CREATIVE UNEMPLOYMENT

The author shares his guiding principles for a more rewarding life (which for him meant not working company jobs) in this debut self-help guide.

In the 1960s, Ouderkirk realized that working for big companies, in his case for several years as a truck loader and in other roles at Standard Oil, got him “no closer to being wealthy, happy and free.” This epiphany led him to study self-development material and forge a new kind of career of “creative unemployment,” or leading with your truest and thus liberating life passions (in his case becoming a solo “network marketer”). In this guide, Ouderkirk discusses how you must first establish the following as top priorities: health (a stroke in the 1990s was his wake-up call to adopt better habits; advice in this section includes a “Things to Avoid” list, including fried foods); wealth (achievable by focusing on passions and engaging in positive-thinking habits and affirmations); happiness (loving self and others, living in the moment, enjoying pets, etc.); and freedom (including setting goals to fuel your own particular destiny as a “unique person of incredible dimensions”). Ouderkirk also uses a CAFE acronym to explain his strategy: to have clarity (be clear what your passions are), awareness (including an awareness of automatic negative thoughts, which must be shed), focus (on what you want, not what you don’t), and, finally, execute desired goals. Several work sheets, including ones to map out goals and celebrate accomplishments, are provided. First-time author Ouderkirk is clearly an eager student of self-development material: he energetically champions positive-thinking precepts, and his four priorities expressed via the CAFE acronym are upbeat handles to help inspire life change and action. His own story of finding “creative unemployment” as a “network marketer” is left rather hazy, however, which is unfortunate. More clarity about the ways his concepts led to successful freedom in his own life would have been welcome. Overall, however, Ouderkirk’s message to seek to become an ELF, or to lead with passion to make work “easy, lucrative and fun,” is an inspiring one.

Enthusiastically conveyed personal-development mantras.