Unemployable doesn’t mean quit your job and be a beach bum with a laptop for the rest of your life.
If you think that you’re high on 4-Hour Workweek kool-aid.
What it means to be unemployable
When I worked in banking I met a few rich elites.
They looked, smelt and talked like the rest of us. There was one difference. The lanyard they wore around their neck with a security tag on it had a different color to mine.
But they ate in the same lunchroom. I eventually got to sit next to this group of miscolored lanyard warriors. They had one big difference.
They didn’t get a salary.
They were misfits known as contractors, freelancers, or consultants. In some cases they were small business owners who just came to the bank I worked at to work a short stint. Then they knick off to their next gig.
These guys and gals were unemployable.
Instead of a salary they sent my employer an invoice. The subtle difference is they got to get paid faster, not have tax taken out, and negotiate their own working conditions.
Everything from what laptop they got, to where they worked, to what meetings they would attend was negotiable.
What the critics said about the unemployable misfits
Me and this gang of unemployables got on like kids eating ice cream and getting it all over their t-shirts without giving a f*ck.
I dreamed of one day being them. But until that day came, I learned from them. Critics didn’t like ’em.
Their main argument was “they don’t have job security.” LOL. Job security is a modern-day joke. No one has it. And those who think they have it are delusional. They forget the bat virus layoffs of March 2020, and the tech layoffs of 2022.
Employers don’t give a crap about you. They exist to make as much profit off you as they can. If times get tough they fire your ass. If you die, they won’t even show up to your funeral. Your dead body will be replaced within a week. This isn’t supposed to be depressing. It’s reality.
When you act realistically, life gets ten times easier. You stop fighting against the tide and start to let it propel you forward.
The other underrated category of unemployable badasses
Since those banking days I’ve joined the more controversial category: the creator economy.
Some love it, some hate it.
In this category, you produce content on social media and link it to an online business doing something you love. The goal is to get so good at it you’re unemployable and never have to sit in an office working a dead-end job ever again.
Here’s how to join one of the unemployable categories
(And experience real freedom)
These three steps come from Youtuber Dan Koe.
1. If you don’t have value, learn.
The first step is to become valuable.
This is a wishy-washy phrase that can sound like pseudoscience. Let me break it down further. Value = Your Unique Skill Stack
If you have generic skills or are straight out of college and don’t have skills yet, then it’s time to learn a few. This is done with self-education.
- The slow way is to learn new skills via free Youtube videos.
- The faster way is to learn new skills from moderately-priced online courses.
- The quickest way is to get high-ticket coaching from someone who’s got the skills you already want and been successful, and who’s helped others just like you do the same. (Plus do online courses.)
What holds people back from learning are three things:
- Taking a risk
- Backing themselves
- Thinking of it as an expense rather than an investment with an ROI
Learn or get forced to earn from an employer at a much lower price.
2. If you have value, but nobody can see it, build.
The way you demonstrate your value is with content on social media.
You share what you’ve learned, how you did it, mistakes made, personal stories people can relate to, etc.
None of this is rocket science. It’s just people are either lazy or don’t want to put themselves out there out of fear they’ll get criticized.
Bottom line: If no one knows what you do then nothing is going to happen.
3. If you have value, and a crowd starving for more, sell.
Some of you have an online audience already on social media.
Yet you’re still employed or struggling to make a living. That’s because you need the final ingredient: persuasion skills.
You need to take what you’ve done online (often for free) and have the guts to charge money for it. It doesn’t make you a sellout. No.
Dumb-dumbs say that.
It’s realizing that you can use skills you built to help others achieve their goals in life or business. Helping people is one of the greatest feelings in the world. The fact some people demonize it is ridiculous.
Now, most of us aren’t born to sell. We have to learn basic persuasion skills. That can be done by learning the art of (ethical) sales and copywriting.
I guess the theme of this whole article is you have to unlearn what society taught you and then fall in love with learning all over again.
The highly desirable end state
If you follow these three steps of learn, build, and sell (for long enough), you’ll become unemployable.
- No more asking for permission.
- No more fixed salaries that get the sh*t taxed out of them.
- No more being told what to do.
It’s at this stage you’ll have discovered a level of freedom that’ll produce limitless happiness and fulfillment you couldn’t previously imagine.
The goal in life isn’t to be employed.
It’s to be unemployable so you can be free.
