Chapter 1
What If My Whole Life Has Been Wrong?
Why do so many people experience a deep sense of regret at the end of their lives?
Reflection activity: The Three-Year Mirror
Chapter 1 · Free
What If My Whole Life Has Been Wrong?
Why do so many people experience a deep sense of regret at the end of their lives?
Reflection activity: The Three-Year Mirror
Chapter 2 · Free
The Unexpected Gifts Hidden in Your Struggles
How to extract insights from your greatest challenges so they become pathways for growth.
Reflection activity: The Hidden Gift
Point atTap on a bookmark to see inside
“Insightful, provocative, and quietly unsettling. A book for anyone who has ever sensed there must be more — more meaning, more joy, more alignment.”
One Choice Changes Everything
Have you ever felt the unnerving sensation that, despite your success, something isn’t quite right?
Blending research from psychology and neuroscience with wisdom from literature and philosophy, Choose Your Work will help you pursue meaningful work and live a fulfilling life.
“Chapter Two alone helped me more than years of therapy.”
Kayla GilesWhen you look back at your life, will you be satisfied?
Or will you feel disappointed?
The dark side of grit is chasing goals that don’t matter,
while your deepest desires quietly fade away.
The way forward is to realize that the secret to a fulfilling life is to choose your work.
What you get for free
Download Chapters 1 and 2 of Choose Your Work
Chapter 2
The Unexpected Gifts Hidden in Your Struggles
How to extract insights from your greatest challenges so they become pathways for growth.
Reflection activity: The Hidden Gift
Praise for Choose Your Work
“A compelling path back to yourself”
“As a psychotherapist, I see how easy it is to lose sight of who you truly are. Choose Your Work offers a compelling path back to yourself.”
“Helped me more than years of therapy”
“Chapter Two alone helped me more than years of therapy.”
“Distils a lifetime of insights and wisdom into a practical guide”
“Distils a lifetime of insights and wisdom into a practical guide to help you clarify what matters most.”
“Stopped me in my tracks in the best possible way”
“Choose Your Work stopped me in my tracks, in the best possible way. This book is wise, warm and deeply human. Read it, do the reflections, and you’ll step into your next chapter with more clarity, curiosity and energy.”
“Unlike other career change manuals”
“Unlike other career change manuals — a guide for those searching for fulfilling work that is both optimistic and encouraging.”
“Quietly unsettling”
“Insightful, provocative, and quietly unsettling. A book for anyone who has ever sensed there must be more — more meaning, more joy, more alignment.”
“Provides the roadmap”
“Dan says the scary, quiet thing out loud — we’ve got a choice in how we spend our lives. He provides the roadmap.”
“Buy this book”
“Most people stumble into careers that ‘kinda work’ and there they remain stuck. Don’t be like most people. Buy this book.”
“The real deal”
“I’ve read a lot of self-help books. This one’s different — it’s the real deal. I wanted to highlight every sentence.”
“A must‑read”
“A must‑read for anyone ready to stop wasting time and start living the life they’re meant for.”
Inside the full book
Discover 17 powerful insights that will redefine how you think about work…
- 1
What if my whole life has been wrong? Why do so many people experience a deep sense of regret at the end of their lives?
- 2
What is more valuable than $100 million in cold hard cash? The truth about why you don’t really want to lie on the beach all day.
- 3
Stop letting your job title steal your future. Many brilliant lawyers, doctors, engineers and business owners are shackled to work that drains them. A two‑minute reframing activity will return decades of freedom.
- 4
Discover the work you were meant to do. Not just the job you were told to get.
- 5
How it’s so easy to become trapped by your competence. Being good at something may lead you down the wrong path and how to find the right one.
- 6
Why your deepest truth won’t arrive through thinking… and what you need to do to find it.
- 7
Why happiness is a misleading goal… and what to focus on instead.
- 8
Why seeking permission is the greatest obstacle between you and the work you’re meant to do… and how to escape the need for validation.
- 9
Why it’s so easy to get distracted and what to do about it. Distractions have a deeper meaning.
- 10
How to overcome the dark side of grit… so that you don’t get caught up in goals that don’t deeply matter to you.
- 11
The unexpected gifts hidden in your struggles. How to extract insights from your greatest challenges so they become pathways for growth.
- 12
Why winning the wrong game only magnifies the inherent emptiness of playing it… and which games are worth playing.
- 13
Don’t confuse success with suffering in comfort. Why your focus on comfort is ruining your life and obscuring the true metrics of success.
- 14
Why extraordinary success seldom comes from setting extraordinary goals… and the real cause of success responsible for Nobel Prizes and elite performance.
- 15
How to think independently in a world obsessed with conformity. Why does conforming to the herd hamper your personal growth?
- 16
How do you pay the bills and still choose the work? Practical answers to the question that stops most people.
- 17
Action plan. A roadmap to convert your insights into action. In just one hour per day you can make major progress.
This book will help you discover your deepest truth, define what success means to you and begin a fulfilling new chapter in your journey.
About the author
Hi, I’m Dan Dobos.
I began writing Choose Your Work as a gift for my children. But as I wrote it, the book worked on me too. I came to realise that the book that will most impact your life is the one that you write yourself.
A quirky fact about me is that I like to juggle. I originally learnt to juggle with rocks on a camel safari in India. I later went to circus school and learnt to juggle five balls.
Frequently asked questions
Is it free?
Yes. Enter your email and download Chapters 1 and 2 of Choose Your Work. You will receive them in PDF, Kindle and audiobook formats.
What is in Chapters 1 and 2?
Chapter 1: What If My Whole Life Has Been Wrong? Why do so many people experience a deep sense of regret at the end of their lives? It ends with the reflection activity The Three-Year Mirror.
Chapter 2: The Unexpected Gifts Hidden in Your Struggles. How to extract insights from your greatest challenges so they become pathways for growth. It ends with the reflection activity The Hidden Gift.
Chapter 2: The Unexpected Gifts Hidden in Your Struggles. How to extract insights from your greatest challenges so they become pathways for growth. It ends with the reflection activity The Hidden Gift.
What is a reflection activity?
Every chapter ends with a reflection activity to ensure that you turn the insights you have discovered into practical actions.
Who is it for?
“A book for anyone who has ever sensed there must be more — more meaning, more joy, more alignment.”Genia Janover · Award-Winning Former Principal, Bialik College
How long is the full book?
10 chapters, each with its own reflection activity, plus an Action Plan and 5 more Appendices.
Not sure where to start?
Take The Work Alignment Profile. In about 5 minutes it shows which of 8 Work Personalities you are, and gives you a free chapter selected based on your work pattern. Take the quiz →
Stop winning the wrong game.
Not sure where to start?
Work AlıgnmentPROFILE
8 Work Personalities. Which one are you?
In five minutes, discover why certain work drains you, what kind of work energizes you, and the quick wins you can make this week.
Discover my Work Personality →✓Free✓Personalized Report✓About 5 minutes
8 Work Personalities
“Rather floored it was accurate”
“I’ll admit that I wasn’t sure this quiz would understand me, so I was rather floored when everything it said was accurate.”LOLindsey O’Neill · Restless Explorer
“One question changed my whole perspective.”
“Thank you for making this free. It felt like a gift – and I don’t say that lightly. It made me feel seen. It forced me to think bigger than my daily to-do list. One question changed my whole perspective.”OKOwen Keating · Restless Explorer