Today marks the three year anniversary of living nomadically, and I thought I’d write a reflection of my time. I didn’t write a one-year or two-year reflection because I didn’t think of it at the time (I got the idea from a travel Facebook group I’m in and another person shared their one-year reflection). I wish I had the idea earlier, as what I’m going to say today is probably quite different from what I would’ve said a year or two ago.
A Recap
Most of how I got started living this life is detailed here, but basically due to the pandemic, I left NYC for the Bay Area, then left the Bay Area to live elsewhere for the summer due to intense boredom and a feeling of stagnant (or moving backwards) life. I didn’t know I was going to live nomadically when I left, and I fell into it because we didn’t have to go back to the office for a long time.
What drives my nomadic life is to avoid boredom and to continue growing by meeting people around the world, learning their perspectives and way of life, and experiencing different cultures. I’m not living this way to check off boxes or tell people I have been to x number of countries.
The biggest learnings, realizations, growth areas, and general thoughts on nomadic living I’ve had in the last three years are ordered roughly in order of what’s important to me below.
Freedom
I need freedom. I didn’t realize how big of a deal this is to me before I started living nomadically because I never really experienced it like this before (I did in my 7-months of traveling without working back in 2018, but working and traveling is a bit different than pure traveling). Essentially, I need the freedom to decide every aspect of how to live my life in every aspect: location, time, work, hobbies, everything.
Realizing I like being able to choose where to live somewhat on a whim was clear to me very quickly, as I get bored easily and moving solves that problem. I remember thinking in Jan or Feb 2021 (less than a year of living nomadically) that I can’t imagine what my life would be like if I had to go back to the office and live in a city long-term. Well, I could imagine it because I’ve done that before, but not being outside in nature for at least some time every day seemed very odd to me at that point. Fast forward two years since then and although I’ve been living in cities where I’m not in nature every day, I don’t think I can (at least right now) go back to a life where I have to live in a place for an indefinite amount of time.
On freedom of time, I realized this in Sept 2022 when I had a work trip with coworkers. I had to be at the event venue from 10AM-5PM every day, and I felt suffocated, like I didn’t have control of my time — because I didn’t. I couldn’t really decide when to go run, when to explore, when to do work. I had to be there at a certain time, and I really didn’t like it. I’m grateful I had to go on that work trip because that’s the moment I realized how important having full control of my time is.
With a job, I’ve always focused on doing daily work I enjoy, and all along my career with different managers in different companies, I always get asked what I want to do and get to do the work I want to do. Recently, I was put on a project I really did not want to do for probably the first time in my 8-year career, which then led me to realize I took this freedom of work for granted.
Freedom is now one of my core values, and it was really able to blossom and come to the surface during my nomadic journey. Funnily enough, all of these freedoms were restricted by work in a sense, and I’m glad for the most part that those restrictions mostly went away for me to really lean into who I am at the core.
Connections with People
I’ve become more outspoken and a louder advocate for what I need in my relationships with people, more unafraid to be straightforward about both the good and bad. I’m not completely sure what pushed this change but I think for the new people who I’ve been closer to during my nomad life, some of them were this way and gave me the space to do so. Creating a psychologically safe environment, even between two people, is in my mind as well — I don’t consciously do it but I think because I tend to ask questions and not judge, it makes people feel safe and heard to say what they want. My level of patience has also increased, probably partially from teaching but also because I know people process information differently — some people need more time or another way to communicate with.
In the past, I didn’t like being in the center of attention in groups and I would be uneasy speaking in those situations. The growth here is somewhat unrelated with nomadic living, but I’ve become much more comfortable with being at the center of attention in big groups — knowing what I’m saying confidently and looking around to everyone making eye contact. Have I become more confident in general? I had a high level of confidence before, so I’m unsure I could’ve gotten more. Teaching had a very big impact on this, and subsequently speaking in front of crowds for work has definitely been helpful too. My friends giving me space to drone on about almost nothing has made me more comfortable in doing so, and this ability has now leaked over to strangers too. Being in front of people on a stage is pretty exciting to me. I still want to figure out how to facilitate group discussions better, but at least I can comfortably talk in big groups now.
A solid family background and upbringing matters a lot. Many people I meet are now negatively affected and working through various issues caused from the past, and that has been interesting to explore and talk about with others. It makes me extremely grateful that my parents are still together and that I had a pretty solid upbringing, although I realize that due to whatever reasons, I have a tendency to be a certain way (and I don’t know what in my past led me to have this characteristic) that affects what I eventually get in my relationships with people. Realizing I am that way has helped me speak up more for my needs and pinpointing what they are, and I’ve also really understood and experienced what good communication looks like. It’s been a lot of growth in that area.
In the nomad and long-travel community, people talk about loneliness a lot. I’ve never felt lonely because my close friends and I have long-established (even before the pandemic) ways to communicate that involve video chatting, and I’m unafraid to ask and let new people I meet that I’m always down to keep in touch. Video chatting is not the norm for many, and I somehow got so lucky that this is the established way of communication between my closest friends and me. They are the steady, constant support system I have everywhere I go, and beyond that, I have coworkers who I regularly chat with and have had so much experience meeting new people that it’s just a part of life for me.
Related to the above but not so related to people (and I don’t know where in this post I should write it), I realized in Mar 2022 how so much of my life has prepared me to live this way: having a remote job, accidentally living nomadically in NYC, all the friends and meeting people aspects in the paragraph above, the habit of minimalism, and an adaptable and fluid mindset. I’ve written in detail about that here — last paragraph — so I won’t recount all of it in detail here.
Lastly, one of the biggest eye-opening perspectives I’ve had is polygamy. I probably should write a separate blog post about this, but after being exposed to the idea, I can’t seem to logically part from it. Love is widespread in all ways: parents can love multiple children, a child can love multiple parents and multiple family members, a person can love multiple friends and multiple pets. Why is it that romantic love is the only one that’s restricted to one person? That doesn’t make any sense. Also with my lifestyle and crave for freedom, polygamy seems to fit. Whether or not I actually live that way is up for debate, but the idea is interesting to think about.
Moving Around
Living in a place for longer and (not) being tired is the way to do this sustainably. I never had any doubts on this and this is how I approached this lifestyle since the beginning. Funnily enough, I’ve found that moving around often doesn’t make me too tired either, if I’m not driving every day in combination with being outdoors every day.
I need to live in places with nature and in cities, I really gravitate towards parks but enjoy city amenities. At the beginning of 2021, I remember thinking about what life would be like if I had to go back to the office in NYC, and I realized it’d be extremely hard to not have the choice to just go trail running or hiking every day. Eventually in the middle of 2022, I did live a pretty long without constant access to hiking, but I gravitated to parks and I like living in nature a lot more than not.
Coming across my thoughts on expat life, the summary being I’m not actually sure if I want to be an expat due to the split of natives versus foreigners in many countries. That is definitely influencing whether I actually want to move outside the US (to a non-native English speaking country), but I guess for now, I don’t really have to choose.
Conclusion
A lot of the time when I get to a new place — or even an old place, I often think to myself: “what is my life?” (especially when I return back to a place I’ve already been before, because my brain goes “Wow, I’ve been to so many places that I’m back to somewhere I’ve already been”). The sense of wonder, growth, non-boredom, meeting people, freedom, all of it — drives me forward to continue living this wonderful life I get to live.
I’m so incredibly lucky and grateful for the background I had growing up and all the experiences I’ve had. I’m truly, truly, truly blessed and I continue enjoying life as best I can while remembering the privilege I have in doing so.
