How many people do you know who are unhappy in their work?
How many people do you know who are living their dream and doing what they love every day?
Everyone would like to get paid to do what they love, but a lot of people either don’t think it’s possible, or don’t know how to go about making the change.
Since I started planning this blog, I’ve come across dozens of amazing people who are following their dreams, and helping others to do the same.
If you’re itching to quit your job and make a living from your passions, then you would definitely be wise to connect with some of these people and follow their advice.
In no particular order, here are 38 51 amazing people who will help you quit your job and follow your dreams:
(Note: to make it easier to connect with these awesome folks, I have added them all to a Twitter List, so you can subscribe to all their tweets with a single click!)
Scott Dinsmore
Scott is leading a revolution of people doing work they love. He is living his legend, and encouraging you to lead yours.
Must Read: 57 Living Legends Expose The Moment that Defined their Passion
Debbie Van De Ven
Debbie uses her artistic passion to help you avoid boring office jobs and make a living from just your art.
Must Read: 5 Ideas for selling drawings online
Lisa Wilder
Lisa is passionate about life and about living life as an entrepreneur. She coaches other entrepreneurs to do the same.
Must Read: How to Stop Seeking Happiness & Create It NOW Instead
Laura Simms
Laura helps creatives discover and cultivate their ideal career, so that they can live on purpose & work on fire! (not literally, that would be hideous)
Must Read: Should I leave my job now or later?
Cody McKibben
Cody helps people break free from the conventional template lifestyle—liberating you from traditional ways of thinking about work and life, building your own (entrepreneurial) projects, living a kick-ass remarkable life, and doing good for others.
Must Read: Reach Your Dreams with Lifestyle Design
Lindsay Hunt
Lindsay blogs about nontraditional career paths, tools for aspiring solopreneurs, career tips, self-employment and living a life of abundance.
Must Read: So You Quit Your Job…Now What?
Kelly Gurnett
Kelly (or Cordelia) is on a mission to learn to live deliberately. To make intentional choices, to live an intentional life, and to try to make each day just a little bit closer to the life she’d like to live.
Must Read: Never Feel Guilty for Following Your Dreams
Annie André
Annie believes that there’s more to life than the status-quo and 9 to 5 lifestyle, and she wants to help you live your dreams.
Must Read: How to Start a Business When You Have No Idea What to Start
Benny Hsu
Benny is tired of listening to people say “get a real job”. He writes about pursuing your passions and having financial freedom to be your own boss in life.
Must Read: Choose to Live an Epic Life
Alejandro Reyes
Alejandro (Alex) aims to make you a warrior of life, and to teach you that you can be a winner at anything you wish to do.
Must Read: How to find your passion and join the work revolution
Barrie Davenport
Barrie wants to inspire you to live boldly and bloom to your fullest potential!
Peggy McPartland
Peggy invites you to join her on her journey to break out of this comfortable life, this routine, and explore the world – live her life fully and passionately in everything she does.
Must Read: It’s just a job, not jail
Joel Runyon
Joel is set on doing impossible things in order to tell a great story with his life. He keeps a list of things that he thought were impossible, and he is crossing them off one by one.
Must Read: Impossible: The Manifesto
Caroline Leon
Caroline writes about personal development with a focus on facing fears and living a life without limits.
Must Read: Homeless, unemployed and single – my road to redefining success
Chris Stott
Chris is a world changer in training. He can help you strike out on your own and build something amazing.
Must Read: This One Thing Is Killing Your Future
Tom Ewer
Tom is passionate about helping you to safely negotiate a path to rewarding self-employment.
Must Read: The Secret To Leaving Work Behind
Tal Gur
Tal encourages others to live their dreams, through the sharing of his own experiences, and in the relentless pursuit of his own, personal life goals.
Jacob Sokol
Jacob wants to help you live an extraordinary life. His blog is all about living a life of passion, purpose, progress and playfulness.
Must Read: 7 Ways To Tell That You’re Not Living Your Highest Purpose In Life (And 7 Tricks For Fixing That)
Jonathan Mead
Jonathan’s mission is to help you create a life where you can’t tell the difference between work and play, and you get paid to be you!
Must Read: How to Quit Your Day Job
Corbett Barr
Corbett writes about doing meaningful work, living a fun and adventurous life, and becoming the best version of yourself possible.
Must Read: Hell Yes You Should Quit Your Job
Also check out: How to Start a Blog That Matters (aff link)
Conni Biesalski
Conni writes about the freedom lifestyle, strategies for unconventional, simplistic and nomadic lifestyle designs.
Must Read: 9 Scary Questions to Ask Before Setting Off to the Land of Solopreneurship
Lea & Jonathan Woodward
Lea and Jonathan aim to inspire and empower you to create a Location Independent lifestyle of your own design.
Must Read: How To Find Ideas For A Business You Can Run From Anywhere
Therese Schwenkler
Therese provides ‘non-sucky advice’ for people who are wondering what the hell they should do with their lives.
Must Read: What the F Should You Do With Your Life?
Joshua Fields Millburn
Joshua left his six-figure job to pursue his passions. Now he writes about minimalism and living a meaningful life with less stuff.
Must Read: Why I Quit My 6-Figure Corporate Job
Matt Cheuvront
Matt writes about talk about the entrepreneurial lifestyle and approaching life, both personal and professional, without restrictions.
Must Read: Do Anything by Figuring Out What You Need
Pat Flynn
Pat makes a living from online passive income, and on his blog he teaches you how you can do the same.
Must Read: Passive Income 101
Srinivas Rao
Srini will help you stop listening to your ego, set your life up on your own terms, and be truly happy.
Must Read: Why the 8 hour Work Day Doesn’t Make Sense
Emilie Wapnick
Emilie writes about how you can integrate all of your interests into your life and even use your multipotentiality as fuel for your life and income.
Must Read: Screw Employment, Invent Your Own Job!
Also check out: Renaissance Business (aff link)
Fabian Kruse
Fabian helps people to achieve more with less effort, live playfully, and go beyond the rules that limit them.
Must Read: There is No Path
Michelle Ward
Michelle Ward has personally helped almost 200 creative people devise the career they think they can’t have – or discover it to begin with!
Must Read: 5 Reasons I Got Off My Ass & Discovered a New Passion
Chris Guillebeau
Chris writes about (among other things) entrepreneurship and other kinds of unconventional work, with the belief that the work we do should be both fun and meaningful.
Must Read: 279 Days to Overnight Success
Also check out: The Unconventional Guide to Art & Money (aff link)
Seth Godin
Seth writes about the post-industrial revolution, the way ideas spread, marketing, quitting, leadership and most of all, changing everything.
Must Read: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us
Jonathan Fields
Jonathan helps people cultivate the personal practices and environmental/cultural shifts needed to become more agile, creative and innovative and embrace action in the face of uncertainty with a greater sense of ease.
Must Read: What Are You Willing to Do For The Rest of Your Life?
Pam Slim
Pam is a seasoned coach and writer who helps frustrated employees in corporate jobs break out and start their own business.
Must Read: Overwhelmed with possibilities when plotting your career? Try this approach
Charlie Gilkey
Charlie helps creative people thrive in life and business.
Must Read: Becoming Yourself and Growing Your Blog
Sean Ogle
Sean writes about building a business you can run from anywhere on Earth, and living a life worth writing about.
Must Read: My Last Day
Darren Rowse
Darren’s site is dedicated to helping other bloggers learn the skills of blogging, share their own experiences and promote the blogging medium.
Must Read: How Bloggers Make Money From Blogs
Tyler Tervooren
Last but by no means least, Tyler aims to help people succeed by embracing risk in their lives.
Must read: Take This Job and Shove It!
Even More Amazing People!
Since I first published this post, several more amazing people have come to my attention who definitely belong on this list, so here are a few bonus people for your consideration.
Carolyn Edlund
Carolyn is a consultant for artists and creative entrepreneurs. Her blog will help you launch and grow your career in the arts.
Must Read: Making Art and Making a Living
Ben Hunt
I worked at Ben’s web design company for four years, and now he’s training aspiring web designers to build truly successful websites and even run their own businesses.
Must Read: I Created Websites, Now I Create Businesses!
Serena Star-Leonard
Serena is all about helping you create a better lifestyle, with more freedom and fulfillment, by turning your passion into profit.
Must Read: Will You Die With These Regrets?
Alexander Heyne
Alex will help you kill that ‘lost’ feeling and live a conversation-worthy life. And his blog has a funny name.
Must Read: Killing Your Old Life and Living the Dream
Tom Meitner
Tom will help you get past your self-imposed limits and take charge of your life so you can be more than just an average person.
Must Read: Stop Complaining and Make Change
Hugh Kimura
Hugh is dedicated to discovering the best ways to turn what you love into a full-time income so you can leave the cubicle…for good.
Must Read: Does Finding Your Passion Guarantee You Will Get Paid? (site currently offline – 24/04/12)
Mary-Eve Boudreault
Mary will help you take control of your life, be happier and do what you love.
Must Read: Do What You Love
Jennifer Gresham
Jennifer’s blog is all about helping you to design a career that enhances your life, and create a life you love.
Must Read: Why Your Ideal Career Is Hiding From You
Drew Kimble
Drew runs Skinny Artist, a community-based website dedicated to giving working artists the tools, knowledge and resources necessary to successfully market their work online and enable them to live their art every single day .
Must Read: How long is all of this going to take?!
Jennifer Lee
Jennifer coaches creative entrepreneurs and blogs about her personal journey of creative expression.
Must Read: Don’t Go it Alone
Beth Nicholls
Beth believes the world would be a better place if more people were doing what they loved, and her blog provides tools and inspiration to help you do just that.
Must Read: Lighting your entrepreneurial fire
Lisa Sonora Beam
Lisa is a Creativity and business strategist to those who want to thrive, not just survive as an artist.
Must Read: Have the Courage to Follow Your Heart and Intuition
Helen Aldous
Helen is dedicated to empowering creative people with the business & marketing skills needed to survive financially and mentally as an artist.
Must Read: The Revolution Will Not Be Televised | How Can Artists Survive & Thrive in the New Economy?
Hopefully there are a few people in the list who you weren’t already aware of, and who can give you some fresh inspiration.
I’m sure I’ve probably missed plenty more people who are worthy of inclusion on the list, so feel free to let me know of any other amazing people who can help you quit your job and follow your dreams. If I like them, I’ll add them to the list!
Leave a comment below, or tweet me up @rightbrainrocks
Thanks so much for including me in an amazing list of awesome people!! I feel very honored :))
You’re very welcome, Conni. You’re doing amazing things!
Ben Hunt helped me start my dream job, designing websites! http://www.prowebdesigncourse.com
Hmm, the name rings a bell 😉
You rock, Dan!
Not even in my wildest dreams I thought of being in a list with such an amazing people. Thank you!
Your dreams are too conservative! 😉 You definitely belong here, Alex.
I guess I will have to let them go truly wild! 🙂
Awesome list, Dan. Thanks for including me! Looking forward to making my way through your must reads.
No problem, Laura. Nice bit of reading for you over the weekend! 🙂
Great list! Thanks, Dan… um, and awesome pet portraits! I love them! Might have to get one one of these days, being that I have the cutest dogs in the world! 😀 (but don’t we all?)
I’d be happy to paint your dogs, Therese! Get in touch if you want to send me some photos 🙂
Wow what a huge list. you must have put a lot of time into this. I love your realistic animal paintings. I read your bio and i know what you mean about not being artistic until recently. I used to be a web database analytics geek and corporate financier. Then i opened up my own online shop selling handmade sleeping masks in the Japanese kawaii genre. It was exhilarating. I still have my store at http://www.lenekonoir.com bit it’s closed while we are living in France becaue it’s too hard to sew when italy and spain and sites are to be seen.
I’ll be sure to check out all the new people on here whom i havn’t heard of. Good luck with your creative endeavors. Are you on etsy too?
Thanks Annie, that’s a great story! Those masks are cool!
I’m not on Etsy yet, but it’s on my to-do list.
I’m not sure how much business you have from your own site but i used to get the majority of my sales on etsy. or people found me on etsy and then bought from my website. My advice is to get on etsy asap. It will take you a couple of hours to fill out all the bios and setup the paypal stuff but it’s well worth it.
I actually set up my account last night and will be adding some listings today! Thanks, Annie.
I can’t tell you how honored I am to be included in this list! These are some real heavy hitters when it comes to following your dreams, getting sh*t done, and living your best life. Plus, it’s lead me to YOUR blog, which is now on my subscription list. Looking forward to getting to know you more!
No problem, Cordelia. Everyone on the list is a heavy hitter in my book!
Dan, you are amazeballs. Thanks for the ego boost – whadda list!
lol @ ‘amazeballs’! Thanks, Michelle!
Thanks so much for including me, Dan! It’s great to see so many familiar faces on the list and I’ll make sure to check out the new faces, too.
You’re welcome, Lindsay 🙂
Wow Dan what an amazing list, I’m so delighted to be featured, thanks a million! 🙂
No problem at all 🙂
Hey Dan! Thanks for mentioning me here. You put three of my favorite ladies right before me. I’m in good company! Others I do follow and aspire to reach their level of awesomeness. Thanks so much.
No worries, Benny! 🙂
Thanks for including us, Dan – you get 3 for 1 with us 🙂 Nice to find another fellow Brit in the blogosphere too!
You’re welcome, Lea. I hadn’t seen Inspiring Ventures before. Looks great!
What a list! Some very inspiring people on here! This is going to keep me reading for weeks!
Always happy to inspire people! 🙂
Sweet line up. Rock on! 🙂
Thanks Jacob!
Hey Dan,
Thanks for including me in your list – you rock!
There are some great people on this list.
My best advice for anyone however is that while reading those listed above is great, the best thing you can do is go out and forge your own path to build something incredible.
Pura vida,
Chris
Cheers Chris. Great advice, there comes a point where you have to stop reading and take action! As Bruce Lee said “if you spend too much time thinking about a thing, it will never get done.”
Dan, thanks so much for including me on this list of amazing people! I’m honored. I’m looking forward to exploring your site.
You’re very welcome, Peggy!
Hi Dan,
YOU are amazing for taking the time to put this great list together. Thank you so much for including me in this stellar group of bloggers. I am honored! 🙂
You’re welcome, Barrie!
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I see Mr Cameron’s recent speeches still aren’t enough to get him on your list then Dan. 😉
Hey Dan,
Thanks for the honour of being listed with some of my heroes! Yippeee!
xx
Wow, that’s some good company and a whole lot of people I haven’t read before. Looking forward to fill my knowledge gaps now! 🙂 Thanks, Dan!
Cheers, Dan. Good to see you rocking out over here.
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I had help following my dream of being a full time artist and would recommend http://www.onewomanmarketing.com also for lots of good advice!
This is great stuff! Time to read up! I think you should consider adding Tim Ferris to this list.
Thanks for the amazing list of resources! In my daily work I often promote many of these articles for the fans to read and enjoy!
I work for a company that specializes in helping its users find their dream job – it’s pretty amazing stuff! You can only imagine how all these articles fit in, when they motivate people to move onward and try their best to live a life they deserve – dream job included! Check it out at http://www.jobdreaming.com!
Thank you for showing that there are so many out there who can break free from the mundane day to day life that most of us have gotten used to.
How about John Williams? You should read his book ‘Screw Work Let’s Play’
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