes, teaching you to fish, whereas the latter is handing over a single fish.

No contest is perfect. Shopify can’t verify net profit (without private investigators proving margins), so revenue is used as the measuring stick, which is trackable. Does this handicap you if you sell comic books instead of race cars? Not necessarily. It just means you’ll need to sell more units. Important: the most any single transaction can be applied the contest is $5,000.

Life is a competition. The rules were the best we could put together without making it impossibly complicated.

But, what’s up with the “limited to US residents” and all that?

From a post on Etsy about their own contest challenges (the whole post is worth a read):

Etsy is an international site. We have buyers and sellers from all around the globe. And we love our community. To solely enable U.S. residents to participate in an aspect of our site did not sit well with me or with Etsy. So I called an attorney who specializes in contest law to find an alternative. Unfortunately, his response supported my disappointing findings. He explained that in order to hold an international contest, Etsy would need to consult a licensed attorney who specializes in contest law for each and every country eligible for the contest. And, in fact, for many countries a translator would have to draft the rules. “How much would this cost and how much time would it take?” I innocently asked the contest law attorney. His two-word answer was most discouraging: “a lot.”

Here is Tobi’s version, especially frustrating, considering that Shopify is based in Canada!

“When putting together the contest we really wanted to make it a contest for anyone, anywhere in the world. Throughout the planning I spent more hours on the phone with lawyers than I’d care to admit to anyone. Unfortunately, as time when on, it became clear that it would be impossible to hold the contest anywhere outside the US without fundamentally altering the original concept.

Without going into too much detail, the crux of the matter is the classification of the contest as a game of chance versus a game of skill. Apparently, being good at selling stuff online is considered chance by many agencies and therefore would be governed by Lottery laws, as silly as this sounds.

That being said, you can still participate in this contest wherever you are. The prize money is significant, but don’t forget the spirit of the contest: to give a kick in the pants to all those people who have wanted to start businesses but haven’t. The real prize is having a business of your own at the end of the six months. You’ll still have all the same resources and guides as everyone else: support from the Shopify team, help and guidance from Tim and other experts, and more control over your financial independence.”

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Elsewhere on the web:

Get the brand-new Expanded and Updated 4-Hour Workweek, published 12/15, which includes more than 50 new case studies (including families) of luxury lifestyle design, muse creation, and world travel.

The 4-Hour Workweek was first published April 27th, 2007.

I did my best to cover all of the bases when it debuted, but there were gaps. Though I included cases studies of families using lifestyle design, for example, it was hard to find more than a few the first time around.

Not anymore. Things have changed. There are more than 30,000 comments on this blog, hundreds of people have shared their successes and failures via detailed e-mail, and both case studies and experiments continue to flow in from around the world.

This doesn’t mean that the current edition doesn’t do the job — it does — but more than 40 printings and 35 languages later, a new and expanded edition has finally been completed…

This new version includes all of the updates and additions that I’ve wanted to make for the last 2.5 years, including more than 50 case studies from readers, as well as 100+ pages of new content. Many of the “tools and tricks” resources have been completely revised to reflect testing with newer and better technologies.

The book publishes December 15th but is available for preorder here at a 30% discount. Why not get some X-mas shopping done early? :)

The graphics in this post are the new cover and jacket, which you voted on here. Thank you all so much for the wonderful input and conversation, both online and in real-life.

I learn more from you than I could ever hope to teach.

I hope you love this new edition as much as I do (larger font in second graphic):

Pre-order it here for 30% off the cover price, making it less than $15.

If you’re in media and would like to discuss exclusive interviews, stories, or segments, please email amy-at-fourhourworkweek-dot-com with “4HWW Media” in the subject line.

Have a beautiful weekend!

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Odds and ends elsewhere on the web:
Tim Ferriss on TED – Smash Fear, Learn Anything
How to Tim Ferriss Your Love Life (from WordCamp 2009)

Napoleon, though mostly known as a little man with a funny hat, is regarded as one of history’s great commanders. He was also well-known for his unusual but effective methods of information management.

Here are just two examples from Ralph Waldo Emerson’s essay entitled “Napoleon, or The Man of the World“…

His instructions to his secretary at the Tuileries are worth remembering. “During the night, enter my chamber as seldom as possible. Do not awake me when you have any good news to communicate; with that there is no hurry. But when you bring bad news, rouse me instantly, for then there is not a moment to be lost.”

It was a whimsical economy of the same kind which dictated his practice, when general in Italy, in regard to his burdensome correspondence. He directed Bourrienne to leave all letters unopened for three weeks, and then observed with satisfaction how large a part of the correspondence had thus disposed of itself and no longer required an answer.

(hat tip to Ryan Holiday for the source)

He was also a source of excellent quotes that can act as decision-making guideposts. To wit:

“Nothing is more difficult, and therefore more precious, than to be able to decide.”
“Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.”
“He who knows how to flatter also knows how to slander.”
“Never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence.”

Read more on Napoleon’s military strategy here, aptly referred to as “Napoleonic strategy”.

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Odds and Ends: Short Interview from London, Comment from the Philippines

Ryan Carson interviewed me in London yesterday, and we covered a number of topics more and more people have asked about, including: favorite software and tech, more detail on outsourcing e-mail and the inbox (the fundamentals are in “The Holy Grail: How to Outsource the Inbox and Never Check Email Again“), application of 4HWW and lifestyle design during a recession, and much more.

If the video doesn’t display for you below, it can be found here. I hope you enjoy it.

—

I’ll let this comment, from another post on the blog (The Art of Letting Bad Things Happen, which I reference in the video), speak for itself. From a virtual assistant (business process outsourcing) in the Philippines:

I am a writer in the Philippines employed by a BPO company which caters to clients in the US needing virtual assistants, and I speak on the latter’s behalf as I get to observe them everyday.

I am sorry to disappoint AAndrews, but as “laborers” in the Philippines “making the cost of Americans’ dream activities less and so affordable”, a VA’s life is not all that bad so there really is no need to guilt Tim Ferriss and others like him who rely on virtual assistants. The VAs in our company may get just a pittance of what personal assistants get paid in the US, but it is still a win-win situation because the cost of living here is after all not as high as the US’s. This case with the VAs and others like them is not the vile, repulsive thing that child labor is.

Those of us in BPO companies are professionals happy to be able to stay in our country doing work we like. We are aware of the gulf between our pay and yours, but you see, with our salaries, we get to live like your average young professionals. We make rent, send our kids to school, enjoy time with friends, indulge in hobbies, dress decently.

Here as in anywhere else, your lifestyle is a choice you make.