For me, living a digital nomad lifestyle is about growth, exploring and self-discovery. It’s the opposite of comfort, same old routine you had for years, and calls you forward to deeper levels of growth.
What does it take to live a digital nomad lifestyle?
1. Get out of your comfort zone
Exploring the city and country you choose to live in will demand patience, discomfort and having grace with yourself as you come up with realizations because you will look fall many times. Kind of like grasping what love is.
Embrace being a foreigner
As soon as you get to the international airport and pick up your boarding the journey begins.
You will hear depending on what country you go a different language and accent. You will encounter both locals who are returning home and foreigners who are visiting. When you land in another country for the first time, trust me, you will feel like foreigner.
This uncomfortable feeling is what migrants, immigrants and refugees feel like when they arrive to the U.S. Obviously in a different context but the discomfort of being in a foreign land is present.
Leverage your curiosity
Embrace the feeling of being uncomfortable and let your curiosity lead you to take public transportation, ordering food in second language, getting a haircut and paying in a local currency are just a few hurdles that will make you feel uncomfortable.
“Get comfortable, feeling uncomfortable.” - Unknown
2. Making new friends
Talk to as many locals as possible in my best advice.
How do introverts do this?
I can be a little introverted so don’t think you don’t need extroverted or super social. Just be curious, learn a few questions and repeat them with over and over again. Attend social events that are more structured like dance classes, language exchanges and gym classes.
Here’s a list of whatsapp groups if you coming to Medellin, Colombia.
Foreign vs. Local Friends
You will more than likely make friends with lots of foreigners who speak english. This is a very cool experience but don’t fall into a foreign bubble. Meaning don’t just hangout with foreigners who speak english.
Why? You can do this but you probably won’t learn a second language. If you want to explore a country, speaking to locals is the best way you can go deep and understand the culture a little more.
Make friends with other digital nomads who live in the same city and/or country so you help each other out. These can be digital nomads who are living part time because they don’t have a VISA or expats who live there.
3. Change your mind about what you call home
Building healthy routines
Build routines for health is the best to feel at home.
This may sound counterintuitive to digital nomadism but routines that make you feel good can help you stay grounded as you are changing, in otherwards learning and growing.
Going to the gym, hiking, dancing, meditating, singing and journaling are just a few things I do because they make me feel good. Obviously it can be pleasurable to eat, drink and hookup ;) but that’s not what I mean.
Doing something that makes you feel good about can give you the feeling of being home in your body. This is what I call home.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with giving in to your pleasures (as long as you are not hurting anyone). One can argue this is what living in a physical reality is all about and the priviledge of being human in our modern times.
“You only live once.”
In my experience, too much pleasure seeking can get out of control and can be dangerous leading to a lot of pain so be careful.
Create your dream schedule
You didn’t quit your job, sell your things and say goodbye to your loved ones to create another jail for yourself. Digital nomadism is an opportunity to do what you couldn’t do in your hometown or native location.
I get it. It’s tough to imagine a new life when you go to the same places and see the same faces. This why I break my routines that are feeling old and stale. When you’ve outgrown an activity, you need to switch things like your gym routine.
Create a dream work schedule calls for creativity, negotiation and doing what’s best for yourself.
Depending on how many hours you work, you can try working a few hours in the morning and a few hours in the evening. Do a 9-5 if you want your evenings for personal time. I personally aim to work around 25 hours a week or part-time and just work on being productive as oppose to giving up my free time.
Find what makes you more productive but flexible to live the life you want to live in whatever country you find yourself in.
Change your energy
This is deeper than going to the gym or taking a yoga class.
“Neuroscience research shows that the only way we can change the way we feel is by becoming aware of our inner experience and learning to befriend what is going inside ourselves.”
― Bessel A. van der Kolk, The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma
Quieting your mind is an ancient practice that has been around since humans have walked the earth. No matter where you are in the world, closing your eyes and slowing down your thoughts can be powerful way to become aware of what’s tripping you up.
Once you start meditating, doing tai chi, or body healing practice that gets you out of your head and into your body, you start to become aware of thoughts bringing you down.
It’s easy to overlook an unhelpful perspective that essentially creates our experience of wherever we find ourselves or who we are with.
One of my favorite quotes is by Wayne Dyer:
“When you change the way you look at things, things change. “ - Wayne Dyer
I want dive deeper so will do a longer post about these practices so stay tuned.
All love,
Josh
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