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Life lessons learned in travelling the world for 8 years straight

fluentin3months.com

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Re: Life lessons learned in travelling the world for 8 years straight

#91

Post by jonnathanson »

corin_ wrote: post #5
vacri wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe what he means by this is part "more money will not solve ALL your problems" (ie: it's not a panacaea) and part "if you have food and shelter, everything else is a form of luxury". If you require a car to provide food and shelter, then I don't think that what he's said is invalid.

Sure a lot of things in life are luxuries, but that doesn't mean they are bad, and often can still solve problems. "My feet hurt all day" might get solved by buying a fairly expensive pair of shoes, for example. Will winning the lottery give you the perfect life? Doubtful. Can money solve many problems and improve your life in other ways? Very often.

As an interesting corollary, it's actually a longitudinally studied and extensively documented fact that winning the lottery does not provide long-term happiness.

More often than not, it actually causes more problems than it solves. I forget the statistic off the top of my head, but some astounding percentage of lottery winners -- let's say 75% -- end up worse off within 5 years of winning than they were before they won. (Granted, a lot of that has to do with the fact that the type of person most likely to be playing the lottery is also the type of person who has no real concept of the value of how to manage a $XXX million fortune, let alone a $XXX million fortune acquired literally overnight).

Re: Life lessons learned in travelling the world for 8 years straight

#92

Post by rapind »

impendia wrote: post #82
rapind wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the end it's all relative to your expectations. For example let's take 2 different people; "A" and "B". "A" has rich parents (few hundred million). "A" has rich friends. "A" enjoys expensive past-times. "A" currently lives off around $1,000,000 per year (mortgage, food, entertainment, etc.). Most of "A"'s associates have a similar lifestyle. If "A" loses all of his money and is forced to take a job at $150,000 a y…

+1, I think all of this is true and wise, but I will offer a contrasting perspective. I think it is good to have high expectations, not so much financially but in general. I was working a stable, dull job, had a quiet social life, and was reasonably happy and content. But I decided that I could be living much more. I quit my job, moved cross country, started and finished a Ph.D. program, got an academic job, and also…

It's in our nature that achievement makes us happy. I think it has something to do with Dopamine being released into our brains.

What I've found to be the secret for myself is that I only appreciate something as much as the effort it took to get it. It doesn't really matter what it is I'm trying to get, how much I enjoy the result seems to depend entirely on how much effort it took to achieve. If I work my ass off for $100, then it might feel like the best $100 I ever made. If someone hands me $1,000,000, I won't turn it down, but I won't care about it nearly as much as that hard-earned $100.

So setting realistic but challenging goals keeps us happy. If the bar's too low we don't appreciate the gains. Too high and we can lose our motivation.

Money can be part of those goals but it doesn't have to be.

It really starts to blow your mind when you start applying this principle to everything in life (I'm not running a cult or anything, ymmv).

Re: Life lessons learned in travelling the world for 8 years straight

#93

Post by georgieporgie »

ristretto wrote: post #36
mburney wrote: post #10

Most of these life lessons have nothing to do with travelling. Most people I know (especially in their late 20's) would come up with a similar list even if they've barely travelled. I think this is just merely the blog poster's world view articulated into 29 points, and incidentally he has travelled the world instead of living in one place.

It also makes it seem like there's not that much to learn by spending large amounts of time travelling. That's because people on average are similar, so it's equally probable you will meet the people who will make a difference in your life, travelling or no-travelling. Maybe in the end you will be wiser using the internet, which can actually help you find people with common aspirations/interests etc.

The advantage of traveling is that it forces you out of your comfort zone. You'll meet types of people that you otherwise wouldn't ever bump into.

Re: Life lessons learned in travelling the world for 8 years straight

#94

Post by ycombiefan »

stayjin wrote: post #31
mburney wrote: post #10

Most of these life lessons have nothing to do with travelling. Most people I know (especially in their late 20's) would come up with a similar list even if they've barely travelled. I think this is just merely the blog poster's world view articulated into 29 points, and incidentally he has travelled the world instead of living in one place.

However it is amazing what an impact does living at a place away from were one grew up in have in the perception of the world. I had already traveled a lot ( as a tourist ) before I left Greece to come and live in Japan, when I started to make a life here, I practically had to rediscover myself. It is not so much the big things, it's the small ones : habits that I took for granted, jokes that do not sound funny, if y…

what's with all these society-rejects living in Japan? you know you will always be looked down upon as a foreigner, a gaijin, right? you will never be accepted as one of them even if you marry a jp. wife

Re: Life lessons learned in travelling the world for 8 years straight

#95

Post by ycombiefan »

jason_tko wrote: post #86
stayjin wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi thanks for replying, I am in Kobe, close to Osaka. Do you ever come to Osaka, by any chance?

Hey Stayjin, I'm coming to Osaka next week actually on Friday. Let me know if you have time for a coffee! My email address is in my profile. Cheers,

screw coffee. Asians drink tea not coffee.

Re: Life lessons learned in travelling the world for 8 years straight

#96

Post by mcantor »

radu_floricica wrote: post #78
srgseg wrote: post #75

> 2. Deferring your happiness to the future is a terrible idea Every time I see this, I ask myself, how is this advice reconciled with the famous Marshmallow experiment? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_marshmallow_experiment There surely must come a point where enough deferred future marshmallow gratification makes deferred gratification a recommended life strategy. If I were always to choose not to delay my ha…

They're different things. Marshmellow isn't about deferring satisfaction, but about using metacognitive skills to reach an outcome you _know_ beforehand is favorable (i.e. two marshmellows instead of one). If you just find a marshmellow on a plate somewhere, by all means, the best strategy is to eat it.

And then let me know where you were when you found it. I'm all about finding random marshmallows while I'm just ambling around.

Re: Life lessons learned in travelling the world for 8 years straight

#97

Post by impendia »

CarolineW wrote: post #87
impendia wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

+1, I think all of this is true and wise, but I will offer a contrasting perspective. I think it is good to have high expectations, not so much financially but in general. I was working a stable, dull job, had a quiet social life, and was reasonably happy and content. But I decided that I could be living much more. I quit my job, moved cross country, started and finished a Ph.D. program, got an academic job, and also…

Just out of interest ... My life has been much, much better as a result. How do you know this? You didn't live the other life, so you seem just to be speculating about how the other life may have turned out. You know know that the life you chose really is better. Or do you?

I am comparing my life now to my life eight years ago, and also to some extent the life of my friends who are still living in the same town and working at the same company.

As far as how my other life may have "turned out"... I guess I'm not really sure what that means. I think the one comparison I can really make is if I had not made a lot of changes. Of course it is possible that I could have changed my life in some totally different direction, maybe without leaving town, and life would have been even better than my life now. That, of course, I can't guess.

But I feel conviction in my bones that I did right.

Re: Life lessons learned in travelling the world for 8 years straight

#98

Post by sanswork »

lhnz wrote: post #84
matthewlyle wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What costs are you cutting? No, vacationing in 5-star hotels for 8 years would not be cheap but that's not a necessity for travelling. You probably don't rent a 5-star apartment at home.

People are talking about buying less stuff, and going out for drinks and nice food less often. These are costs that would be decreased. My thought was that: you have to make concessions beyond what you would normally have in your life and that, to me, is proof that you are undertaking in a luxury which you can not easily afford. Which brings me to my original point: when it's clear that the ability to travel requires…

You're also often lowering your level of income by getting rid of steady employment which is where the cutting down on things comes from.

Re: Life lessons learned in travelling the world for 8 years straight

#100

Post by trb »

I don't like the way this article, and many others like it, disregard peoples ability to be malicious. They portray all humans as good-natured, kind and helpful, and while this is true for the overwhelming majority, the small percentage to who this does not apply do exist.

I personally would love to read some good advice on how to deal with people who actively try to harm you, as most advice available focusses on how to make friends and acquaintances.

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