How to Do What You Love from Anywhere in the World

WORK IS MAKING PEOPLE WEIRD.

Imagine this:

You wake up, shuffle into the office, and someone hands you a toothbrush. “Start brushing,” they say. So you do. You brush until your gums feel like hamburger meat. Then, before you can even put the toothbrush down, some asshole walks over to critique your grip. “Hmm, maybe hold it more synergistically.”

You brush again. And again. By 10:00 a.m., you’ve brushed your teeth so many times you’re pretty sure you’ve sanded them down to tiny Tic Tacs. You get thirty whole minutes off to not brush your teeth, before being herded back to the sink to keep going, arm aching, jaw numb, surrounded by thirty other dead-eyed people brushing their teeth in unison like some kind of oral-hygiene cult.

You’re clock-watching, counting down the minutes until you can stop, leave, and reclaim your humanity…only to realize you’ve got to come back and do it all again tomorrow. For years. Until you die.

And the reason? Because they give you money to brush your teeth.

It’s not just repetitive. It’s not just demoralizing. It’s an industrialized drain on your mind, body, and biceps—a slow, polite lobotomy dressed up as “professionalism.” And the scariest part? You get used to it. You stop noticing you’re bleeding at the gums. You start telling yourself it’s normal.

Shouldn’t you be grateful?

This is, of course, a ridiculous over-dramatization, but also—is it?

I can’t help but think that by living life long-term this way, and working this way for decades on end, there are other social and personal repercussions. Like, for example:

• The permanent “Sunday Dread” face. You start looking like you’re bracing for bad news even at your kid’s birthday party.
• Relationships that run on fumes. You’re so drained by sink time that all your partner gets is a grunted “uh-huh” while you scroll Instagram in bed.
• Social isolation disguised as “self-care.” You keep bailing on friends because the idea of having one more conversation after work makes your brain melt. (BEEN THERE.)
• Loss of personality range. You realize you haven’t laughed from your gut in months. You’ve been living in polite chuckles and “lol”s for so long, you’re basically a human LinkedIn post.
• Decision-making atrophy. Your brain gets so used to running on autopilot that even choosing between tacos or pizza for dinner feels overwhelming.
• Micromanagement creep. You start critiquing your spouse’s grocery bagging method with the same condescending corporate cadence that ruined your Tuesday.
• Attention span collapse. You can’t follow a movie plot anymore without mentally tabbing back to an imaginary work email.
• Hobbies that turn into chores. You catch yourself treating your painting class like it has KPIs.
• Chronic time scarcity. Every free hour feels like a countdown clock instead of a gift, so you never actually rest.
• Identity erosion. You slowly become “that person from work” instead of an actual human with their own life—and you start believing it’s enough.

What a mental wedgie, am I right? 🔪

The old way of working is killing us.

I’d much prefer the new way of working:

Waking up and making your coffee while listening to an audio note from a friend; heading out onto the porch to write down your fresh morning ideas in your notebook with a giant cup of coffee and a breeze tickling your tatas; spending the first few hours of your day LITERALLY TURNED ON by the passion project you’re working on; thinking to yourself, ‘I’m so PUMPED to do this work, to dig in, to make something new’; taking a break at lunchtime to plant a big-ass box of new flowers that just arrived (oh shit, they don’t fill the window boxes! emergency!); taking a ride down the dirt roads for a nice bottle of wine with dinner; coming back and looking at plane tickets to Ireland (for the month? the year?); hopping on Slack to type to clients that feel more like friends; spending the day moving your favorite ideas forward; feeling certain that money flows to you, that life is full of ease, that you are exactly where you need to be.

Ahhhhh, yes. You feel the ease in your shoulders? You feel that little spritz of relief?

I’ve been exploring this theme and writing about this subject for 15 years now: old work vs new work. And how to reinvent your career, pursue your passions, and work from anywhere in the world remotely. And, you know what stops most people?

Not knowing how to brush their teeth any other way. 🪥

We can get oral hygiene differently, nowadays! 🤣 (Ooooohhh, must stay away from word ‘oral.’)

We can make a living differently, nowadays.

But, we gotta reprogram our heads about what ‘work’ looks like.

The Old Way of Work 🪦

• Cling to the safe
• Lead with what won’t rock the boat
• Your boredom bores everyone
• Surrounded by people in same predicament
• You get paid to keep the lights on

The New Way of Work 🚀

• Chase the thrill
• Lead with what lights you up
• Your spark sparks others
• The right people come running
• You get paid to make it real

Most of us are still influenced by outdated ideas about what ‘work’ looks like—and, thus, what makes us look “smart.” Remember when we did things because we wanted to look smart?! *looks wistfully at 11th grade school essay on becoming a CEO*.

Smart equaled safe, responsible, reliable, dependable, predictable, practical, and humble. Which is why you’re now the proud owner of three “World’s Best Employee 🏆” mugs, a LinkedIn endorsement from your dentist (BAHAHAHA), and a soul that sighs every time someone says “circle back.”

My amazing client, Sigute (she’s a freakin’ genius who helps multipassionates with their personal brands and ALSO happens to look like a Swedish supermodel), is the queen of talking about updating your mental operating system—and it’s just the perfect way to think about this.

So many of us are stuck with 1.0 mental operating systems. We think about our work the way people thought about work in the 80s, despite it being nearly 50 years later! (As an ‘84 babe, that hurts so hard to say, LOLLLLLLLLLL.)

That’s like trying to use a VHS player to stream Netflix—sure, you can mash buttons and blow in the slot all you want, but you’re not getting “Bridgerton,” you’re just getting COVID all over the tape. 🤣

This explains why I get THE QUESTION.

I always get THE QUESTION.

And THE QUESTION is:

“Soooo, but, like, what do you actually—errrrr—dooooo(???) for, like, a living(?????)”

I get this ALL. THE. TIME.

And even more ever since I bought this (questionably haunted?) farmhouse and guest cottage snack in the middle of the American countryside, from which I am (still) writing my blog—since the year of our internet lord, 2009—and not believing that I actually now know how to cut down trees 🌳 in addition to cutting down sentences with a real and actual saw 🪚?????????????

No, really. I literally cut down a baby maple tree the other day to turn it into a walking stick.

Like I said. ‘80s baby. She’s 41 now, folks. Get off my lawn, and get your own damn walking stick.

I’m going to really regret writing that thing about cutting down a baby tree, aren’t I? Why does that feel so feral? It’s not like I ate a baby DEER. Then again, I might have to. There’s a baby deer eating all of my hydrangeas. Like, every single one. And the other day she looked at me like she was about to burst into song with woodland creatures holding up my laundry. So obviously I had to forgive her… even though my hydrangeas now look like the ‘before’ photo in a landscaping horror story.

(I’m not really going to eat the baby deer. CALM DOWN. Although, to be fair, if she starts bringing friends over for an all-you-can-eat hydrangea buffet, I’m calling it a bed-and-breakfast and charging admission.)

ANYWAY—this is why, when people ask me what I do for a living, I totally want to tell them: "I’m a zoologist.” Which is absolutely a *literal* thing I have told people jokingly over the years, side-eyeing my jumbo mug of coffee, because somehow, no one (still?) believes that blogging is…a thing people do? And somehow it always makes me feel kinda silly. Like having to explain where babies come from.

But, oh my god, you guys know that blogging is (still) a thing that YOU CAN DO FOR A LIVING, RIGHT? 💰📝💰📝💰📝💰📝💰

None of this is to be confused with social media influencing, which is an entirely different Olympic sport. I think most people are turned off by anything internet-y because they assume it requires wearing a G-string while holding a skincare product and whispering “link in bio” into the void.

Meanwhile, I’m over here in sweatpants writing about rural American diners and deer crime. 🦌 The usual!

This is because I have learned, from a lifetime of writing professionally on the internet, that ‘work’ is a construct just like ‘church’ is a construct: and you can choose what you believe about it.

And thus, what you do about it.

If you want to believe that work should feel like work; that work should be 8-5; that work should be serious; that work should be stuffy; that work should be something you do on behalf of an employer; that you should get paid an hourly rate for your work; that you don’t have any options; that you aren’t creative or smart or capable; that you are just an average person with an average salary and an average job—

—then you will be an average person, with an average salary, and an average job.

Because we can only believe what we can see.

(I mean, okay, THAT statement is opening up a ripe can of worms, but don’t @ me. You know what I mean! 🤣)

The truth is, if you don’t know what your options are, how are you ever expected to use ‘em?

I’m in the business of giving you options.

You already know the traditional ones.

Let’s explore some of the more modern ones. The ones that let you wake up in a foreign country on a Monday morning. The ones that let you buy a cottage in Scotland because you feel like it. The ones that let you spend time in the park with your kids at 11 o’clock in the morning. The ones that let you write that novel, refinish that old bureau, garden in your overalls, learn how to speak French.

…All while making a generous, healthy income that supports your goals, your dreams, and your life.

Not every career requires your every waking moment to support it.

Not every job demands your whole life.

Today, technology has given us ways to earn money with our creativity that past human populations could have never; the ability to write, and photograph, and paint, and make, and design, and teach, and share—and allow the world to compensate us handsomely for our art. Our ideas. And our contributions.

No matter where we want to be in the world.

Whether that’s Paris, or an old farmhouse in the sticks.

The new way of work is the only way we can save the old way of living.

To that end, let’s workshop this together! 🤓

Let me show you how you can do what you love from anywhere in the world.

I have three goals for my students:

• Target income of $250K/year remotely
• While working 50% less (~4 hours/day)
• And traveling 500% more (~3 months/year)

Inside the free workshop, I’ll give you my step-by-step roadmap for getting there. 🗺️ 📍 🧭

All you need to do is come!

Please absolutely creep me up, because I’d LOVE to introduce you to my methods. *strokes mustache maniacally*

My signature course, Selfish School, is coming up this September, and at the end of the workshop, I’ll tell you more about that, too. Inside of Selfish School, I help people take action on the plan and execute. (You’ll also get a special deal to join early if you’re feelin’ the vibe and want this for yourself! But, I promise, no weird webinar vibes, awful teleprompter scripts, or 30 minute sales pitches. 🤢 You know I’m legit.)

The best part? 😃

This all coincides with my HUGE, FUN, HAIRY-LEGGED, UNHINGED new site launch, happening next week! 🎉 Here, you’ll see me unveil a whole new series I’ll be working on throughout 2026—and you’ll also see that blogging is still *very* much alive. 😉

(No, but really. You are gonna DIE when you see what passion project I’m working on this year. I hope it inspires you to chase big dreams and go, go, go!)

Wanna come learn how to do what you love from anywhere in the world?

COME ON IN, THE WATER’S DIVINE.

(If you can’t make it, register anyway, I’ll send out a replay!)