For the last 2 months, I’ve been traveling again full time and getting back into the flow of my pre-pandemic long term travel life. It feels amazing beyond words, and I hadn’t realized just how much I missed it until I got back into it. Meeting amazing people at every turn, seeing new places, discovering new cultures, and exploring old towns and natural wonders – this is what I live for. Oh, and that sense of pure and authentic freedom? My favorite feeling in the world.
Since I’ve been on the road, I feel like I’ve come home, ironically. As cliche as it sounds, I feel like I am truly my authentic and most whole self when traveling full time. This is my element, and it’s never been more clear. But something else has become really clear over the last few weeks. The more one dives into the world of full time travel, the less connected to “normal life” we become.
I feel like an alien in my own country and among my peers. In social settings that resemble normality, I am incredibly awkward. I never feel comfortable staying in one place, in fact it gives me extreme anxiety and I have long term travel to blame. If you can relate, we can be friends or travel buddies in no time. Here’s why I am certain that long term travel turns you into a weirdo, because I know I can’t be alone here.
Why Long Term Travel Turns You Into a Weirdo
1. You Become Utterly Unrelatable
Long term travel is an alternative lifestyle in and of itself. I have no bills, no address, no fixed phone number, friends group, or routine. Sometimes it’s hard to relate to what most of the people my age do and go through in their day to day because I don’t live it myself.
As Lauren from Never Ending Footsteps said, “Long-term, continual travel, for years on end, guarantees you’ll be the least relatable person on the planet by the end of it. And it’s not until you experience true loneliness that you become kind of obsessed with it.”. I honestly couldn’t agree more.
I don’t have a tv, favorite restaurant in my “city”, or any sense of fashion because everything I own is stuffed into a carry on suitcase. When these things come up in conversation, I honestly don’t even know what to say.
2. You Won’t Understand Any Cultural References
When traveling, I don’t have time (or any desire honestly) to keep up with pop culture, watch any tv series, or keep up to date with the hottest trends. When I sit down with my American friends and listen to them gush over Game of Thrones or The Real Housewives, it’s like hearing Chinese for me. I have no contribution, and sometimes a reference just goes way over my head. “You haven’t seen that?! How did you not see that?”, becomes a common reaction to my uncultured existence.
The truth is, I have no idea what the Kardashians are doing. I don’t know half of the slang people are using back home anymore. Or why we are suddenly super into house plants or Dyson vacuum cleaners. I’m clueless, and that makes for a lot of “insert cricket noises” moments at the dinner table back home.
3. You Are Behind on All the Gossip
When you do finally go home and catch up with friends, they will be excited to update you on the latest happenings that you’ve missed. This excitement slowly winds down into frustration when they realize you are actually about 7 million and a half years behind, and that they’d need to start their story with what happened in 2014 for you to understand.
Eventually they just kind of give up, and I don’t blame them. I’ve missed so many of my friends’ major life milestones like weddings, baby showers, graduations and more. I wasn’t there for the hard times, and I certainly wasn’t around for the shared good times. There is a part that feels some guilt and fomo regarding always being gone. There’s definitely an even big part that just feels out of the loop entirely.
4. Telling Someone Where You Live is a Long-winded Speech
For most people answering the question “Where do you live?” is a single word answer. For travelers, it becomes a moment of panic where you consider what it means to even have a home. Do I tell them the address on my credit card bills? Do I tell them where I keep all my stuff, which is currently stuffed into a suitcase? Or do I go down the route of explaining that I work online and don’t live anywhere, in an ongoing aimless wander around the world, existing rootlessly and chaotically? Who knows.
5. You Don’t Own Any “Stuff”
When people ask me what I want for Christmas, my brain goes blank. I’ve existed for so long without a home, the idea of buying stuff is entirely foreign. The very idea of accumulating more things, that need a home or take space, are so out of my reality it’s comical.
When I go shopping with friends, I know damn well I won’t buy anything because everything I own is currently stuffed into a 20 pounds carry on suitcase and backpack with no room to spare. The pleasure of buying furniture and home goods is also something I have not experienced in a long time.
6. You Spend Way too Much Time Alone
Long term travel, namely the solo type, means that by default you spend a shit ton of time alone. Even if you start this journey as an extreme extrovert or someone who hates being alone, somewhere along your journey you’ll come to love your own company. You have no other option.
Once you spend so many days with no one but your own thoughts, and really get to know your inner world so deeply, you become kind of obsessed with it. Making all decisions for yourself, based on your own whims, spending quality time lost in your own thoughts with no distractions – it becomes addicting. After a while I always miss having alone time, no matter who I’m with. Even my boyfriend.
This extended alone time has turned me into a weirdo in social gatherings. I can no longer travel in groups of more than 4 or 6 people max without experiencing extreme anxiety. It’s nothing personal, I’ve just gotten way too used to my own vibe that when there are too many energies in the mix I can no longer “hear” myself over it and I begin to lose myself a bit. And that stresses me out.
Somehow this anxiety does not apply to meeting and hanging out in huge groups of other travelers. I can meet people on the road, and within 5 minutes spend the whole day with them and feel totally at ease. I think it’s because as travelers, we can relate to each other. We “get” each other and I don’t feel the same social pressures and judgements as I would doing a 20 person party trip with my own friends. For me now, that’s just too hectic.
7. You Have No 5 Year Plan
When discussing normal adult topics with close friends like when we will buy a home, when we hope to get married, how many kids we will have, my brain is more empty than the Sahara Desert. If asked about my plans for the future I may respond with “I bought a flight to South America for next week” and consider that sufficient.
Having no sense of future orientation is a surefire way to get some confused looks and eye rolls from people. After all our whole society is built on the concept of working towards our futures. As a traveler, I left that concept behind years ago and haven’t bothered to look back. I live in the moment, and make as little plans as possible. I can’t say whether how I live is right, unstable, or just crazy. But I do know it’s different and I don’t blame people for judging or not understanding.
8. You Embrace Weirdo Life
And finally, long-term travel turns you into a weirdo because you like being a weirdo. I may never fit into society the way I feel like I’m supposed to, but I’m quite happy with the life I live and regret nothing. Travel and the experiences I’ve had are worth all the things I gave up. Plus, life’s too short to not get a little weird.
Marina says
Haha I can relate to this so much!! It’s definitely how I feel most of the days now ><
Elyse says
Such a good read, I haven’t started my long term travel yet but i feel like this is good preparation
Josy A says
Lol I can relate to a lot of this and I have now been living in the same place for way longer than I ever travelled. You may call it weirdo life, but it’s pretty aspirational for a lot of people. 🙂
p.s. I hope you find more fabulous weirdo friends that have travelled and can relate to you more!
Hannah says
Ah I LOVE this post! I don’t travel full time but do travel frequently and I can still relate to many of these things! I never get cultural references and always feel unrelatable! I wouldn’t change it for the world though. The experiences we gain through travel are worth every moment of being a weirdo…”normal” people have no idea what they’re missing!
Lisa says
Haha, if long term travel turns me into a weirdo, sign me up! I love these examples!
Anna says
This was a really interesting read. It might turn you into a weirdo, but it’s pretty amazing all the new and different places you get to see and experience.
Mark And Chuck's Adventures says
LOVE THIS! While we still only travel a few weeks a year, we are getting closer to retiring (fingers crossed) and longer amounts of time on the road. Your comments are hysterical, and oh so true! XOXO
Renata - www.byemyself.com says
I get most of the points since in the past, I used to live abroad for months and now I’m based in Germany, but on the road very often. Some of the points you’re mentioning are quite enjoyable, some a bit annoying. Funny enough, I hardly ever missed people since I met so many new, inspiring folks on the road. It was rather the cultural references. But no matter what, I’m a nomad….at heart.
Lorry says
Your story is so interesting. I have a home and things, but enjoy traveling periodically. It would be hard to imagine being on the move all of the time, but it sounds like a wonderful adventure.
Linda (LD Holland) says
We are not nomadic travellers but we are on the road for 6 months a year in most years. I know that feeling of being unconnected from what is happening and what is trending. We often got weeks without really even watching the news. Which is not really a bad thing! Unfortunately the pandemic has put a bit of a glitch in our 5 year plan to be travelling even more. We are still re-thinking things. We are different from so many of our friends and family. But that is ok!
Claire says
i loved reading this! traveling in this way is something not everyone is going to get, and i think before people dive into it, they should read this and really understand what they are giving up (and gaining in return!)
Nicole says
I can relate to this so much. I spent two years travelling and then came home to do 8 months a year overseas working and travelling again for four years afterwards. Now I’m home and travelling whenever I can I just don’t feel right. I don’t care how I look or about gossip and tv etc I just want to get back exploring again and prioritise this. No one gets it apart from other travellers.