If you think about all that needs to happen to reach FI, your brain will overload, and you’ll likely shut down and give up. Why bother, you might ask, when I can just continue down the Standard Path? It requires little thought. It’s also comforting because nearly everyone else is on this path, and so I’m not alone. The answer to “Why bother?” is that reaching FI is worth the effort, more than I can explain to you on the page. Imagine waking up one day without job stress or money worries, able to spend the day how you like. This is just the beginning of what FI can do for you.

Step One: Build Your Engine

The key is to view FI as the final goal and then break it down into small, tangible steps that, completed one by one, will get you there. The first step? Education or training. You need a job that pays enough to cover your bills with money left over to invest. It’s the engine that powers your financial life. It doesn’t matter if Warren Buffet comes to you on bended knee, groveling for investment advice: a 25% annualized return will get you nowhere if you can’t earn and save enough capital to invest in the first place.

Build a powerful, reliable engine. One that has a good starting salary with room to grow if you work hard. There are two ways to build your engine: go to college or learn a trade. If you go to college, do yourself a favor: take it seriously and choose a practical major with excellent job prospects. Think about all the effort it takes to get into college, all the money and effort to finish your degree, all the support from your parents. Now think about the job market for your B.A. degree in 17th century French literature…there isn’t one.

To build a powerful engine, choose a major that will prepare you for a practical career with deep, wide job prospects. One where others will seek you out and pay you very, very well. So, build your engine. As the comedian Steve Martin once said, be so good they can’t ignore you. Use your time at college to tackle difficult subjects that will allow you to solve problems for potential employers or start your own company. These are the subjects that require hard work. So, get educated in subjects that few others are willing to tackle and where there is a market for your skills.

And please, please consider the odds when making a career choice. The odds of becoming a pro athlete, the next big musician, Instagram influencer, tech startup billionaire, etc. is about 0.0000001% (I’m making up numbers here, but you get the point). If you chase it too long, you’ll end up 40 years old with no money, no training, no prospects, and starting from scratch. Not good. The odds of making a very comfortable living in business, finance, sales, or as an accountant, engineer, applied scientist, computer expert, etc. is about 99.9%. Now those are odds I can live with. Plus, you’ll get an early start in your career so after 15 or 20 years, the slow compounding of working hard in your career will begin to explode with benefits when you’re still young, say age 40 if you started at 25.

Other Considerations

Not to say that you should choose a major strictly based on the job market. Find something that you are curious about, feel drawn towards, and interests you – something that comes easy and that you have a knack for. After all, you’ll be doing it for a while and having a knack for your work makes you better at it.

Your career should also be compatible with your wiring: your tolerance for stress and anxiety, your personality, etc. should factor into your career choice. So, if you’re an introvert, you may want to avoid a career as a courtroom litigator. Picking a career that goes against your grain is a recipe for long-term stress, anxiety, and unhappiness.

In the end, to find a job or start a business there must be a market, preferably large and robust, for your skill set. Interested in art history, philosophy, or political science? That’s fine, just know that you’ll likely need a PhD, or further your education such as law school, because the only job market for these skills is teaching college – a small, very competitive market.

A More Practical Approach

If you’re interested in art history, make it your minor while getting a more practical degree such as accounting, business administration, finance and economics, STEM (applied science, technology, engineering, and math), computer science, pre-law, pre-med, physical therapy, nursing, etc. Continue exploring art history as a hobby once you’re out of school and gainfully employed. If you get your investments rolling early enough, you could eventually to switch to a lower-paying career that interests you more. Your initial investments will continue to grow after you switch careers.

Or Learn a Trade

College is not for everyone. There are plenty of well-paying jobs for those that are skilled at a trade. So learn one: become a plumber, carpenter, electrician, or mechanic, and get good at it. The trades allow you to work with your hands and build a set of valuable skills that the world needs. You’ll also have the pride of a job well done and a tangible result at the end of each day – rare in today’s work world. A skilled, honest tradesman will always be in demand.

A Parting Thought on Student Loans

It’s best to get through college or trade school with minimal student loans. Being saddled with any kind of debt right out of school, let alone tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars, is a burden that could weigh you down for years, especially if you chose a major with limited job prospects and low pay. (A rule-of-thumb: limit your total student loan bill at graduation equal to or less than your annual gross starting salary).

We’d all like to go to that private school that costs $50,000 a year, but you can still get a great education elsewhere. It’s the effort and interest you put into the classes that’s important. So consider a two-year community college and get your prerequisites out of the way, then go to an in-state university to finish your degree. With no or minimal student loans, you’ll be able to start building your investment portfolio on day one. And don’t worry about what people might think if you do this. Believe me, if you’re nice to be around, show up on time, and can think critically, solve problems, and write well, no one will give a rip where you went to school. I worked with about 500 people at my old gig, and I had no clue where anyone went to school, nor did I care so long as they were nice and got the job done.

Find Your Passion

A parting thought: “Find your passion” is misleading advice. Passion isn’t buried somewhere, fully formed, waiting for you to find it. It’s created through hard work, getting really good at something that you enjoy and provides a sense of flow, and the resulting success – an upward cycle. Once this process is rolling, your passion will likely grow and grow. But it takes time and hard work. So don’t flit from one thing to another, dropping it if you don’t instantly feel passion. Start with something that you’re interested in, feel drawn towards, and have a knack for – then dig in, work hard, and get really good at it. Passion and success are the natural by-product of working hard at something you enjoy.