One Step Forward, Two Steps Back – Rethinking My Next Steps

(Warning: 1472 Words Ahead)

I’ve been on the road for more than two years now and have been moving from one country to another checking out some beautiful sights, trying out a variety of cuisines, meeting local people and at the same time making a small living to sustain this nomadic lifestyle. A few years back I know that it’s my dream, heck that’s why I left my job and pursued this nomadic lifestyle regardless if I forego the ‘comfortable’ life of having a secured paycheck from month to month.

But after two years of living on my backpack I realized something very important. I realized that traveling is just the ‘tip of the iceberg’ of my dream. Traveling is the platform that helped me realized a greater pursuit.

And that is… “to maintain the freedom to use my time on my own terms”.

A bit vague perhaps to some, but means a whole lot for those who are always time bound in your every move as I were in my previous employed years.

Prior to living everything behind to pursue this nomadic lifestyle, I used to be employed in a variety of companies. In the past nine years that I had worked, I vividly remember how I often tell myself that time was not enough to do everything I want, especially during that time.

My last two jobs were of a management role and in a given 24 hours/day that we all have, I spent an hour or two preparing to go to work (including commuting to work), more than 12 hours in the office on a daily basis (too many deliverable and teams to manage), another hour or two going back home if the traffic is not bad, one hour for dinner, eight hours to sleep and an hour left to do something else. An hour which during that time was always spent watching TV or browsing the internet incessantly.

I usually got only one hour to do something else on regular days, two full days off if there’re no client meetings or emergency meetings during those days.

I treasured that ‘one hour’ and made sure that I get to relax and forget the worries and stressful matters brought to me by my responsibilities on my job. And sometimes to increase that ‘one hour’ of free time, I borrow some time from my sleep which I know is not a healthy strategy as well.

I know that burn out is inevitable in that kind of setup and sometimes I think of shifting to a job with lesser responsibilities but then again it also meant a lower pay, so I didn’t opt for it.

At present, as I’ve mentioned, I left my job a couple of years ago to pursue a nomadic lifestyle. Comfort has become secondary to basic survival as the budget is quite limited and I don’t have the luxury of a regular paycheck anymore.

And even though I don’t have a regular income anymore, this kind of life has given me way more than what could I asked for when it comes to ‘time’. I now have the full 24 hours at my disposal. I could decide if I’m going to use it to do sightseeing every time I want, sleep any time I want and work online any time I want.

However, in the past few months I noticed that the regular gig that I learned online is now drying up so fast, the fear of losing the monthly financial sustenance coming from my websites is also creeping up to my brain. This is the reality that I think most starting digital nomads are facing.

We always need to be on our toes because it’s either we push harder so that we could keep on going or give up.

I really enjoy the current setup that I put myself in. I feel that I am more productive if I’m not tied to a specific set of working hours. I feel that I am more productive if I have more freedom to decide on what to do on my projects rather than just being told what to do and following orders or targets handed down from the upper management.

I enjoy waking up anytime I want and eating a variety of foods anytime I want to almost anywhere I want. I enjoy eating Pad Thai in Bangkok, Khao Piak in Luang Prabang, Amok in Siem Reap, Pho in Hanoi, Momos in Dharamsala and drinking tea in Darjeeling.

I want to maintain the freedom that I have but at the same time I want to have a more stable income.

So in the past few months, I’ve been building smaller niche sites that I hoped could help add funds to my dwindling bank account. It was just recently when it hit me that the business model of my niche sites are just as the same as my blog. And I realized that it’s not a great strategy because if that business model dies then all of my sites earnings will die with it.

It’s time to diversify. Lately I’ve been reading about how fellow digital nomads are earning and even though I couldn’t grasp those ideas yet, I still keep on reading and taking down notes on the concepts that make sense to me.

Nothing will happen if I’ll just play this thing on my head or if I’ll just keep on reading those inspirational articles and hope that one day it happens to me too.

Small Changes Matter

I’m starting by trying to wake early. I know that I use to sleep and wake up anytime but after doing it for two years, I know that it doesn’t help me that much to be more productive. If I wake up at 12 noon then I’ll start doing something productive late in the afternoon and be lazy again around night time. So I realized that I’m going to give it a try. I’ll sleep early and wake up early. I’ve been trying it for a week now and usually drop everything I’m doing at 9PM but I still wake up so late. Bad habits are indeed hard to break.

I also made a new niche site with a different business model. I am experimenting with a new website that I’ve been doing in the past few days and will become my main priority for the coming months. I don’t know what will happen yet but for the meantime I’ll keep building its webstats first.

Possibility of Going Offline

Thinking of a possibility of doing an offline business, I have been visiting markets in all the places that I’ve been to, observing, looking around, checking out products, asking for prices and getting to know vendors and business owners. I have always been fascinated with local markets, as I find it really a great place to learn business and not to mention a great place to find unique creative pieces by local artisans. I’m very fascinated with handcrafted products made by artisans and I’m toying with an idea of doing a business related to that but it’s still far fetch as of now but the websites that I’ll be doing from now on will be align to this goal.

Travel Slower

Keeping up with the balance of sightseeing and maintaining 15 websites is insane! It’s driving me nuts LOL! So to make sure that I don’t burn myself out and find some time to do both while maintaining my sanity, then I’ll be traveling much slower this time around.

Staying Motivated

It’s hard, d@mn hard to do something you’re not trained to do. I’ve been an employee for my whole life and this is the first time that I’m doing things based on my own direction. There’s no one to tell me if I’m doing it right or wrong unlike in my previous life where there’s a monthly, quarterly and annual meeting of making sure we all stay on track.

Now it’s all up to me.

When the going gets tough, I just think about what I have achieved in the past. I also try to remember that things that matter and the people that matter to me. Whenever I tell my mom (over the phone) stories about my travels and how my websites are doing, I know that she doesn’t fully understand the technicality of it but she makes me feel that I have her full support.

And if there’s one thing that I also consistently remind myself with, it is that, ‘I have the power to change my life for the better, just like everybody else. So I better not waste this chance.”