Although we are focusing mainly on the thoughts involved in relocation, it’s logical to consider first some of the key activity options open to you. These will cover aspects such as your career, personal development and the opportunities available for downshifting. This is a very personal thing – we’re not in the game of trying to force you down any particular routes. This is the age of empowerment – it’s you who will make the decisions because it’s mainly you who will live with them, fine-tuning the ideas as necessary to get the best fit for your particular needs.

Your initial thoughts and decisions are thus very important.Do bear in mind the possibility that your decisions are quite likely to affect others – partner, children, spouse and so on: it’s their life as well as yours. Remember also that, however well you plan, some things won’t work out as you thought they would, and some situations will undoubtedly change from the way they were when you did your initial planning.So, if you’re thinking of future plans as a twosome or a family, make sure you include the full picture in the frame.

If your dream is to run a sheep farm halfway up a Scottish hillside, check that your partner is happy about all the implications. Initially, this involves establishing in some detail what these implications would be. Talk to those who know. Best of all, if you can, talk to someone who is actually doing it. Keep an objective mind open to the strengths and weaknesses of your cunning plan. It may realize your needs, but equally it might have so many blocks and concerns that an objective review will show that it’s really, honestly, a non-starter.

Carrying Out A Swot Analysis

This is a business idea, which is very useful in life generally. Using it helps you remain as objective as possible and it also encourages you to compare like with like if you’re trying to come up with a preferred strategy. For our purposes, we can take the letters to represent:

S    Strengths

W   Weaknesses

O   Opportunities

T  Timescales/Threats (as appropriate)

So, taking our Scottish Highland shepherd idea as a mini case study, let’s run through the considerations for James, a teacher who is married and currently resident in Putney, south London.

Can Teacher Become Shepherd?

• Would give me the open-air life I crave.
• Living would be cheaper than my present city life.
• Overall would provide me with more free time to pursue interests.
• Profits from present flat sale would reduce any future mortgage.
• Young child (aged 4) would gain benefits from rural life.

Weaknesses

• Wife does not have driving licence and has lived an urban life to date.
• I have limited knowledge about sheep husbandry.
• Doubts about annual profitability, without additional income.
• Not sure, as a family, how we would fit into rural village life.
• Lack of awareness about local schooling arrangements.

Opportunities

• Dramatic change of way of life and work/life balance.
• Possibilities for self and wife to develop artistic interests.
• Potential for income from marketing art commercially.
• Healthier lifestyle.
• Involvement in working with livestock.

Threats

• Probability of being able to gain enough income, year on year.
• Acceptance and enjoyment of rural living by all parties involved.
• Lack of knowledge about animal husbandry and crofting.
• Availability of funds for adequate land to make project viable.
• Ability to cope with possible extremes of weather.

So, with these considerations in mind, how would you advise our good friend James? Are there more pluses than minuses? Does he have some preparatory homework to do before proceeding much further down the line? I think he has.

Keeping An Open Mind

Let’s keep positive, though. We’re not saying that James should forget his pipe dreams and settle down to a life of broadening the upper fourth’s knowledge of French participles. What we are saying is that, when you’re going through this initial reality check process, you have to respond openly to the issues that it raises.

• Are your personal desires blinding you to the valid concerns displayed by your partner or family?
• Do you need to find out more about the activities and way of life that you fancy, to make sure that the reality will be more or less as attractive as the dream?
• Do you need some experience of living in the potential geographic area(s)?
• Would you really, happily, settle into the lifestyle which your plans can finance?
• Could you complete a business plan or at least put some figures to your plans?

There are many other considerations but these are probably enough to be thinking about at this early stage.