One year and one month ago I’ve set out to become a full-time entrepreneur. I have not succeeded. Can you learn from my mistakes? This is the final episode of Valiant Growth, season 1. Photo credit: daivinandleah via Flickr

I've been thinking about talking more about my story with breaking contact with everyone I knew three years ago and completely resetting my life while coming to England. I especially wanted to talk about the painful mistakes I have made in talking to my family and friends following my understanding of the Freedomain Radio relationship strategy. I just couldn't figure out the personal development garb to dress those in to make them fit into the Valiant Growth format. They might make it...

I’ve been an ultra-sedentary person for most of my life and had zero interest in anything to do with physical health. But I am doing more now than I did before. Chris Stefanick can claim some credit for that - this is an interview with him. My aim is to nurture your intrinsic motivation to live a healthier life and show you some potential paths you can go down on. We’re going to focus on the why and on strategy, and also on how to do it without a lot of (or any) financial expense or extra...

Despite being amazing, self-study also has its fair share of challenges. Luckily, my friend Shane Radliff has figured out a way to learn directly from experts, teach others, and build a great reputation in his field, all on his own initiative and without a large financial cost. I call this the Interview Learning System.

How do you stay frugal when friends want to go out? And can you actually find better groups and collectives instead of building independence? I answer these two questions in this extra show. 1: "What do you do when someone suggest for instance grabbing a lunch when you have no desire to spend even on drinks but find it hard to say "well, I do not wanna spend money on food or drinks"?" 2: "I find myself really valuing from the attention paid to underlying needs in this discussion. It...

In 1974, a man disappeared somewhere in the Siskiyou Mountains, never to be heard of again. He wasn’t a tourist lost in the forests - he’s been living in the region for years. He wasn’t a rookie camper overwhelmed by wilderness - he had written several articles on camping and survivalism, based on his own experience of practising these skills. So what happened to Tom Marshall? Letting Go Isn't Free A basic and well-known tenet of stoicism is to stop trying to act on (and worrying about)...

It was a little past midnight on Wednesday and I was sitting in the bathtub. It was the 9th of November, and I was feeling terrible. I had no idea who the Prime Minister of Romania, the country where I grew up, was. I had no idea which party was in power in the UK, where I had been living for the past year and a half. But I had just spent 12 months following the ups and downs of of the 2016 US elections, a country that I couldn’t vote in, had no real way of living in in the short and...

I've become quite fed up with a show notes that had very little value to the listener. So I've decided to turn them into full-blown, stand-alone blog posts! Hence, until this experiment lasts, I am now running a blogcast instead of just a podcast. Are you as excited about this as I am?

So you’ve followed the advice my previous talk with Jake Desyllas and set up your own basic productivity system. You know that a system like that is not a pedantic badge of honour, but is in fact the best way to add actions to your ideals – to LIVE your values. You also know the three components of any successful productivity system: Capture: Get things out of your head Review: Check everything regularly Organize: Put things in their right place You probably are in a happy place - so...

Sometimes people tell me: “Philip, it’s all fine for you, but you can’t do this stuff with a family and car based culture”. That makes a lot of sense to me: in many ways, being a single, young person is the easiest way to keep costs on the low end. That is why I was very happy to ask Nicola, a listener who called in about his story on how he biked and lived in his tent in backyards to travel Europe to tell me more on how he, as a married man with a child, living in the sometimes less than...

Imagine that you have a magic marker. It looks like the usual whiteboard companion, but it has secret that only you know about. You see, with this marker, you can go into any store, pick any item off the shelf, and write your own price on it. And when you go to the checkout, they accept your price, no matter what it is, and everybody walks away happy. Where can you get this magic marker? You already own it! It’s called creativity. It’s also called adventurousness. Or flexibility. With those...

I've started releasing guest appearances I've made on other podcasts. The first one is an interview with Joshua Sheats on Radical Personal Finance about hitchhiking and budget travel in general. I share my experiences and we both go in depth on tactics around hitchhiking, housing, transport and ultralight backpacking. Here are Joshua's show notes: Do you wish to set out and travel but feel like you lack the money? Well, what if you did it anyway and just adjusted your style of travel to...

Early Retirement Extreme may be one of the four ways to quit the rat race on the surface. I think, however, that underlying ERE is a much deeper philosophy. In fact, I’d say that saving a lot of money, investing it and living of the income is a completely optional part of ERE. What this approach has taught me is the value of resilience, independence and living a well-rounded life. Through looking at our needs (and the strategies handed to us by the mainstream to meet them) critically, we can...

On the final day of the 21 day ERE makeover (but only penultimate of the series), Jacob addresses a simplified approach to investing, called Dogs of the Dow. Original article at http://earlyretirementextreme.com/day-21-investing-for-early-retirement.html A more detailed discussion of the ERE philosophy at http://valiantgrowth.com/e30 Get Early Retirement Extreme The Book at http://valiantgrowth.com/ere Donate to the podcast at http://valiantgrowth.com/support On the final day of the 21...

Frugality and high-quality products are not antithetical - you just have to own classics. Join http://forum.earlyretirementextreme.com for ERE specific advice, and http://valiantgrowth.com/community to meet fellow Valiant Growth listeners. Original article at http://earlyretirementextreme.com/day-20-own-classics.html A more detailed discussion of the ERE philosophy at http://valiantgrowth.com/e30 Get Early Retirement Extreme The Book at http://valiantgrowth.com/ere Donate to the podcast...

A TV (or insert other entertainment technology here) will cost you some money, but it will cost a lot more than that for your growth - if you aren’t aware of what you are doing. But entertainment is not the greatest threat - in fact, for many of you, it may not even be all that significant. The allure of narrow technical skills over broad life skills (personal development) can just as well cost you in terms of your long-term happiness. Presentation on personal development (skip intro):...

Self-imposed constraints (a.k.a challenges) can be a great tool for accelerating your frugality, building your self-esteem, and having fun at the same time. Original article at http://earlyretirementextreme.com/day-18-join-a-challeng.html A more detailed discussion of the ERE philosophy at http://valiantgrowth.com/e30 Get Early Retirement Extreme The Book at http://valiantgrowth.com/ere Donate to the podcast at http://valiantgrowth.com/support

We throw things out too easily sometimes. The good news is that you can become a handyman perhaps more easily than you’d think. And perhaps one day you can start building your own things! Original article at http://earlyretirementextreme.com/day-17-maintaining-andrepairing-things.html A more detailed discussion of the ERE philosophy at http://valiantgrowth.com/e30 Get Early Retirement Extreme The Book at http://valiantgrowth.com/ere Donate to the podcast at http://valiantgrowth.com/support

How being frugal on quantity can actually get you really great quality. Original article at http://earlyretirementextreme.com/day-16-the-stuff-you-actually-keep-and-use.html A more detailed discussion of the ERE philosophy at http://valiantgrowth.com/e30 Get Early Retirement Extreme The Book at http://valiantgrowth.com/ere Donate to the podcast at http://valiantgrowth.com/support

A bit of fun revision today, going through the previous 14 days and self-scoring on the ERE test! The scale is 90 points scores an A, 70 a B, 50 a C, 30 a D and 10 an F. Housing is worth 30, transport is worth 20, food is worth 10 and the rest are 4-5. I used 4. Original article at http://earlyretirementextreme.com/day-15-the-first-two-weeks-of-the-make-over.html A more detailed discussion of the ERE philosophy at http://valiantgrowth.com/e30 Get Early Retirement Extreme The Book at...

Jacob lays out his (2009) active investment strategy, while I comment on the balance of offence vs. defence in ERE. Original article at http://earlyretirementextreme.com/day-14-investing-for-early-retiremen.html A more detailed discussion of the ERE philosophy at http://valiantgrowth.com/e30 Get Early Retirement Extreme The Book at http://valiantgrowth.com/ere Donate to the podcast at http://valiantgrowth.com/support