Also let me know if there are any hiccups with the delivery of ‘Bali on the Cheap’; it should be included in your confirmation email. I hope you find it helpful. Thanks again and all the best.

Wow! My husband and I have been planning for a move to Bali for a few months now. Your blog post was extremely well-written and spoke to our hearts. We’re looking specifically at the Lovina area because we read it is one of the more secluded areas. I’ve signed up for your newsletter and anxiously await the e-delivery of Bali on the Cheap!

Thank you so very much! Maybe when we arrive, we can meet in person and enjoy one of those extra-long lunch-dinner afternoon-evenings

Michele

I’ve been pondering a worthy reply since the 18th.

I do agree that there are endless possibilities and that time is indeed an unstoppable elephant. My mental journey into ‘wage freedom’ began when I read Ferriss’ book. Since then I’ve discovered six quit-your-job blogs that I can stand to read and each post gets me further and further out of the prostitute mindset. However I feel these crushing responsibilities to my wife to secure at least a tenable income before quitting the golden handcuff job.

My best thinking is something like: “Okay, you are definitely not working here until your 67 years old (the year 2037 – gasp). But you have to have a plan and you have to exploit the system the way it has exploited you. The path to your wage freedom is through this W2 job until you have a replacement income. Yeah, you have to keep your mouth shut and put up with incompetence, but think of your wife and cheap health insurance.”

So, the income streams I’m working on still require the prostitute mindset, where the income is the end, not the means, to my happiness. And TIME. Precious TIME. 40 hours a week in exchange for money. I am slowly realizing that the more TIME I spend at this job, the longer it’s going to take me to find the means to be in the top 1% of happiest people on the planet. I know it wont take a million dollars and that’s not my reservation, that’s not what I’m waiting for. What I mean is, your post here reminds me that my passion, or my current trade, are probably NOT going to bring me the means aka Dreamline income. The happiness should be my goal, not having to endure working at my trade until the passive income is great enough.

Looking forward to Part Two!

Sometimes specifics are helpful, before we leap. If you’d like info on getting set up as well as recent prices you can take a look at my free 19-page E-guide on saving money in Bali for expats. I’m still getting the auto-responder set up but if you leave your email in the signup box in the right sidebar I will make sure ‘Bali on the Cheap’ gets to you. If you need help with practicalities (or the psychological hurdles) of your move let me know how I can help. Good luck Jean! —Tom

Thank you very much
Regards
Jean

Don’t you think today holds more endless enriching possibilities for the average person than any other time in history? For this reason it’s never been more crucial to break free from doing what we do for money if the best part of us suspects we can do better. Tempus fugit. We need creative thinking, courage to follow a path we devise, but maybe most of all a willingness to work at least as hard for ourselves as we do for an employer. Luckily, along with the possibilities, we have more methods we can use to liberate ourselves practically and psychologically.

Wondering what you mean by ‘my best thinking will continue to enslave me’ Joe? Please elaborate.

Thanks for the Reddit submission too Joe; hundreds of people visited from it the link in the first few hours.

I read 4HWW in the summer of ’10 and have been perplexed as to why mentality has been slower to change than my actions. This post is sublime to me in that every thought resonates. It’s like the one nugget I have been trying to find within. I see now that my best thinking will continue to enslave me. Thank you for saving my life, today, and please consider posting MOAR!!!

Oh yes, Bali: well with no advance planning at all you’ll get off the airplane and get a 1-month ‘visa on arrival’. As of Jan 2012 you can extend that one more month; the extension is about US$27 then you have to leave.

With a little planning beforehand you can get a social visa (‘sosial budaya’), about US$60, which lets you stay for two months and then extend each month until you’ve been here six months, then you must go. The invite letter you need is quite easy/cheap, my friend here has been helping me for years and has helped other friends of mine with it also. You get the social visa before you come to Indonesia, simply go to an Indonesian Embassy anywhere with the invite letter.

Good luck there Mike, maybe we’ll see you in Bali sometime, lots going on no matter what you’re looking for. –Tom from Seminyak