But I Don’t Want To Travel…

The other day I heard someone say, “Lifestyle design is great if all you want to do is travel around the world, but I don’t want to travel.”  I think a lot of people have this misconception that lifestyle design equals expatriation and world travel.  But that’s just one option.  Regardless of how you want your life to look, lifestyle design is for you.

I have a broader definition of lifestyle design than some people do.  For instance, some folks think lifestyle design is all about passive income.  Set up a passive income business, work four hours a week, and then go have fun.  That type of lifestyle is part of lifestyle design, but that’s not the only lifestyle that fits into the lifestyle design template.

For instance, a person who wants more time to garden could design their life in a way that offered them the additional time they are looking for.  Same thing if you want to write a novel.  It’s not about what you are doing with your time, it’s about having the time and finances to do what you want.

In a way, lifestyle design is all about being happy; living life on your own terms.  How many people are stuck in jobs that they hate and/or don’t allow them the time or financial wherewithal to live the life they would like to live?  Unfortunately, the answer is way too many.  Lifestyle design simply allows you to reclaim your time and build your finances so you can live the life you envision for yourself.  It also allows you the location freedom to be where you want to be while you’re doing what you want to do.

Although I’d like to do some traveling, I’m not really interested in relocating to a tropical paradise (at least not long-term).  There are things in the U.S. that make me want to continue to have my home base here.  So rather than travel, my motivation is to have the time, finances and location freedom to write novels and race cars.  Everyone has a different set of motivations driving them to design their desired lifestyle.

So don’t get the idea of lifestyle design confused with the lives being lived by most of the proponents of lifestyle design.  Most people advocating a proactive lifestyle design just happen to be people who are interested in extensive world travel or even relocation to another part of the world.  But that doesn’t mean that you have to want to travel in order to become a practitioner of lifestyle design.  All you have to want is to live your life on your own terms.