I recently learned there is this term called "Sigma male" where status is not interesting. Now, I don't know if it is real or just some label, but I do know people that don't care. I personally don't care, but this is after testing the waters of spending money for happiness (remodel house, changes, etc...).
The key that I hope to leverage is that for me money nor traditional status does not translates directly into happiness. However, working on my silly programming language and products that use it: very happy.
My hope when I retire is to work almost full-time with the flexibility to stop and go. I'll be tinkering on http://www.adama-lang.org/ whilst I try to bootstrap a board game company.
I've come to the realization that most of my ideas are going to be seen harshly from many technical people, and they will not be taken seriously at first. My strategy therefor is to balance the meta-game of language building with building actual games. For instance, I'm currently designing a two player deck builder game for husband and wives to play.
I gave a demo of a product that I am building with a friend, and his mind was blown. Sadly, this is the form of status that I seek. I don't see the lifestyle or the materialism, I seek demonstrating my cleverness and being ahead of the curve.