Digital nomad: Is this the real life or is this just fantasy?
Enough singing? Now let’s start talking about Digital Nomad, a topic hotter than summer 2022. A lot has been said, written (self-shame!), and shown on social media about this lifestyle especially after the pandemic and the travel rules being eased.
Somehow you get the feeling that the media and some people are trying hard to portray it as something new and trendy, but I would argue that it is as old as the first Starbucks coffee shop.
I remember back in 2015, a good friend’s mother told me about an organisation called Nomad Cruise, which consisted in a community of people who would go on a cruise and work remotely for a few months.
Not even the term is new, it first appeared in 1997 in a book by Tsugio Makimoto, it was called… Drum roll… “Digital Nomad.”
Rant over, and fast forward to post- pandemic times, the topic is omnipresent. There are conferences on the subject, countries issuing special visas so you can try it out, and there are websites and apps that give you all the information you need about the best places to go to make it happen. The beautiful dream of digital nomadism is much more accessible than it used to be.
But before you leave it all behind and burn all your material possessions in an ”Into The Wild” style (Careful, you still have to work anyways), you should really think about what you are trying to get out of it, because the disadvantages of this lifestyle might outweigh the advantages.
I can not call myself an expert on digital nomadism. But having worked remotely in various cities for a few months since 2020, I will try to give my humble perspective.
We can probably all agree that people’s goal is to be happy. We are constantly striving to achieve happiness. To do so, we look for new hobbies, new professions, new stuff to buy online, or new places to visit. We get tired of something and we change it. We need to be entertained, otherwise we get bored. As if boredom were the opposite of happiness. But that’s not the most sustainable way to live. Spurts of happiness are not the same as being happy or living a meaningful life. And that’s exactly the problem with the way the Digital Nomad is portrayed and promoted.
The lifestyle is being sold as a way to live your best life by moving around and working in beautiful places for short periods of time. On the plus side, you do get the excitement from meeting tons of new people, going for drinks with them, or doing some other activities together. You’ll also enjoy seeing new scenery and places to visit on the weekends (yes, weekends! Remember, you are still trying to be productive at work, that fancy short-term let is not going to get paid for itself). You’ll get all those extra shots of dopamine, but until when? What will happen when you try to make meaningful connections? Or when you really like a place and want to stay there? Or when you have too many deadlines and are too tired after work? This lifestyle does not allow you to settle down, or expand your inner circle or make long-term plans, it is mainly focused on the present.
When you are on the move, deep friendships are hard to find (not impossible, but hard). People will come and go (and so will you), and after a while the networking events and conversations will become repetitive, and so will the chit-chat. Most likely, you will grow tired of it. It does not matter too much if you are there with your partner, you will both experience the same thing. It’s easy to tell when people that move around a lot start to feel empty, because they usually start posting too many Instagram stories (no pun intended).
I am a big fan of “Happiness is only real when shared”, and the pandemic has taught us that neither IG stories nor other social networks, Zoom or House Party are the best way to share, and they can not replace a face-to-face meeting with friends or family.
There is one thing we would never find in Digital Nomad: meaningful human connections. That feeling of belonging to a group is what keeps you strong in dark times.
Then from a professional perspective, if you work in a company, with a team or with people in general, you have to be present and focused. We also want to get better at what we do and connect with our colleagues. This becomes more difficult when we can not find a comfortable working environment or good internet, and even more difficult when a beautiful sea view distracts us.
Let’s picture we are on a paradise island, with a fantastic beach and beautiful mountains to hike on. And there is a perfect café with a co-working space and a great view. With delicious coffee, pastries and fast internet. What would you like to do there? Be relaxed, with free time, no worries and focus on some personal projects? Or deal with your work issues, deadlines and pointless meetings? If we try to mix relaxation and work, we may end up doing neither correctly.
The main takeaway here is that while it can be fun to live the day as if it were your last, your future self would probably advise you against it. We should aim to find a balance between being present-oriented and future-oriented. It’s important to be able to choose how we want to feel today, but also think about how our actions will help us achieve what we want for our future.
Finally, to summarise: Digital Nomad is nothing new, the concept has been around for a while, but it’s more accessible today. And for anyone who wants to try it, I would suggest doing it for about one to three months per year. You’ll get a lot of enjoyment out of it without spoiling it. However, trying to adopt the whole lifestyle feels like trying to mix two concepts that can never go together: Freedom and Capitalism, but that’s a topic for another article…
