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Quitter by Jon Acuff
Closing the Gap Between Your Day Job & Your Dream Job

My Thoughts

Practical advice and action steps for pursuing your dream career and starting a side hustle. At the end of the summary are action steps that I put into practice after reading.

My Favorite Quotes

• Discipline begets discipline.
• 90% perfect and shared with the world always changes more lives than 100% perfect and stuck in your head.
• You have a 100% chance of not achieving your dream if you never try.
• “It’s too late to start now” is a lie.
• Work hard at your day job; it is preparation for your dream job.
• Right now the size of your dream probably outweighs your ability by tenfold.
• Don’t succeed at becoming someone you do not want to be.

Best Questions

• What have I done in my life that I love doing?
• What do I love enough to do for free?
• What do I do that causes time to feel different?
• What do I enjoy doing regardless of the opinions of other people?
• If only your life changed, would that be enough?
• Are there any patterns in the things you like doing?

General Book Information

• Author’s blog: stuffchristianslike.net
• Author’s website: acuff.me
• Author is a Christian
• Author is a public speaker
• References to other authors or books: Dave Ramsey, Michael Hyatt, Seth Godin, and Malcom Gladwell.

Chapter 1: Don’t Quit Your Day Job

Author’s 5 criteria for accepting a speaking engagement.

1. Are they willing to pay my fee?
2. Will I be speaking to an influential crowd?
3. Will I be associated with other influential speakers at the event?
4. Will I already be in the area speaking somewhere else?
5. Is this a unique chance to share an important idea with a new audience?

People with jobs tend to have more creative freedom than people without jobs. If you have a job you can be more selective and take more risks.

Discipline begets discipline.

Dreams take planning, purpose, and progress to succeed. Quitting your job does not jump start your dream.

Success comes when preparation meets opportunity.

Figuring it out as you go is not a plan.
To learn to be focused and dedicated to your dream, practice being dedicated and focused at work.

Want to give your dream the best shot at success? Learn how to be successful at work.

Your day job can be your dream job’s biggest ally.

Chapter 2: Removing the “I’m” from your “But”

We get drunk on the idea of what might be and ignore what already is.
We don’t know what we want, but this isn’t it.

Your gift is something, not nothing. This is scary for three reasons:

1. Nothing can’t hurt you.
2. Nothing is comfortable.
3. Nothing is normal.

Are you trying to discover your something, or recover your something?

Instead of asking “What do I want to do with my life?” Ask “What have I done in my life that I love doing?”

Comb your history for hints that will reveal your something. Hitch a ride on your rewarding past.
Look for “hinge moments.”

In search of the hinge.
Mercedes SLR car design.
Adding a hinge to the ignition button on the gear shift.

Questions to ask yourself to discover your hinge moments:

1. What do I love enough to do for free?
2. What do I do that causes time to feel different? Time shifts when doing what you love.
3. What do I enjoy doing regardless of the opinions of other people?
4. If only your life changed, would that be enough?
5. Are there any patterns in the things you like doing?

Love yourself enough to write down your answers.

Hinge moments can be happy or sad.

Chapter 3: What Lies Between a Day Job and a Dream Job

Three ways we look at fear

1. Magnifying Glass
2. Kaleidoscope (fears and worries are jumbled and multiplied)
3. Telescope

The problem with perfection.
Do what you love with the life you already have.
90% perfect and shared with the world always changes more lives than 100% perfect and stuck in your head.

The things you create and share will always outperform the things that stay stuck in your head or laptop.

The business that is open will always outsell the business that is closed.

If your goal is to change the world you have to step out and share your stuff. You may have to get comfortable with A- work.

The land of perfect is a myth. Perfect does not exist. Quit perfect.

Strive for great but not perfect.

Internal conversation with himself: Later Jon vs Today Jon. Stop the internal discussion to do things later by deciding now and scheduling your time in advance.

You have a 100% chance of not achieving your dream if you never try.

“It’s too late to start now.” Is a lie.

“It would be easier if…” not true.

Chapter 4: Falling In Like with a Job You Don’t Love

Success at your dream job does not necessarily mean the instant death of your day job.
The author’s take-home income was $13k from his first book advance of $30k.

The incubation of a dream.
Every dream takes longer than you want it to take.
Don’t rush it, give it time to incubate.
March 21, 2008, started stuff Christians like blog.
Accepted job with Dave Ramsey in 2010.

How to think like Leonard da Vinci
Da Vinci planned parties for his patrons, worked a day job while he pursued his passion.
We do a tremendous disservice to our dream jobs when we talk about pursuing them to the detriment of our day job.
Platform and the Prison principle.
Be patient and deliberate.
Work hard at your day job; it is preparation for your dream job.

Look for the parallels between your day job and dream job.
Three questions to ask yourself regarding your dream job:

1. Why?
2. How much time can you give it?
3. How can you start small?

Look for freelance jobs on Craigslist, etc.
Look for purpose.

How does your dream job improve your day job?
Author’s example of the desire to help and impact people. He was ignoring his co-workers. He started seeing them as real people and trying to impact and encourage them.
See the purpose of your dream at your job.

Three easy ways to ruin your day job and your dream job in the process:

1. Steal from work.
2. Think of your job as your adversary, not your advocate.
3. Demand that your job meets the needs of your dream.

Stop swimming in tennis courts.
Two options if you do not love your job:

1. Change your job
2. You change

Chapter 5: Wait on the Main Stage

The plan myth.
You must have passion before you need a plan
Second, you need practice.

What you need:

1. Passion
2. Practice
3. Plan

Right now the size of your dream probably outweighs your ability by tenfold.

Seth Godin and the dip.
Enjoy your invisibility.
The Nebraska Years.

Chapter 6: There Will be Hustle

Dreams start in the morning.
Like vs Love list.
When you get busy doing the things that matter to you, you have more time to do the things you love and less time to do the things you like.

The unfortunate relationship between quality and quantity.
Quantity leads to quality. The more you practice your dream the better you get at your dream.
The author wrote 500,000 words on his blog before publishing a 50,000-word book.

Three things the author learned about giving away free content for over 3 years.

1. People won’t pay for what they can get for free
2. Weigh the long-term benefits of doing something for free
3. Free pays dividends toward expertise

Don’t compare yourself to your competition.
The author is friends with and looks up to Michael Hyatt. If he compares himself to his blog it would discourage him. But they have different dreams and experience and there is no need to compare himself with Michael Hyatt.
Let the competition serve as a source of motivation not measurement.

Be wary of analytics and letting stats control you. Don’t create the content to generate traffic.
Your message must be true and honest and come from the core of what you care about.
Measure your hustle/effort; that you can control. Don’t measure traffic, you can’t control it.

Nielsen’s book scan is a tool to measure a book sale.

Make sure you know what to do with success

Chapter 7: Learn to be Successful at Success

More dreamers fail in success than in failure.
We are often woefully unprepared for the challenges that come with success.
Attention
Opportunities
Arrogance

Define your “enough” before you hit your first wave of success.
Instead of chasing enough, you have to define enough.
Pat Riley, the disease of more.

Futureme.org
Send an email to your future self.

Don’t burn out.
Don’t burn the candle at both ends.

Do not confuse hustle with burnout.
Hustle fills you up; burnout empties you.
Hustle renews your energy; burnout drains it.
Hustle impacts every other aspect of your life in a positive way as your learn to prioritize the things that matter; burnout impacts every other aspect in your life in a negative way as your dream becomes the only thing that matters.

The land of later is a myth.
Your kids and your spouse do not live in later. Do not neglect them while pursuing your dream.

There will always be a little more success just out of reach.
Example of a $2k bonus which was worth $3/hr over the course of the year. Not worth it.

Don’t turn your platform into a prison.
Share your platform with guest posters.
The yes side of saying no.
Ask yourself: if I say yes and am successful, what will be the long term outcome?

Don’t succeed at becoming someone you do not want to be.

You don’t want to get really good at something less significant than your dream.

Chapter 8: Quit Your Day Job

Scorecard.
How the author knew it was time to quit his day job:

1. He had somewhere to land.
2. The opportunity fit our opportunity filter. Build your own filter.
3. He tested the dream before he quit.
4. They had a support network.
5. He had the support of readers of his blog.
6. God seemed cool with it.

Rules
Set guidelines.

Create a risk list.

Epilogue

Why you won’t follow the advice in this book.
You think work is never meant to be fulfilling.

Start where you are, start with what you have, start today!

888-406-7640
Call this number and tell yourself where you want to be in 6 months, 1 year and 3 years

My Action Steps After Reading

• I started seeing my co-workers and friends as real people and trying to impact and encourage them.
• Started this blog and my Metal PM blog (now merged here)
• Wrote my future self an email at Futureme.org

Hope you enjoyed this and got value from my notes.
This is the 2nd book in my 2018 reading list.
📚Here is my complete list of book summaries.

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