Conventional wisdom continues to herd the masses into college and jobs. Yet, college and jobs fail most of the people who engage in them.
The reason college doesn't pay off for most people is that they have no idea what they want from it. So they invest 4 years (5% of their entire lifespan!), incur tens of thousands in debt and exit college with the same unremarkable skills as millions of other people. Then they all compete for the same jobs, with most losing that competition and having to settle for lesser jobs or no job at all.
This is clearly insane. Someone just has to say it. Most people who attend college are idiots and most people who graduate college are still idiots. I define "idiot" as someone willing to "invest" four years and tens of thousands of dollars to get a "return" that could've been achieved in a few months and a few thousand dollars. Or less.
Stay with me here. There's a big payoff.
No matter what your age, you can achieve these same benefits by skipping college completely and just attending targeted training classes. These classes can be found online, in community colleges, in technical and vocational schools and through self-study using books, the Internet and speaking to people who have already achieved what you desire.
You can learn how to perform many marketable skills in a matter of weeks or months if you just focus on that. You can make connections and gain social benefits in every activity that takes you outside your home. College doesn't have a monopoly on those benefits.
You can also get an education from working an entry-level job in an industry that lights you up. The education is free and you even get a paycheck while learning skills you can use later. You'll make connections and gain social benefits at a job too.
But let's back up.
This is also insane! Time is far more valuable than money. So trading 40 years of work so you can retire for the last 15 years of your life is a bad, bad trade. Yet most people never even question the wisdom of taking a job.
What is this fascination with jobs? Jobs are the absolute WORST way to earn income because they require you to trade something priceless (time and freedom) for something common and melting in value (money). Yet everyone brainlessly keeps marching into jobs. Worse yet, we teach our kids to do it.
Conventional wisdom keeps jamming kids into college, smothering them in debt and in the best-case scenario, working them like dogs for 40 years. The top five percent of these "successful" people scrimp and save enough money for decades so they can retire at age 65. The remaining 95% (who didn't have the income levels or the self-discipline to save and invest) are screwed and just work until they die.
Insane, insane, insane.
There is another way.
Skip college.
Skip jobs.
It's no harder to learn how to buy and operate passive income streams than it is to get an associates degree. You just have to focus on what you ultimately want and then logically take the shortest path to get there. There are ways to buy businesses and income properties with little or no money. The skills and techniques are just part of your education.
Once your passive income exceeds your monthly bills, you are free of a schedule and a job for the rest of your life! Right now! No waiting until age 65.
I recently helped a 30-year-old buy an asset that generates more passive income than his full-time job as a chef. He's now free to quit that job and "retire" any time he wants. Or if he still enjoys the job, keep it. But now he has the choice. His passive income stream is secure forever. He's only 30!
When you own the asset that provides your income, you can't be fired. You can't outlive your income like conventional retirement accounts, because your asset gives you fresh income every month. You don't have to worry about stock market crashes because you have no money invested in stocks or retirement accounts. You don't have to worry about strangers holding your life savings for 40 years because YOU hold your money and keep using it to buy additional passive income streams.
Once you've purchased enough assets that pay for your life with passive income, you're free to use your time any way you like.
Want to become a lawyer? Fine. Go to college now. You can afford it, you know what you want out of it and you don't have to depend on getting a job so you can eat.
When you have financial and time freedom, you can live any amazing life you desire. And you can be "retired" by age 25 or 30 instead of age 65 or never.
They know what they're doing to you. You don't.
But now you do.
Are you wise enough to consider skipping college and skipping jobs and going right to the passive income that frees you forever? Are you wise enough to learn how to BUY your own income streams so you never have to worry about horrible bosses, layoffs and grueling work schedules again? Are you wise enough to learn how to retire within 12 months instead of working decades and hoping you can retire at age 65?
There are tens of thousands of businesses and income properties that generate passive income for sale right now. Fortunately for people like you and me, all those college graduates and job holders don't even know they exist.
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Mike Johnson made the journey from jobs to freelance writer to entrepreneur to passive income and early retirement. Today he teaches people how to skip right to passive income and early retirement at WorldsBestWriter.com .
Once I learned how to BUY passive income, I stopped chasing the bucks and the bucks started chasing me!