Last year I wrote about the 4 stages involved in making The Great Office Escape. It was an effort to show the path one could take to get from a world of professional, emotional, and personal prison to a place of connectedness, strength, creativity, and harmony. I called this place the “4th stage,” which one could reach once their income and work were completely separate entities. In this stage, a person no longer has to work if they choose not to. They either have enough funds in the bank to retire to that proverbial island away from it all, or they are generating so much passive income that they can reasonably expect never to have to work for a living again. This is the 4th stage.
But in describing this stage, I did a disservice to the very people who had reached this enviable place in life. I assumed (quite falsely) that the journey out of the office ends here. In reality, it does not.
We are programmed at an early age to go to school, go to work, have a family, work ’til we retire. This programming that takes place throughout a person’s early life is no fault of society or any one person in particular… it is just the way things work. This needs to be accepted. While I may be in the minority here, I am a firm believer that many people are completely out of touch with who they are. Many of us live lives of compromise: we wanted so much more out of life as kids, but once we realized that for one reason or another our dreams were unrealistic, we slowly gave up on them. With time comes forgetting, and with forgetting comes acceptance. Then comes complacency. And complacency is the opposite of living.
This is what I mean when I say that it takes a long time to remember who you really are once you finally reach a point in your life when you don’t HAVE to work for a living. One must go through some serious de-programming before they can feel “themselves” again. Not everyone who reaches the 4th stage makes it successfully to the 5th. Some actually go back to work because they can’t possibly think of anything else to do. Some go on to do extraordinary things because they learn to reconnect with themselves. This process of reconnecting and figuring out where to go next is the bridge between the 4th and 5th stages.
In reality, the 5th stage is a place very few people have truly reached. I’ve heard some stories of a few: the millionaire lawyer who threw it all away to open a surfing shop in the Caribbean, not for the money but because he loves it there, or the Investment Banker who couldn’t stand the daily grind of comparing homes, cars and families and relocated to Africa to teach poor children. There are probably some bigger names you can think of. Oprah might be one. But it takes a certain kind of person; one who does not desire recognition, to get here. Recognition tends to make people fall back into becoming what others want them to be on some level.
The Defining Characteristics of the 5 stages
There is a turning point in each stage that will show you without a shadow of a doubt where you are. Here they are:
The 1st stage – Your income comes from a source on whom you are partially or totally dependent. Usually you live with a parent and they pay some or all of your expenses. Even if they help you out only $50 a month, it is enough to keep you in this stage.
The 2nd stage – Your income comes from a source for whom you work a set number of hours on a set schedule. Most people fall into the 2nd stage. Most never advance beyond it. Still, it is nice to have complete control over your finances, isn’t it? This is still nothing but indentured servitude.
The 3rd stage – You create your own income by choosing the sources. Your hours are flexible, as is your schedule. Your work is still tied to your output, though you have greater freedom and control. You are not in this stage until you have absolutely not tie to a salaried or hourly position, even if it is very part time (unless you are just doing it for fun.)
The 4th stage – Your income is no longer tied to your work. You are financially free and could survive without working another day in your life, OR you have so many passive sources of income that it is reasonable to conclude that you’ll always have money.
The 5th stage – Your life is no longer tied to your income.
What the 5th Stage is Like
Remember what you were like as a child? Probably not as well as you think. This is a bit like the final stage. Once you get over all the guilt, shame, boredom, confusion, depression, and uncertainty of the first four stages (yes, I said four) your purpose is clear and you are truly connected with your life, and your mission. Your inner child is at play expressed through the wisdom of your adult self. Your life finally becomes the answer to the question “what would you do if you had (insert huge sum of money) dollars and never had to work again?” It is your answer, and you are living it. You aren’t simply gambling, drinking, spending money excessively, buying a new huge house, car, boat or sitting around bored like many people who have reached the 4th stage. You have opened your eyes, and you are like a child in the sense that many of the ties that have bound you your whole life have disappeared.
The 5th stage isn’t for everyone. Some people are perfectly happy in the 2nd (or even the 1st!) Of course, this is entry isn’t for you. You know who you are.
What is the 5th stage really like? It is simply you being yourself, working not because you have to, but because you want to, as an extension of who you are. You’ve long since conquered the work for money routine, transcended the need to escape the 9 to 5, and even moved beyond the mastery of your finances. You have become connected with your life purpose, and you are living it. I can’t think of a better place to be.
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