Chapter 10: Are You a Tumbleweed or a Rock?
“Soulful travel is to discover the overlapping point between history and everyday life; the way to find the essence of every place, every day. Curiosity about the extraordinary in the ordinary moves the heart of the traveler intent on seeing behind the veil.” – Paul Cousineau
Location Wealth and travel are the same. Location Wealth and exploration are the same. The ability to do both is what makes you location rich.
But while Location Wealth is synonymous with travel and exploration, you don’t even need to leave the comfort of your own home to achieve the riches of location independence.
Location Wealth is a mindset. It’s a belief that the world is meant to be understood, and it’s a desire to immerse yourself in the uniqueness of life. In this sense, becoming location rich is the willingness to approach every day with an open mind, excited for the opportunity to take whatever comes your way in stride.
Location Wealth doesn’t mean full location independence. It doesn’t mean long-term travel, and it doesn’t even mean being well traveled. Location Wealth is the ability to live and travel wherever you want, but not that you have to live and travel everywhere.
This distinction is important. Someone who loves their town, city, state, or country, and wants nothing more than to plant roots in the place they love, is no different than the perpetual vagabond, who only stays in a place long enough to learn something about him or herself.
Location Wealth is the ability to live and travel where you love. If what you love is your backyard, than that’s all the Location Wealth you need. If not, well, then it’s time to look further outward.
So what does Location Wealth mean to you? Are you a tumbleweed, or are you a rock?
A tumbleweed is the type of person you traditionally think of when you first hear the Principle of Location Wealth and location independence. This is the person who wants to soak up different cultures, thinks that life is better lived in motion, and treats travel as a kind of reverent experience.
They’re the person who lives to explore and treats every day like a journey. When they work, their goal is to work toward travel. When they’re stationary, it’s only because they’re scheming their next trip. They get the most value out of life when they’re experiencing the world around them.
A rock is the opposite of a tumbleweed, clearly. It’s also someone you wouldn’t think of as having traditional Location Wealth, but I challenge you to think otherwise.
A rock is someone who enjoys his or her day-to-day routine. They place high value in the idea of home and community, and enjoy the comfort of the hearth. They’re the ones who extract the most value out of hard work and building something tangible and great, that benefits a specific region.
Do you fall under either category? Which one? If not, you’re in luck, because there’s a third type of person: a blend of both.
Most of us who are intent on pursuing true Wealth probably fall under both categories. We have a strong sense of home, a love of community, but really want Location Wealth for the chance to explore life in the way we see most fit.
For us, Location Wealth is the desire to have a beautiful place to call home, but the ability to live where and when we want.
I definitely fall under both categories. I view travel as a spiritual endeavor, I love to explore the world, I treat every day as a journey, but I also love where I live.
And when you live in San Francisco, it’s kind of hard to want to live anywhere else. Which is why I’ve made a commitment to calling the City my “home base,” but at the same time, building a life of location independence that allows me to travel where I want, when I want.
This is why the two principles of Wealth laid out previously are so important. Through your Emotional Wealth you’re able to build your emotional framework, understand more of how the world operates, and shift your mind into believing an “unconventional” life of Location Wealth is possible.
Through your Time Wealth, you’re able to build a life that you not only love, but one over which you have complete ownership. When you’re creating your Time Wealth through a collection of projects, ensure that you’re intertwining your projects in ways that will grant you Location Wealth. If built correctly, your Time Wealth will give you both the ability and means to achieve true Location Wealth.
Before you go on, define what you are. Are you a tumbleweed, a rock, or both?
Defining what you are will give your life greater clarity. Your vision will be in greater alignment with your goals.
The passion found with your Emotional Wealth will be in greater alignment with the way you go about achieving Time Wealth. Your Time Wealth, if built strategically, will let you achieve Location Wealth in the best way for you.
But, none of this is possible if you don’t first define your Location Wealth. It’s the process of understanding what you’ll do with your Time Wealth; it’s the way you’re able to see what’s important to you emotionally.
If you gain your Emotional Wealth through a passion of storytelling, for example, and gain your Time Wealth through a location independent communications company, but your idea of Location Wealth is a single-family home, your three principles of Wealth might not be in alignment.
If you gain Emotional Wealth through a passion of helping inner-city kids in Brooklyn, you gain Time Wealth by creating an after school program for at-risk youth, but your idea of Location Wealth is living life out of a backpack and the constant exploration of new cultures, then your three principles of Wealth might not be in alignment.
Your principles of Wealth must always be in alignment, because they are all connected. As you move through life and build each Principle of Wealth, make sure you’re placing focus on how each one connects with the others.
Use your definition of Location Wealth as the fuel that drives your other Principles of Wealth. Use the other Principles of Wealth to build a life that can achieve the type of Location Wealth you want and deserve.