About Location Independence and Freedom

Like to travel? Ever wonder or scheme about ways to incorporate more freedom to travel in your life? We have, too!

Ever thought about what it might be like to add income or even replace traditional employment with work that you actually like? So did we!

Thinking that with the way things are now you might not be able to retire the same way your parents did? Boy, do we hear that! It’s tough when you realize you’re probably going to have to continue working long past traditional retirement age.

We’re doing something – well, more than a few things – about it all. And we can help you do it, too.

Here’s what people have to say:

“Love your attitude. Not relying on traditional employment as a source of income is very smart for anyone, regardless of how secure they might feel.” – vered | Blogger for Hire

“Instead of waiting for something to happen, you’ve taken the initiative and mapped out your own destiny. Smart move.” – Barbara Swafford

“Inspiring and realistic.” – Eliza Fayle, Silver & Grace E-zine

“…everyone will take away something beneficial.” – Dot, Deeper Issues

The Time of Our Lives

This photo was taken just before we headed off on our first extended trip after achieving our goal of location independence last summer. We’ve put together a simple business toolkit which allows us to

work from anywhere there’s a phone and Internet connection
travel any time we want and
stay wherever we are as long as we wish.

This is what TRUE FREEDOM means!

When we got married in 2006, we faced a number of challenges: blending a family, financial and real estate downturn-related issues, and the realization that Pete’s career had plateaued. In a brutally honest assessment, we acknowledged that we both needed to continue working until the day we died. We felt trapped!

This makes us no different than many people, nowadays. Except for one thing. We decided to treat our circumstances as opportunities.

We decided we’d better figure out something we liked and could do together, and perhaps it wouldn’t seem “so much like work.” Could we get to the point where location independence meant we could move forward in our life together, instead of being stuck?

What if we could create our own business that

provided ongoing and diversified income so that all our eggs weren’t in one basket
gave us the freedom to work from home or anywhere so that we could travel
allowed us to integrate work with life for more enjoyment, and
we could share with others who might be in a similar boat

We decided to try!

Quickly, we settled on a combination of online business activities that matched up. Betsy sold her business and quickly achieved location independence. Continuing to work with the franchisor, she now has a consulting role in that organization utilizing her skills in communications and business development. After almost four years of moonlighting on our online stores, last year Pete took the plunge and quit his job, a couple of months after we downsized into a townhouse. Now both of us had location independence! We could literally lock the door and go, any time we wanted!

Many of our friends and relatives couldn’t believe it. They characterized location independence as early retirement, failing to realize that we had chosen freedom and designed the lifestyle we wanted. Left unsaid was their obvious belief that we would fail. We know several placed informal bets as to how long it would take before we had to go back to “real jobs.” But, just as the tortoise won the race with the hare, we’ve hit a comfortable stride. We are IN IT to WIN IT!

As we write this, in the time since, we’ve been away from home about 40% of the time. We’ve made a significant dent in our goal to get to all 50 states together. We’ve been in Montana, Wyoming, the Dakotas, Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, Missouri and Tennessee.

We’ve been to Graceland, Beale Street and Branson (where Betsy danced on stage with Chubby Checker!) on a rock’n’roll and blues music pilgrimage. We’ve done the Lake Superior Circle Tour and visited our beloved Minnesota North Shore several times. We spent a month at our cabin in Northern Minnesota, away from it all – fishing, eating, happy hour-ing, the whole nine yards. And all the time, having the freedom to work just a few easy hours per day.

We began this year with travel: two weeks in Hawaii, where we visited Oahu, Maui, and our new favorite place on earth: Kauai. We’ve got the photo evidence to prove that we did work while we were poolside, but anyone would agree this sure beats punching a clock!

At the moment, we’re strategizing our goal of visiting all 7 continents. This may involve a semi-permanent relocation or two – we’ll keep you posted.

And after working on – and achieving! – our basic objectives, we finally figured out what PassingThru wants to be: a way to share information and ideas, and introduce you to resources and others who are all about similar objectives, too! We’re not claiming to have all the answers. And sorry, we won’t be sharing an overnight, “get rich quick” strategy. Those never work anyway, do they?

What we can tell you is with a little elbow grease, inspiration, and education, you can make significant work-life changes just like we have.

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