Lifestyle as Business Concept

I'm not much of a materialist. I get no kick out of shopping, nor do I get any great joy out of traveling for the sake of traveling. I like things to have meaning. There has to be purpose to my activities. I also like the freedom that comes from not having to go to an office. So I'm content to be with my family and with my plants on my balcony, occupied with my own thoughts and the little things that make up an ordinary day.

This is my simple lifestyle that I'm sure a lot of my friends and family would like to have for themselves as well. However, they muddle things up for themselves. They go on expensive holidays. They buy expensive things, and they make bad investments that drain their resources. They conclude from this that they cannot do what I've done. They can't live like I do, neither in material terms, nor in terms of work and meaning. But they're wrong, and I'm determined to demonstrate this in a simple and non-intrusive manner.

I'm going to continue with my present low key promotion of my lifestyle through positive and mildly subversive posts on Facebook. Today, I posted a picture of our neighbour's pomegranate tree, together with a reference to D-Day. The message being that life can be good, even if simple, and that a liberating army landing on our beaches would be nice.

A large number of my friends know that I'm no richer than they are. They also know my love of liberty, simplicity and the good life. Every time I post an image like this, they get reminded of this, as well as the fact that they too should be able to retire early and enjoy the sort of freedom that I've found through a combination of simplicity and sound money management.

We have people coming down to visit us here in Porto from time to time, and my plan is to have these visits recorded and posted about on Facebook. Nothing big or fancy. Just a simple picture taken at a restaurant somewhere or out in the streets. The message will again be that of simplicity and hospitality.

If this gains momentum, visitors will start asking about my lifestyle, and I can then introduce them to various ways to achieve something similar for themselves. I can help them come in contact with people that can help them move down here. I can set up a meeting with Mr Cork if they are of the investing kind. I can introduce them to my friends here in town. All of this, I can do for free up to a point. Then I'll have to charge for these services. At what point this happens, I don't know. But it seems inevitable that it will happen at some point once this strategy gains some traction.

Keep this friendly and non-intrusive will be key. Nothing should be pushed or promoted aggressively. The lifestyle should be implicit in my posts. It should always be up to the visitors to ask about possibilities for themselves. I mustn't tell people directly what they should do. It must all come from them, and even when things reach a point where I'll have to charge for my services, it must come across as nothing but a reasonable compensation for my time invested in helping them. Every one of my clients should feel that I'm a personal friend that they can trust, and in truth that's what I'll aim to be.

Our neighbour's pomegranate tree