Welcome to Escape 101!
March 31, 2008
If you’re like most people, you’ve dreamed of one day just leaving it all behind. It turns out you can, and this is the place to start.
Escape 101 started out as a website to help promote our latest book by the same name. It didn’t take long, though, to realize that we still had a lot more to share on the topic of sabbaticals and lifestyle design.
The purpose of this blog is to help you make your way toward the the life that you want, and in the end, that requires change. You might do it in big leaps, or you may do it in small steps, but either way we’re here to help.
Your First Steps
Subscribe to Escape 101
It’s free, it’s easy, it’s safe, and you can unsubscribe anytime you want. If you use an RSS reader, just click here. Otherwise, just enter your email address in the box below. It’s as simple as that.
Check Out Escape 101: The Book
You’re not alone in dreaming of a sabbatical. Escape 101 has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, The Miami Herald, and been endorsed by best-selling authors like Timothy Ferriss (The 4-Hour Workweek).
Learn more:
Reviews and Press | Excerpts | Order
Get in Touch
Creating the life you want is a lot easier (and a lot more fun) with some help. If you’ve got questions about sabbaticals or lifestyle design, contact us anytime. We really don’t mind.
Share this post-> del.icio.us | Digg | Facebook | Technorati | StumbleUponCommit To Your Sabbatical With StickK
March 31, 2008
Sabbaticals can be challenging. Like saving for retirement, quitting smoking, losing weight and a host of other goals that never seem to come to fruition, taking a career break requires a commitment. The challenges is that it’s tough to get committed to your…err…commitment.
What’s really going on here? Why is it so hard to accomplish the things we want so much? The challenge is that desirable outcomes in the long-term (like good health or wealth) tend to require not-so-desirable actions (like exercising or saving money) in the here and now. The result? We avoid the less-desirable options, and put off for yet another day what we should do right now.
Enter StickK. It tries to leverage your psychological wiring by penalizing your lack of action. At StickK, you create a “Commitment Contract” for your desired goal - quitting smoking, or running a marathon, for example. Fail to butt out or stick to your training, and you’re subject to your chosen penalty, ranging from public shaming on the StickK site, to actual financial costs, which are donated to the charity you choose. To ramp up your motivation further, you can even have your money donated to a charity you hate if you fail to perform.
Using StickK to Lock In Your Sabbatical Plans
You can use StickK to get some leverage on yourself and accomplish a few of the steps that can help make your sabbatical a reality.
Some goals you might choose:
- Pitching your boss, announcing your plans or otherwise going public at work with your sabbatical goals
- Opening a savings account and setting up an automatic paycheck deduction
- Buying plane tickets, or other financial commitments
A word of caution: make sure you set your penalty high enough that it represents enough pain for you to be sure you’ll follow through.
Share this post-> del.icio.us | Digg | Facebook | Technorati | StumbleUponLiving on a Jet Full-Time
March 30, 2008
Airport Journals has a piece on using retired passenger jets as homes. Maybe it’s just me, but I found the whole idea incredibly intriguing.
JoAnn Ussery, shown here, lost her home in an ice storm, and replaced it with a Continental Airlines 727.
Ussery named her dream house “Little Trump,” a reference to Donald Trump’s $16-million corporate jet, also a Boeing 727. The floor plan consisted of three bedrooms, a living room/dining room, a fully equipped kitchen, a laundry area and her favorite room, the master bathroom with a Jacuzzi, in what was once the cockpit.
The tail was anchored in 18 inches of concrete. The nose extended out past the shoreline of the lake, giving the 727 home a dynamic look, as if it were flying. The 11-foot-wide cabin looks roomy with the high-density airline seats removed. The 76 side windows and 10 cockpit windows provide ample illumination.
Her story is one of several on the site - have a look:
Airport Journals
Six Months Off: A Book Review
March 20, 2008
When we started doing research for Escape 101, the book I kept stumbling across over and over again was Six Months Off. It eventually found its way into our book as recommended reading, and it deserves the good reviews it’s received.
Billed as “The Sabbatical Book”, Six Months Off is indeed a comprehensive guide to getting away. The book attempts to cover the whole range of sabbatical planning and experience, from overcoming doubts to choosing a destination and negotiating with your employer, and does a pretty good job of it. The authors also interviewed a number of people who have successfully escaped on sabbaticals of their own.
What’s Great:
The case studies are inspiring and broad, and do the job they should: make you believe you really can get away from it all. The section on “Big Buts”, is terrific, and tackles the toughest of the “I could never do that because” scenarios with ease. If you only bought the book for this section, it’d be worth it.
The chapter on negotiating with your employer is also excellent. For most people, this is a significant hurdle, large enough to stop most people from even considering a sabbatical. The book even includes scripted responses to the big questions that an employer will throw at a would-be sabbatical-taker. It’s a thorough, and best of all, it’s not focused on “quitting and walking away” - there’s a pervasive attitude of get-paid-while-you-do-it that’s quite refreshing.
What’s Not as Great:
The book’s a bit older. Published in 1996, it’s extensive resource sections have no website listings. Don’t let that stop you, though. The book’s just as helpful and inspiring today, and in this day and age, printed resource materials go out of date quickly anyway - most of the resources can be found online quite easily.
Great Reasons to Subscribe to Escape 101
March 4, 2008
I’m convinced: The best thing about blogs is that you can subscribe to them. Here are some great reasons why you should subscribe to Escape 101.
- It’s Risk-Free. There’s really no downside to having our updates delivered to you. Subscribing is free, we don’t spam, we’re committed to protecting your privacy, and you can unsubscribe anytime. Just like that.
- You Won’t Miss Anything. You’ve likely found some great sites in the past, and thought, “I should bookmark that so I can check it out later.” What happens? You never go back, and you miss some great articles. By subscribing, you’ll get updates delivered right to your email inbox or your feed reader.
- It’ll Help. That’s a bold claim, but we really believe that if you’re looking to change you life for the better, particularly by taking a sabbatical or making changes to improve your work-life balance, then what you find on this site is going to help.
- You Might Just Meet Some Great People. Blogs tend to create conversation, and that conversation can be a great way to meet like-minded, helpful people.
Interested? Just click here to subscribe to the feed, or enter your email address below. It’s as easy as that!
Share this post-> del.icio.us | Digg | Facebook | Technorati | StumbleUpon-
Plan Your Escape Today!
