I began reading this book as a skeptic: it seemed to be doing too much without the depth necessary to do it well. However, I’m glad I kept reading, because Chris Guillebeau really comes through in the second half of the book.

At the center of the book is Guillebeau’s simple, but insightful, view that an ideal career requires the combination of love, money, and “flow.” In other words, what you do has to bring you joy, it has to bring an income, and it has to challenge you enough that you lose a sense of time. In other words, it should be effortless. This is easier said than done, especially when there seems to be almost always a trade-off between “fun” work and well-paid work. The best jobs, on the other hand, are hyper-competitive.

Now, to Guillebeau’s credit, he spends extensive time writing about ways that readers can create their own work outside of the confines of any extant workplace. Side hustles get a lot of attention in this book. In principle, I’m opposed to turning everything into a side hustle, as so much current messaging urges us to do. But, they do have a place for those needing fulfillment outside of their full-time job. The fact that they’re so necessary is a sign of a larger breakdown in workplace structures: a disparity between meaning and need, or income and need. But, we must also be pragmatic, and it’s very difficult to change the world just by talking about it.

More helpful is his commentary on inventing roles for yourself, doing them, and pulling your own income. I had long thought of “building your own business” or “your own work” as something organizational. I thought about it in concrete terms, like forming a restaurant, creating a product, and so on. This is one way of doing this sort of work, and–in my head–it stood in stark contrast to “freelancing” (which is the main way of doing things now in creative industries and, to lesser extent, in consulting). However, Guillebeau helped me to reframe the barrier between “freelancing’ and “creating a business.”

Thanks to his book, I was able to think closely about ideas that I have and maybe start to put them into effect. That alone, makes it valuable, and I think there’s something here that most readers will find resonate with them. That “something” will be subjective, but it will be helpful nonetheless. It’s certainly a book worth reading!