How You Can Be Lazy Yet Successful

Someone emailed me some very good questions the other day — questions that intrigue a lot of people:

Can someone who’s lazy really be a successful professional?

The answer is: Yes, absolutely! There are a lot of people who have understood and mastered time and money enough so that they’re successful and lazy as well. How did they do it? In a great many different creative ways of course — everyone is absolutely unique and develops their own unique methods that lead them to success. The way I did it was so simple that I can teach it to nearly everyone:

The day I turned 30, I took a sheet of paper and wrote “Ideal Scene” at the top. Then I dared to dream the kind of life I wanted ideally. It included financial success, but it also included having
a life of ease. I didn’t want to work too hard. I wanted plenty of time for other creative things, and for family, and fun. In fact — ideally — I wanted to be pretty lazy a lot of the time. That’s my natural inclination, and has been since I was a kid.

My ideal is to work when I feel like it, and not work when I feel like doing something else, especially if it involves lying down flat on my back.

I started affirming that I was becoming successful — in fact I was creating the life of my dreams — in an easy and relaxed manner, a healthy and positive way, in its own perfect time, for the highest good of all.

After I affirmed it a few thousand times over a few years, some pretty remarkable changes started happening in my life — including going from rags to riches, in my own lazy way.

Is it possible to be lazy and productive at the same time?

Absolutely. Most of us think that we have to be active all the time to be really productive. And where does that lead? To burnout, or illness, or something else that limits or destroys your productivity. But if we allow ourselves to be lazy, what happens for almost every healthy being is that after a period of time, we wake up one day and find we’re filled with energy. There’s nothing we’d rather do than be highly productive.

So many people feel they have to work 40 or 50 or even 60 hours a week — but half the time, they’re not being productive anyway. Sometimes during the day it would be far better to take a nap, because you wake up with more energy and get more done in the long run.

I live my ideal week: I don’t do mornings, ever. I have no plans before noon. I don’t do Mondays either: That’s my day to myself, with no plans at all (my favorite day of the week).

When I go into my office Tuesday afternoon, I’m energized. I really look forward to it — there’s nothing I’d rather be doing. I work Tuesday through Thursday afternoons, usually. Friday afternoon is a swing day — I might work or do something else. Saturday I’m at home. And Sunday is family day — I never work on Sunday.

That’s a fairly lazy week — I usually don’t work much over 20 or 25 hours a week. But it’s enough: I’ve built a company that has fulfilled my dreams in every way, including financially, for the past 30 years.

Be well, be in peace,

— Marc Allen