Lifestyle design has been one of the hottest topics around. Tim Ferris brought the excitement of lifestyle design and lifestyle entrepreneurship to the masses back in 2007 when he published his book: The 4 Hour Work Week. His book has been on the NYT bestseller list for years!

I loved his book when it came out, but it did not resonate well with me on a personal level. While I admired Tim, my life was different- I was a parent with obligations and commitments.

Tim is a Princeton graduate, aggressive go-getter and anyone reading his book immediately senses his extremely confident personality through his “punchy writing style and the extraordinary, almost super human goals he has achieved.

For most parents who read it, we cannot easily see a reality of our own from his vision and teachings. After all, we have significant obligations to our families and very busy schedules and significant obligations and are not able to immediately and drastically change the way they live (as he suggests).

Security Over Luxury

If you are like me, you are not motivated with dreams of buying luxury toys and visiting exotic places. Instead, we want the ability to give ourselves (and our family) a nice home, a good education, a positive community, access to quality healthcare and meaningful experiences in life.

Presence Over Escapism

If given the choice, we would give up the chance to travel to exotic places and play on the other side of the world for the opportunity to be home more and to be engaged and present in our children’s lives and in our communities.

Yes, there are now tens of thousands of individuals who have become world travelers and suitcase entrepreneurs by leveraging the opportunity of lifestyle design and entrepreneurship.

But- Freedom is Freedom

Despite the different motivations for lifestyle design, lifestyle design and lifestyle entrepreneurship is based on one fundamental principle: FREEDOM.

For parents, the dream of having the freedom to be a rich jet setter or world traveler is replaced with a dream of having the freedom to live life on our own terms- be a meaningful provider and participant in our family and personal life.

You see- the same tools, strategies, systems, and opportunities that make lifestyle design possible are available to anyone- including parents like you and me.

The Key Difference

The major difference is the approach that parents need to take when creating lifestyle businesses. Tim Ferris thinks big and he acts big. He is aggressive in the decisions he makes in both business and life. And that is okay- it is why he is so cool and interesting to follow.

For me, I like to dream big as well, but my dreams are not what has made me a successful lifestyle entrepreneur. In fact, it has been the total opposite.

I became a successful parent entrepreneur because I was able to see a realistic path to getting to financial freedom. One that I could accomplish as a busy parent with limited time and money . . . and with a lot of inescapable commitments.

I used the same tools as they do and built businesses based on the same models, but I took a more practical approach and one that created meaningful success moments along the way.

Parents have just as strong a motivation to create freedom in our lives. With a family friendly, practical and risk comfortable approach, we can achieve the freedom we want in our lives as well!