A new emerging lifestyle for the 21st century

Believe it or not but the world is changing at an unprecedented pace and the ways of life known to our previous generations are being challenged by new unconventional ideas to live life. The idea of a 4-hour workweek seems so surreal that you often just pick up the book to find the weaknesses in Tim Ferris's argument. However, when you re-consider the idea in light of the empirical instances of such successes emerging (like Ali Abdaal, Ankur Warikoo, Tim Ferris) you start to consider the mechanics of the idea a bit more seriously.

Starting with the late 20th century, human productivity has exploded into an exponential rise due to the emergence of automation. Most of the benefit of this increase in productivity has been captured by large corporations which have brought capitalism to its apex. Very few individuals have unlocked ways to capture some part of this increase in productivity for their own benefits. Tim Ferris calls them the New Rich and defines their lifestyle by three crucial characteristics - freedom of money, freedom of time and freedom of mobility.

The core uniqueness of the new rich is that they have found ways to automate their work to an extent that they have freed up themselves 80% of their working hours while still making a lavish living.

What is the new emerging lifestyle?

The emerging new rich have demonstrated a lifestyle that are breaking a bunch of hardened beliefs of generations of our ancestors. The new rich have successfully been able to develop scalable earning sources not tied to their time and attained a state of time and money freedom that allows them to backpack around the world making money off smart and transient professions. The age-old wisdom of money doesn't grow on trees is today being challenged by this new emerging lifestyle.

The new rich are often curious about automated business models and display a vast accumen to learn things quickly to build a working infrastructure that generates revenue. Most usually start from settled careers which allow them to take risks and devote some time to creating side-hustles like those Ali Abdaal talks about in this video. Most of them are avid readers who swear by the value of reading books and do not flinch at the prospect of making meaningful investments to generate money. They are masters at finding the simplest ways to generate value.

Some claim that content creation is the fastest way to create assets and invite business opportunities towards yourself. Others harness online sources to teach and consult people in a way that the impact of their work scales vastly generating huge amounts of revenue. Yet others talk about simpler methods of selling local products on online e-commerce making a significant cut in between.

The new rich have devised creative ways of earning money that are worth understanding and analysing. While many might be flawed business models, some demonstrate a fundamentally sound business model that was just waiting to be captured with a little extra effort.

What are the key ingredients required?

I have identified some key ingredients common to the members of the new rich that I have seen. They are as follows:

1. Fast Learning: The members of this community demonstrate a very fast learning skill in most things as they usually setup most things either alone or with a small team. Voracious reading gives them a sharp capability to dig into any field and relate it to their existing sea of concepts.
2. Business Accumen: They often have a very deep sense of business because each mini-venture they create to generate revenue is a mini-business in itself. A fundamental curiosity in business concepts if both a need and the consequence of building independent revenue streams.
3. Automation: They also often have the right mix of skillset to automate a bunch of things not just through coding but by using the right services and the right architecture to do things. An Amazon seller for instance, has automated everything from sales to packaging to delivery by tying local sellers to amazon delivery agents while managing operations from a laptop at his home.

Is it sustainable?

While the promise of the new rich is deeply tempting, the question remains of how practical the new way of working actually is. Questions remain on how risky the path is and what is the success rate on such an endeavour. The idea is so revolutionary compared to most accepted wisdoms about time, work and money that many will be tempted to criticise the model of work and the loop holes in the beliefs of the new rich. I keenly look out for criticisms and loop holes into the claimed efficacy of this new lifestyle.

However, the best of the opinion I have today is that for the promise they make, the investments are mostly risk-proof. All you have to do is start to learn and try to develop a money making machine with the lowest amount of investment you can manage.