![]() ![]() What if the prospect of penury comes to be realised? I have experienced this on my own pathless path, which I would not have so named before I read Millerd’s book. It is to say that in turning down contracts he sees as unsatisfying, Millerd renders himself vulnerable to the anxiety that he may regret his insouciance. Employees are at risk of losing their jobs and even, through no faulty act they foresaw, their reputations. That is not to say that he actually is more exposed. But he recognises that in living his sort of life, prioritising what he can offer over what he can earn, he will feel more exposed to the risk that he will meet with hard times. He has slashed his expenditures, and recommends planning. ![]() Millerd believes that he will sustain himself, and the book has been only one of his projects. He is not so silly as to assume this won’t happen. Keen-eyed readers will spot the metaphorical fly in the ointment here, which is the possibility that what comes next will not generate enough revenue to replace Millerd’s book sales and savings. Not as much as he was making in a year from his corporate job, but more than enough to support him in Taiwan, with his wife and new child, while he figures out what will come next. Royalties ~131k / $5.14 per book /rljw2fKRqs- Paul Millerd May 30, 2023 ![]() Millerd’s Twitter account has offered this proposition anecdotal support by revealing the sums earned from his self-published book, which exceeded US$130,000 in its first 18 months.Īpril and May have been my best two months – hit 25k in 500 days. Millerd proposes that a determined individual can eke out a subsistence living, at least, from participating as a sole trader in the market for ideas, if that is the work that they want to keep doing – his description for work that is intrinsically motivated. Over the 90 years since, the knowledge economy has become much more fertile. There is an echo here of the 1932 Bertrand Russell essay In Praise of Idleness, in which the renowned mathematician observed that his contemporaries over-valued productivity and were much the worse for their mistaken priorities. And not just any contribution, but one you experience as satisfying your desire to contribute. The Pathless Path (2022) is subtitled Imagining a New Story for Work and Life, and at the bottom of Millerd’s proposal is a shift in focus from making money to making a contribution. The point of this leap into space is to relax your grip on the belief that adult life is foremost about making money, an assumption that Millerd claims plausibly is widely held and less widely examined. But he suspects that more unhappy wage-slaves are in that position than wish to admit it. Millerd acknowledges that such moves are available only to those who can secure food and shelter while bereft of an income. In his recent book The Pathless Path, former corporate strategist Paul Millerd argues for a more adventurous approach, encouraging restless employees to leave well-paid positions while endowed with only a vague sense of what they’d like to do next. “Never leave a job before you’ve lined up another” is broadly considered wise counsel. ![]() What do you do when you’re tired of your job? The standard answer is that you look for another one, through either a promotion or a change of employer. ![]()
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