The Pathless Path; Imagining a New Story for Work and Life

by Paul Millerd

It takes a few wrong turns to find the right way.

Paul Millerd thought he was on his way. From small-town Connecticut kid to the most prestigious consulting firm in the world, brushing shoulders with CEOs and with the resume to match.

The Pathless Path is about finding yourself in the wrong life, and the real work of figuring out how to live. Through painstaking experiments, living in different countries and the goodwill of people from around the world, Paul Millerd pieces together a set of ideas and principles that guide him from unfulfilled and burned out to the good life and all of the existential crises in between.

This book is a personal journey of awakening and is an ideal companion for people considering leaving their jobs, embarking on a new path, dealing with the uncertainty of an unconventional path, or searching for better models for thinking about work in a fast-changing world.

Genres: Nonfiction, Self Help, Business, Personal Development, Philosophy, Productivity, Psychology

220 pages, Hardcover

First published January 18, 2022

About the author

Paul Millerd is an independent writer, freelancer, coach, and digital creator. He has written online for many years and has built a growing audience of curious humans from around the world. He spent several years working in strategy consulting before deciding to walk away and embrace a pathless path. He is fascinated about how our relationship to work is shifting and how more people can live lives where they can thrive

Reviews

[Joe · Rating 1 out of 5]

Didn't enjoy, gave up at 34% (on ebook).

Very mundane story about a guy's career path from corporate climber to self-employed.

Feels like he took a lot of millennials' paths these days (see: subsection of semi-ER within entire FIRE movement, entrepreneurs, self employed, etc.), thought he had discovered it himself, and just needed to share his story.

Worse, he took the boring "I became a blogger instead of corporate climber" route--common, but not super repeatable.

The bigger problem was (and the reason why I gave up continuing to read), I couldn't figure out why I'd care about this guy. Nothing about the writing or him personally was compelling or kept my interest.

Feels like it was an ego boost book written by an internet personality for his friends and family that he could market and sell to his blog followers.

Gave up one-third in figuring if I were still bored and hadn't learned anything, it was time to move on to something better. Hard pass.

[Ahmad Qassab Bashi · Rating 1 out of 5]

To make a long story short (If you don't want to follow a career path, you can work as a freelancer)
does it work for everyone? I don't think so.

[Angie Wang · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book gives me so much hope as a creator who wants to live an untraditional life!

Paul uses his own experiences to help readers understand how our personal experiences of work are influenced by the force of history. He then proposes how we can live a life based on freedom and success defined by ourselves, not by the norms of society.

This is not the type of book that gives you the cliches of quitting your job and hustle to get rich advice. Rather, it’s a sincere sharing about an independent creator’s journey and an invitation to navigate the unknown with hope and courage.

[Jeff Sun · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was quite the page turner. Picked it up one morning and had finished it within 24 hours.

I’m currently on my own “pathless path” journey and this book reflected back to me many of the emotions and feelings I had felt over the last months. It was honest, real, and inspirational.

What I appreciated most was that this wasn’t a “self-help” book. Too often, we read these kinds of books looking for “the answer” - that one nugget/insight/framework that will finally help us find bliss.

Instead, Paul tells his own story and connects that story back to some fundamental truths in the human experience. He calls out the elephants in the room around money, “success”, and shame, and encourages us all to re-think our default lives more creatively.

If you are at all interested in building a different life in a default world, give this a read!

[PeaceOfGod]

The reviews are so ⬆⬇⬆⬇⬆⬇


I'm kanfused 😵


Might read it.

[Fassina2 · Rating 1 out of 5]

Very boring life story, while I'm very interested in non conventional living and work this is just not useful.

Maybe the author's friends and followers find it interesting, but for anyone else it's a very mundane life story that could've been told in a short article, bloated to fill a crappy book that tries to be profound while being as deep as a puddle.

Ali Abdaal is recommending some crappy books lately.

[B+ · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ali Abdaal's book recommendations seem to have lost their value by now. A fitting subtitle for this book might be: "Suitable for Young Millionaires Seeking Career Change." Unfortunately, the book's 200+ pages lack substantial insights.

Though I pushed myself to finish it, the book merely rehashes the typical journey of millionaires under 35, offering redundant advice.

While the author doesn't explicitly claim millionaire status, his narrative of quitting a $200k job to indulge in European trips and luxurious getaways raises questions.

My disappointment with the book is profound.

[Hamad · Rating 3 out of 5]

Listened to this one on audiobook.

I don't have much to say about this book. despite it being short, it was still long for the point it was making. I thought the bullet point summary at the end was good -and sufficient-

[Davis Whitehead · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book after getting laid off from WHOOP and during a time in which I was reflecting on what to do next and considering various options. This book has challenged me to think about my priorities in life and has made it hard to ignore that finding another "default path" job may not make me happy. I'd highly recommend this to anyone who's interested in exploring a non-traditional career/life path.

[Tiya · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was really interesting at the beginning but then struggled to keep me engaged in the last pages. The idea of having a pathless path is quite daunting and it is definitely not applicable to anyone, i.e A single mother or a caregiver, etc.
I found it a little bit too philosophic at some point. Nevertheless I appreciated the reflective process of the author.

[Meera Sundar · Rating 1 out of 5]

Meh. Best to skip the book and read a summary online. I read only 1/3rd of it and gave up. Way too much fluff. And excessive explanation of jargon and history of work, leisure etc. Meandering read with the central premise always remaining vague.

[Tanya · Rating 5 out of 5]

Found this book extremely relatable as someone who left the corporate world a few years ago. I struggled to find the words to explain what it felt like taking that jump and how to adapt to a pathless path and Paul’s book did a really great job of summing it up, providing validation, and inspiration. Also a super easy read, felt like I was listening to a friend.

[Maneka Balasooriya · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nice idea that we can chose out paths, but some of the things that he's done like moving to Taiwan temporarily (as a digital nomad) even without a job is a privilege for the white man. Us, brown people will be questioned and turned around even if we wanted to do that. So I take some of the things that he discusses with a grain of salt.

[Shameem Kaypee · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book taught me & my friend Ajnas Mohamed a lot about the modern society's relationship with work & How there's a lot wrong with the "default path"

And that's where the Pathless Path comes in, A path which allows you to be yourself rather than conform to the crowd, a path which gives you the freedom & time to be yourself!
I was expecting a "Here is 7 advice to be more successful in your career" kind of vibe, but surprisingly it turned out to be in the way that the author was explaining his life story to us, how he used to work at high paying high-status jobs, but was never fulfilled and how he gets out of it slowly, He explains his journey.

The only reason I've given it a 3-star rating is that it didn't match up to my expectations and as a teenager who is not working a full-time job, I wasn't able to quite relate to most of this book, but I still think reading this book earlier in life is gonna benefit me.

[Andrii · Rating 1 out of 5]

"The pathless Path" has "useless use" for people who're already passionate about their career/profession and curious enough to approach it from different angles. Although its very helpful once in a while to reevaluate your global values and goals, but to spend time finding pathless path just for the sake of it is unnecessary

[Ella Pang · Rating 5 out of 5]

exactly what i needed to read at this point of my relationship with work and would reread every year to be reminded that there are so many possibilities out there, and never settle for familiarity & comfort at the expense of curiosity and true meaning 🥺🥺🥺 LOVE

[Julian Dunn · Rating 4 out of 5]

My mother credits the health crisis I faced in my 20s for putting me on my current path. "It changed you," she says. While I don't think it was the sole reason I left the default path, my illness did change my relationship to uncertainty.

I started this review with the foregoing quote from the book because I think it, good or bad, gets at the crux of this book, and Millerd's motivations for leaving his full-time job as a McKinsey consultant. Contracting a chronic illness, Lyme disease, is a surefire way to ensure that you can no longer put in 80-hour weeks as a management consultant, but it also means that Millerd had far less agency than you might assume, based on the premise of the book, to choose a different path. Accordingly, the book falls into the typical trap of many self-help books, where the author takes his or her personal experience and jumps to the conclusion that it's straightforwardly applicable to all people. I'm sure that this is what's behind some of the pushback Millerd has received about the relative ease at which he's become a professional thought leader/influencer/creator: he needed to start from a place of high skill, intellect, a positive mental attitude, and in no small way, privilege, in order to have a good chance of doing that successfully. I would have liked Millerd to have countermanded the fact that he is only one data point by interviewing many others who have successfully chosen a pathless path, especially if they didn't come from privilege, to make a more compelling case. As it is, the book reads a little like an (admittedly compelling) memoir and isn't as convincing that the pathless path is obtainable by the masses.

It's a shame because Millerd does have a convincing argument to make about how many of us unwittingly fall into such a default path in our work lives, motivated in no small way by the fact that capitalism, and the dominant version of capitalism, American capitalism, has told us that what we should pursue is money, power, influence, etc. and that's what will make us happy. Millerd is right that there is an alternative, iconoclastic way of living, one that often engenders ridicule from folks who are still living on the default path, but that we should all seriously consider -- or at the very least, contemplate whether we are living lives that are true to ourselves, or merely to others. It's a very important thing to reflect on; it's just the "look at me, I did it!" (n=1 sample size) undermines the argument substantially.

[Justin Chen · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 stars

This book caught my attention because of its recent splashy translation release in Taiwan (with a much-improved cover). I’m not much of a self-help or personal development reader, but I resonated with Paul Millerd’s experience of feeling stuck and burned out in a 'society-approved', well-paying job. I appreciated the references he used and his overall perspective on not letting titles, salaries, or societal expectations define self-worth.

However, I did find it slightly frustrating—and even a bit unsettling—that many of the individuals he highlighted as successfully taking 'the pathless path' ended up becoming life coaches or selling courses, which to me this practice often feel like scams. This conclusion undermined some of the sincerity I felt in the first half of the book.

[Leom · Rating 4 out of 5]

At first, I wasn’t sure if I agreed with the advice being given in this book, and I felt like in order to live the kind of life that was being promoted here, you have to be a very specific type of person— privileged.

However, I kept reading and found that I misunderstood a lot of what he was saying and I actually found myself getting really excited about the idea of being more creative when it comes to thinking about work. I felt like I was being pushed to think harder about what I value and how I want to live my life.

Don’t approach this expecting any answers because you’ll actually end up with more questions than when you started.

Highly recommend!

[Thomas Neil · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book that provides a few tactics and maybe a helpful “push” towards a meaningful break with work and status obsessed culture. I have noted some of the strategies and felt quite empowered by the author’s writing.

Does such an approach scale to doctors and teachers? Do we need 50,000 new online coaches or course builders versus doers? I guess at the individual level an answer to this question is unimportant and I think the message is healthy for most.

[Daksh Jindal · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good book for people trying to follow an unconventional path in life. It inspires you and normalises that doing a job is not the only way to live your life. If you are thinking about starting a new career, read this.

If you are already in the middle of changing careers then this book is just a motivational book not a practical guide. I expected a bit from this.

[Khadi · Rating 3 out of 5]

This doesn't sufficiently consider the role of privilege that some may have over others for achieving success on such a risky and uncertain path. However, I see its usefulness for convincing persons who are now considering shaking up their life and taking this leap for the first time.

[Thao Tran · Rating 2 out of 5]

Had some really interesting tidbits in the first third about how humans' relationship with work has evolved over time due to different historical movements and cultural differences. Then the author starts wanking himself for the rest of the book.

[Prateek Surisetti]

I am a little uncomfortable rating this book as I haven't read it the way I usually read books i.e. cover to cover, page by page and word by word.

I had come across this at a friend's place and had about an hour to spare. Since this didn't seem like the kind of book I would read end to end, I tried to break out of my comfort zone and see if I could cover the book within that time without compromising comprehension and retention too much. Though somewhat embarrassing, I must admit this endeavour was partly inspired by a documentary of Fernando Alonso where he suggests that reading everything is hardly necessary and he prefers to cover material as fast as possible.

Anyway, this review will be more about the learning from reading than the book itself.

The book isn't particularly deep and to be fair, the author doesn't intend it to be either. It reads a bit like a journal with generous helpings of anecdotes and the research in between. It documents the life and learnings of an academically well-to-do person who started out in the elite part of the corporate world and transitioned to a freelancer due to various obstacles (health issues, lack of fulfillment, etc.). This brings me to my first dilemma:

Is it optimal to skim books with depth or those that lack it?

Skimming books with depth would result in loss of comprehending the interconnections and logic of the author's thought process, though you would probably get a lot more information per unit words read. Therefore, here, the relevant question is depth of information needed.

However, with books that lack depth, you are looking to be convinced by the author's argument or trying for a general feel of the material (through anecdotes, feel-good stories, etc.) rather than the information (directives, suggestions) alone. Skimming would lead to loss of the impact of the content though you would get all the information, which isn't particularly meaningful anyway. So here, the relevant question is whether you want the information versus a feel for the book and give the author an opportunity to convince you of their viewpoint.

Moving onto the learnings about skimming:
1. The book is incredibly convenient to skim. Divided into convenient sections that provided the gist in the penultimate or last paragraph of the section. Further, excerpts and research that the author found useful were in distinct formatting. So, next time I will look for these structural patterns.
2. Since it was the author's insights that I was looking for, I could conveniently breeze through the first half as it was mostly a narration of his life till he wrote the book. The insights start rolling in around half way through the book.
I used a rather intuitive skimming strategy. Treated each section in isolation and skipped forward in a section to check if I could comprehend the flow and keep moving ahead until I could. If I sensed that I was missing anything, I would go a bit back and read the first line of some paragraphs to figure out. So, it is more a puzzle solving exercise than a straightforward read.
3. Skimming did definitely reduce comprehension to a good degree. Though not as much while I was reading, but more in terms of remembering information after I stopped reading. Reading from end to end leads to spending more time with the subject matter and it naturally reinforces memory. But without the crutch of the author's anecdotes and lucid flow, the reader needs to exercise more effort to create the connections in their head and also engage with the material. I need to be more cognizant of this while skimming the next time around and put constant effort into structuring the information in my head.

From memory, here are a few of the insights from the book that I felt were moderately intriguing or were at least worth being reminded of or were relatable:
1. The author isn't pompous and doesn't claim that he has solved life. Nor is he presenting an all encompassing panacea. They are merely urging others to take a more experimental approach to life that requires risk and getting out of one's comfort zone, but only after taking precuationary steps (e.g. saving, minimizing costs). Further, the author recognises that he may also fail and will have to figure things out all of over again and similarly, his readers might have to as well. But the bottomline is: experimentation is key to understand one's desires and needs from work.
2. Presents research that the most fulfilling careers are those that challenge us, as opposed to careers centred around 'work-life balance'.
3. Creating a idea of your worst future self and taking steps to avoid getting there.
4. Other points included the role of generosity and creativity in mental health maintenance.

[Manu · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have to admit a little bias here - I started my own journey only a few months ago, and a bunch of things that Paul Millerd has written about resonates very well and mimics the thoughts and paths that I have experienced recently. I also share some of his influences in terms of thinkers - Erich Fromm, David Graeber - both of who have had a lot to say about the human condition in the context of work.
The book is divided into two very broad sections. The first, with six chapters, focuses on the default path. The default is what most of the world does - predictable incomes, predictable lives, "life's existential fears are traded for certainty". Paul also quotes Keynes - "it is better for reputation to fail conventionally than to succeed unconventionally." And it provides prestige, which as Paul Graham says, is "a powerful magnet that warps even your beliefs about what you enjoy." However the story is cracking. "You work hard, but get laid off anyway. You have the perfect life on paper, but no time to enjoy it. You retire with millions in the bank, but no idea what to do with your time."
He introduces us to his own journey from the default to the pathless across his academic and professional lives, how he figured out the hacks to grow fast, his health crisis, and how he then started thinking about his life and work differently.
At this point, he goes back in history to understand where our current beliefs and structure about work came from, how work took the space religion vacated, and how the larger narrative of defining and judging people by their profession became a part of culture. He then continues to take us through his own struggles in the default path as values clashed and the lure subsided, but the pressure of making a living continued. He stresses how moving to the pathless path is not a simple story of sudden glory, but rather a series of experiments, deliberate changes, and iterative learning towards a journey that fulfils the self.
In the second section - the pathless path, the focus is on how one can reimagine one's life, and address the many barriers that a part of our self comes up with to discourage us - narratives around (lack of) money, creativity, to name the most common ones. He also notes the importance of finding one's tribe, and designing work in such a way that you love it. His perspective is that ultimately what we want is to be useful to others. In the final chapter, he writes about a couple of things I have spent a lot of time thinking about - the abundance mindset, and playing the long game. Both have the potential to radically change the way one interacts with the world at large.
From what I understand, Paul went off the default in his 30s, so this is not a midlife crisis-management book. Rather, it's for anyone who has that little 'pebble in the shoe' which tells them that there is a better way of living, and working. The pathless path is exactly that - it is deeply personal, a blueprint doesn't really exist - you have to arrive at your version yourself. It's uncomfortable, uncertain, and a movement away from conformity. But you'll know when the shift happens, and when it does, it's quite liberating. As per Andrew Taggart, crisis moments lead to "existential openings" which forces us to deal with existential questions. These could be of two kinds - a "way of loss" (loved ones, health job) or a "way of wonderment" (moments of undeniable awe and inspiration). But you don't necessarily need to wait. It's never too early, or late.

Notes
1. People who face crises often experience 'post-traumatic' growth and this manifests as "an appreciation for life in general, more meaningful interpersonal relationships, an increased sense of personal strength, changed priorities, and a richer existential and spiritual life"
2. "But under the hardness of that armor there is the tenderness of genuine sadness." ~ Pema Chödrön
3. Uncertain discomfort < certain discomfort + coping mechanism. Given sufficient coping strategies, people will be willing to tolerate consistent levels of misery for long stretches of time.
4. Tim Ferriss "fear setting" reflection - what is the change, what are the worst possible outcomes, how can you mitigate them, possible steps/actions to get back to where you are now, what are the benefits, what are the costs of inaction 3/12/months few years
5. "Misery tax" - the spending an unhappy worker allocates to things that "keep you going and keep you functioning in the job". e.g. alcohol, expensive food and vacations (Thomas J. Bevan)
6."Belief clings, but faith lets go" ~ Alan Watts
7. There is a kind of status we get from doing impressive things or having impressive traits or skills. In some domains like sports, this works. In the business world, talent is harder to assess, and we tend to use proxies like credentials to determine quality and prestige.
8. "The problem is that our culture has engaged in a Faustian bargain in which we trade our genius and artistry for apparent stability" ~ Seth Godin
9. "Critical thinking without hope is cynicism. But hope without critical thinking is naïveté" ~ Krista Tippett

[Toño Sánchez · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think it was a good book, it gives you a different view and opinión on how to approach life and your relationship with work, of course for people who are already passionate about their work life will find it boring and not interesting but I think is a great book for people struggling to find sense on what to do at a young age and also for people who are years deep on some job that doesn’t make them happy.

[Carl · Rating 5 out of 5]

I must be in the right frame of mind to read this because it hit me. Normally I'm a cynical and skeptical type, but my present situation had made me ready to hear the message of this book. I've already made one important decision, and this book confirmed it. Now to explore forward.

[Zoe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Was alright. Basically another corporate ladder climber in consulting realizing that his job was not fulfilling. I was very connected to that part of the story because it is very similar to my own story. But I don’t see any practical suggestions as to what to do about it. Not everyone wants to become a YouTuber/writer/content creator. If you are looking for an inspiring story, this would do. If you looking for some guidance on how to navigate career after realizing that it needs some fine-tuning, this is not helpful.

[Ines Bacao · Rating 3 out of 5]

30/7/23

I’m still confused about this book: for me it’s such an obvious thematic, I can’t really understand the concept of life script and the author at times just seemed lazy on his profissional life.
I think this book tries to validate the blogger life regarding it has a extraordinary experience but I can’t really understand that.
Will need some more thinking about the book.

[Ann-Marie Ng · Rating 5 out of 5]

Concise and thought provoking

What I like about this book is that it is thoughtful encouragement to different types of readers - you don't have to be a vlogger/online marketing guru wannabe to benefit from this book.

This made me seriously think about the assumptions I had unconsciously been making and challenged me to think about the choices I made so far and why I'm on my current path in life (and question if things could be different) If you're on the fence, I would get this, just to broaden your perspective - important in today's economy especially.

Who this is not for: People who want a concrete list of 10 steps that can tell them what to do right now - there are summaries, but overall the book encourages reflection through narratives because that is the point of the pathless path - it will differ for everyone and is totally opposite of what a top-down approach to thinking and acting entails