Digital Nomad?

     While I gear up and prepare for my upcoming trip to Southeast Asia a question keeps popping into my head; do I want this lifestyle?

     I have always loved traveling and consider myself to be an avid adventurer, but this time it’s different. This time won’t be for work and there is no mission to accomplish. The only goal I will have on this trip is to have fun and explore as many places as I can.  This makes me nervous because this trip is actually a test trip.

     A term kept appearing all over the internet as I scoured travel blog after travel blog searching for helpful tips and inspiration. The term I kept seeing was: Digital Nomad. What did this mean and why were people referring to themselves as this? Most of the people I have come into contact with have left pretty successful big business jobs and have transitioned to working strictly online. They write, and edit, and run successful travel blogs with the help of advertising to help fund their trips. They are all Digital Nomads or travelers who fund their adventures through 60-90 hour work weeks hunched over their laptops working tirelessly to keep their nomadic lifestyle dreams afloat.

                                         AND IT WORKS FOR THEM.

     I have always been a big proponent of forgoing the status quo of living a normal life consisting of investing hours upon hours of your life working some corporate job to fill some house you can’t afford with things you don’t need. I myself gave up a promising career in medicine for the Hollywood lifestyle. A decision I do not regret at all. I have had the opportunity to be a part of some really great projects and meet people whom a few years ago I had only known from television.

          NOW I WAS SHARING DRINKS AND SWAPPING STORIES WITH THESE PEOPLE. 

    I am still involved with the industry and still hope to continue my involvement while I test the waters of this new Digital Nomad lifestyle. One of the biggest reasons for becoming involved in the industry was to travel and touch as many lives around the world as I could. Plus, I love being able to be goofy and express myself through many mediums including writing and comedy.  

     I know I will have to give up more than I have in the past, and make many more sacrifices along the way. This is what scares me the most. Saying goodbye to family and friends and heading out into the unknown with no destination in mind. I’ll be living solely off of savings and the money I make from writing, and advertising from the other websites I plan on launching in the future as well as occasional acting gigs that I get here and there.

                                                             OH AND MY BOOK.

     I’m still not sure if this is the right choice but hey, a life lived without taking any risks is not really a life lived is it? 

Finding My Way Back

     In a few short months I will be putting all of my stuff into storage and boarding a plane from Los Angeles to Taiwan and then to Bangkok where I will start an epic journey of discovery and adventure. I have undergone some huge life and career realizations which have led me to change the way I have been thinking and acting for the past few years.

     Some of you may know that I am approaching the three year anniversary of a very particular obstacle I have overcome. I beat the odds and survived. However, I have lost sight of what that used to mean to me. I have lost sight of the beauty of life and people and exploring. Somewhere along the journey of survival I lost my way.

     Now I am on the journey back. I’m going to re-discover myself and what it means to truly be alive and appreciate this one life that we are given.

     I will be traveling to Cambodia to visit the famous temples of Angkor, exploring the many little islets of beautiful Halong Bay, Vietnam and practicing my yoga in Bali. 

     From there I plan on going where ever the wind or the tuk tuk or the buses or the motorbikes take me. Don't worry, I plan on fully documenting my trip through this blog my YouTube channel and Tumblr, where I'll be uploading pictures and video from my travels. You can also follow my journeys semi-live from my Twitter and Instagram(where wi-fi permits).

     Thank you so much for all of your help and support throughout the years and I hope that you continue to do so for the many years to come. I truly appreciate all of my friends and family and especially you the reader! Thank you and stay tuned!

Ps: If you have any ideas of where to stay and or travel or awesome things I should do along the way please leave a comment!

Surviving the Airport

             Ahh to be at the airport during the holidays. Filled with the hustle and bustle of weary and anxious holiday travelers there is never a shortage of interesting things to see.  If you're catching an earlier flight you'll most likely witness people still dressed in pajamas. Yes, pajamas. Airplanes are nothing but an extension of our beds at home these days and what better outfit to wear on a long early morning flight than what you went to sleep in? There are business men and women running about the airport already late for meetings five hours away. They scuffle about in their two thousand dollar suits pressed and custom fitted, Bluetooth devices in their ears and multiple cell phones clipped to their waists resembling a superhero’s  utility belt.  They take up all of the many hundreds of charging ports for your portable devices located around the terminal, charging their entire office with them. This leaves you to forgo browsing the interwebs with your phone in order to save precious battery power. You pop your headphones in your ears and play the same playlist of songs on your phone because you've been too lazy and or busy to update your music during the rush of the holiday season. Let’s face it; between buying gifts for your huge extended family and the office, and trying to make it to the gym as often as you can to shed off that winter weight you've had no time for yourself.

                Mid-afternoon flights don’t get any better than early morning ones.They are even worse.The airport quickly becomes bursting with families and couples. Kids run amock through the terminal covering everything they touch in sticky-who-knows-what, and tween couples are sitting awkwardly on the floor making out. You’re trying to enjoy your thirty dollar turkey sandwich that you bought at an airport bookstore, but it grows more and more difficult when the five year old in front of you is turned around in his seat staring you down like a bull at a bullfight. The stale cold bread and old cheese is hard enough to scarf down without the added pressure of pleasing this kid. Finally they announce that they will begin boarding over the PA system. You stand up thinking that you’ll be among the first to board because you've managed to score boarding zone two on your ticket. However, you fail to realize that they have to board all of the Priority Members first. The Gold Star passengers, the First Class Flyers, the people in wheelchairs, the people with kids, the kids traveling alone, members of the Military (bless them for what they do) and the business class people. You look down at your watch and notice it’s already been forty-five minutes and they haven’t even gotten through the Premier Mileage Plus Extravaganza passengers yet, or the passengers wearing khaki pants! You plop down into your uncomfortable leather chair and take a sip of your seven dollar bottle of water as you eagerly wait to be called.

                If you’re like me, you’ll choose a late flight. Late flights are my preferred flights. I show up at the airport with no traffic problems. Say good bye to my ride and head straight to the check-in. There is little to no line and I am all checked in and through the security line in about ten minutes. From there I head straight to my favorite places in the airport; the bar. I love airport bars. Yes, the drinks are expensive but nothing calms the nerves of travel like a smooth bourbon on the rocks, or a nice lager. Some airports even have iPads at the bar so you can order your drink, pay and tip the bartender in one easy step. You don’t have to wait to get their attention, or flag them down like an airport ground controller. I get my drink, plug in my headphones and jam out to my new playlist that I had time to create peacefully relaxing in the big empty terminal. The airline calls out the boarding groups and being as how there are only forty of us it goes pretty fast. I reach my empty row of seats, stretch out sideways, cover myself with my blanket and prepare for a nice relaxing flight. That, ladies and gentleman is how to properly survive airports.