{"id":952,"date":"2009-06-22T10:00:31","date_gmt":"2009-06-22T17:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/2009\/06\/22\/the-art-of-nonconformity\/"},"modified":"2018-04-03T08:33:08","modified_gmt":"2018-04-03T15:33:08","slug":"the-art-of-nonconformity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/2009\/06\/22\/the-art-of-nonconformity\/","title":{"rendered":"The Art of Nonconformity"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Every once in awhile, I get a chance to promote a great blogger. Chris Guillebeau is one of those bloggers. For those of you that haven\u2019t heard of Chris before, here\u2019s a few details:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>He\u2019s been gainfully unemployed for over a decade, earning his income online.<\/li>\n<li>His goal is to travel to every country in the world. He has already reached 111 out of 197.<\/li>\n<li>He\u2019s written a manifesto on <a href=\"http:\/\/chrisguillebeau.com\/3x5\/a-brief-guide-to-world-domination\/\">world domination<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Chris\u2019s website is <a href=\"http:\/\/chrisguillebeau.com\/3x5\/\">The Art of Nonconformity<\/a>, and it\u2019s a must-read resource for anyone who wants to live an unconventional life. I got a chance to chat with Chris recently, and I wanted to share some of the great insights he offered me.<\/p>\n<h2>The First Steps to Unconventional Living<\/h2>\n<p>\u201cI think the quarterlife crisis is a good thing,\u201d Chris explained, \u201cit means you\u2019re actually thinking about what your motivations are in life.\u201d If you\u2019re in your twenties and unsure what you want to do in life, Chris suggests that this is an opportunity to do something unconventional. Even if you\u2019re later in life, he points out, \u201cit\u2019s never too late to start.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>One reason I was drawn to <em>The Art of Nonconformity<\/em> is the lack of self-inflated hype. While many other writers have exaggerated claims in a vain attempt to motivate their audience, Chris often does the opposite. He makes his advice genuine and practical.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSmall steps are good, sometimes people feel intimidated to make changes.\u201d This philosophy is reflected in his writing. For example, in his great guide, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/2008\/10\/16\/the-unconventional-guide-to-working-for-yourself\/\">The Unconventional Guide to Working for Yourself<\/a>, he focuses on allowing readers to create a micro-business that can earn $200 per month. Not an empire, a first step.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you\u2019re interested in travel, for example, you don\u2019t have to go completely broke traveling around the world. You can take a smaller trips.\u201d AONC is, in many ways, about taking that first step.<\/p>\n<h2>The Short List of Deadly Countries<\/h2>\n<p>As he is an extensive world-traveler, I asked Chris how he felt about going to places that aren\u2019t typical tourist destinations. Including many places in Africa and the Middle East that North Americans might see as being dangerous and unfriendly. Chris argues that, \u201cthere are a few places around the world that are dangerous, but that\u2019s a very short list.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Chris advocates not letting overblown fears get in the way of your life. \u201cSometimes people equate the unknown with the dangerous. But really, 95% of the people I\u2019ve met have been friendly.\u201d An unconventional life might be different, but isn\u2019t necessarily riskier than following the masses.<\/p>\n<h2>Lifestyle Design and Tradeoffs<\/h2>\n<p>The Art of Nonconformity does paint the upside of living an unconventional life. Of course, Chris is that upside, as he\u2019s been able to build a unique lifestyle without regular employment. However, Chris is realistic in that he recognizes tradeoffs that need to be made in order to do something unique.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI know people that are more successful than me.\u201d Chris explains that he has had plenty of opportunities to expand various businesses, but turned them down to focus on his goals of personal freedom and becoming a full-time writer. Life is always going to have tradeoffs, AONC does a great job of teaching you how to minimize those tradeoffs and choose them wisely.<\/p>\n<h2>Unconventional Products<\/h2>\n<p>In addition to his blog, which is updated frequently with high-quality articles, Chris also maintains a great store with guides on travel, work and money. Chris has a natural ability for combining the higher-level ideas with the practical tricks needed to get started, so I\u2019ve enjoyed all of his guides that I have read.<\/p>\n<p>In the past, I did a review of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/2008\/10\/16\/the-unconventional-guide-to-working-for-yourself\/\">The Unconventional Guide to Working for Yourself<\/a>, which is my favorite guide on AONC, and it has great advice for anyone interested in starting a microbusiness.<\/p>\n<h2>Nonconformity<\/h2>\n<p>If you\u2019d like to read more about Chris, check out his website <a href=\"http:\/\/chrisguillebeau.com\/3x5\/\">here<\/a>. Also, you can check out some of his best articles:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/chrisguillebeau.com\/3x5\/a-brief-guide-to-world-domination\/\">A Brief Guide to World Domination<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/chrisguillebeau.com\/3x5\/28-things-i-wish-i-knew-before-i-started-traveling\/\">28 Things I Wish I Knew Before I Started Traveling<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/chrisguillebeau.com\/3x5\/why-you-should-quit-your-job-and-travel-around-the-world\/\">Why You Should Quit Your Job and Travel the World<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Every once in awhile, I get a chance to promote a great blogger. Chris Guillebeau is one of those bloggers. For those of you that haven\u2019t heard of Chris before, here\u2019s a few details: He\u2019s been gainfully unemployed for over a decade, earning his income online. His goal is to travel to every country in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[9,656,681],"tags":[221,400,670,26,401,402,115,665,68,182],"class_list":{"0":"post-952","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-courage","7":"category-life-philosophy","8":"category-nc-mindset","9":"tag-aonc","10":"tag-blog-review","11":"tag-business","12":"tag-goals","13":"tag-guillebeau","14":"tag-lifestyle-design","15":"tag-money","16":"tag-news","17":"tag-travel","18":"tag-work","19":"entry"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>The Art of Nonconformity - Scott H Young<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/2009\/06\/22\/the-art-of-nonconformity\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Art of Nonconformity - Scott H Young\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Every once in awhile, I get a chance to promote a great blogger. 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