Why We Are Nomadic

The demand of permanence in every area of our existence is the cause of human misery-

there is no such thing as permanence at all

~ UG Krishnamurti

I am starting with a disclaimer. I’m about to say some disparaging things about ‘normal’ society and expectations and how I personally feel travel and movement is an antidote to particular issues. But I’d like a disclaimer because as a frequent traveler, some of the most annoying people I have ever met are other travelers. These are the travelers that treat destinations as places to conquer and claim, as substitutes for a personality that they can pin to their chest and flaunt as a reason they are superior. Travelers like these can be found in some hostel living room, laying in wait, asking where you’ve been as a thinly veiled excuse to sermonize about why some other place is actually far more authentic or magical, while the real magic is in how long they can talk about themselves without pausing for breath. I do believe that travel can make one more knowledgeable, humble, open-minded, and grateful. But meeting other people on the road is the plainest way to see that it doesn’t work for everyone.

Travel alone won’t shape you into a better, more interesting person. It’s also not a requisite for a meaningful life and, perhaps most hurtful of all to certain travelers, it’s not something everyone wants to do. I emphasize this last part because I think it’s become a cultural trend to treat traveling as a default desire and if you aren’t achieving it, you’re failing at something. Beautiful travel snapshots play well on social media and often pair with captions about happiness, luxury, wisdom, etc. As someone who does have an innate desire to travel, I am fascinated by those who come from deep roots and nurture their communities over generations. After all, most of the cultural places I visit are created by the homebodies, the people who stayed put and built incredible temples, monuments, cities, and traditions. The traveler’s legacy is often lost in the same wind they float by on. All this is to say, is that the following thoughts are not a universal prescription, but a very personal one. Travel should be an intimate, meaningful choice. If you enjoy your stable home, your conventional job, your own backyard, then all the more power to you. If you have found your bliss, don’t let anyone else tell you what you need to be happy.

But, there are a lot of people who genuinely struggle with where they want to go in life, are disillusioned with the way modern society works, and are searching for alternative ways to find their own bliss.

So.

If you had to sum up my current world philosophy, it would look a lot like this comic from the artist Oglaf:

NSFW link, pretty much everyone else they draw is about sex

The world is a giant ball of insanity that we humans have only the slightest grasp of understanding (and that’s being generous) from our tiny amount of Sapien experience on Earth’s timeline. We’ve created fantastical things like society out of evolutionary tribal needs and long-since agreed upon rules have been laid out to make our lives flow easily through various paths. You’re born and clearly see how batshit insane everything is (studies show babies are basically tripping on acid all the time). Then through childhood and into early adulthood, we are taught the ways humans have decided the world works and apply that ourselves. As we get older, I think many people do see how arbitrary everything is, but either don’t mind because it works for them, can’t see a way out, or, as they lift their head and say “I’m struggling to make sense of this,” society swoops in and says “there, there, nothing to see here, now shouldn’t you be at work or posting on Facebook?”

Realizing all this and choosing to opt out of those arbitrary rules as much as you can is one way to tackle it. Lots of people have done it, so maybe it’s not any different than any of the other choices we are given. But “lots” is a relative term and overall it’s a fairly lightly-trafficked road. For the ultimate manifesto in ‘dropping out,’ check out Ran Prieur.

My own life path isn’t too far out in left field. But I’ve had this undercurrent that defines me and it’s a deep desire for change and movement. Not change from anything bad…I’ve been lucky to come from a happy home and live a happy life. Just change. I love it. It’s the most reliable thing in the world and will never not fail to appear, especially when you least expect it. Exciting! I’ve discovered- to my surprise- that apparently, it’s more natural in humans to hate change. To fear it. To treat it as a last resort. People are slow to change their jobs, their homes, their minds.

You can see why I like travel. Traveling is nothing but change! It’s also movement, endless opportunities to form relationships with people and land and then say goodbye and start over. I’ve started over several times in my life….moving somewhere new with no friends, no job, no housing or all three. Almost all of my adult life has been lived in cycles….move somewhere, save up, leave, travel, and repeat (the ‘mini-retirement’ lifestyle). This is not to say I cut ties completely. I have a breadcrumb trail of dear friends and family geographically scattered, but nestled in my soul, ready to pick up where we left off every time I see them. The world’s not so big after all.

My travel pattern slowed when I moved to Boston for the hell of it and met my now-husband, David. And by slowed, I mean we stayed in Boston for several years (a new record for me!), but traveled often. David enjoyed it so much that he came up with a plan to create more freedom and sustainable travel in our lives. We moved to Connecticut and David made a sharp left turn out of a 10-year professional music career (we both have a lot to say about ‘dream jobs’ but that’s for another time) and into his father’s local accounting practice. He started the long, grueling road to becoming a CPA and thus began the ‘Connecticut Gambit’- a temporary 5ish year plan to create a nest egg and financial opportunities that would sustain travel in the long term.

A funny thing happens when you move to suburban Connecticut to work in the family practice and you tell people your plan. They don’t believe you. They say oh sure, but 5 years will turn into 10 and 10 will turn into 20. A very lovely friend of David’s said that it was nice that we were “settling down” and there was an awkward pause as I involuntarily stared at her with my mouth open and David glanced nervously between us. There has never been a greater insult! I’m sure we lost further credibility as we got married, got a dog, and bought a house. Very settling behavior.

Our favorite part of our house was the outside.

But I don’t believe in pipe dreams. And I’m lucky to be married to someone who doesn’t either. Four years after we moved to Connecticut, we had achieved our goals and were so ready to move on (Covid very helpfully accelerated our goals by turning both our jobs remote). We had put on all the trappings of what’s expected around our age and dipped our toes in that path. We went in already knowing it wasn’t right for us and was a means to an end, but left so sure beyond a shadow of a doubt.

The average adult life snowballs. Most people over the age of 30 can attest to this. You get a house, but it’s bigger than you need (because of asinine US permitting laws), and the empty rooms look awkward, so you get some more furniture. Needing more stuff means spending more money, and you get a job with more hours and more pay. Your new job requires nicer clothes and more commuting. Having friends who aren’t poor college students means going out to nice bars and restaurants. Your big home takes more time to clean, so you can either spend time cleaning or hire someone, which takes more money. You have less time with your job and all the home maintenance, so you eat out more. You eat out more, so you need a gym membership (or better health insurance). So on and so forth, and we’re not even getting to kids. It’s the classic American story and a globe of a snowball on our overwhelmed shoulders.

Don’t get me wrong, some people love this (per my disclaimer!). It feels like constant upgrades on the road to building a life and it works for them. Being in someone’s home that they’ve worked hard on and reflects who they are is such a wonderful experience. This is one of my favourite parts of visiting friends around the country. But for David and myself, this lifestyle feels like a never-ending to-do list that simply values different priorities than the ones we have. One reason he and I get on so well is that we both really hate feeling like we’re part of a scam that we never agreed to (and also suspicious of things like ‘society’ and ‘reality’). Getting a well-paid job opportunity via nepotism isn’t exactly gaming the system, but we hoped to use this privilege to find freedom rather than climb further into the hole of consumption.

Minimalism

Happiness consists, not in possessing much, but in being content with what we possess. He who wants little always has enough. ~Zimmermann

I believe that our freedom and time are the most precious things we can truly claim as our own. The classic book, Your Money or Your Life by Joseph R. Dominguez and Vicki Robin lays out the trade we make with our time for the money we earn in practical terms. When we turn around and spend this money, what do we spend it on? More often than not, just things we have been duped into believing we need, whether for relevancy, status, our own self-esteem, or just in the maintenance of other stuff we have. We live in an abusive, for-profit society that creates an addiction for consumption and traps us in an endless cycle of work and consumerism. We are surrounded by the weaponized psychology of ads and the prevalence of meaningless labor. The more we think we need, the more we trade our life away for it, all the while getting the raw end of the deal. This isn’t a tirade against all possessions- the heart of minimalism isn’t getting rid of everything you own, but rather making sure everything you own has an intentional and oft-referenced place in your life.

I’ve lived in extreme minimalism on long-term trips, where everything I use regularly fits in a backpack. Consistently breaking that habit of consumption has shown me time and time again that all my “stuff” adds very little to my overall happiness. Not having everything you want doesn’t make you miserable. To be sure, never having anything you want is a huge drain. But forgoing a few luxuries…even important ones….isn’t as much of a loss as it might seem.

Additionally, humans have an infuriating characteristic called hedonic adaptation. This means that we very easily become acclimated to the luxuries we do have and no longer see them as special or fulfilling. There’s no finish line in the race to collect stuff. This treadmill can be avoided by being very intentional with the luxuries you bring into your life and practicing deep gratitude when they do. Gratitude should be practiced constantly with what you already have, as it is the most singular path towards happiness.

Being on the move also helps me practice non-attachment…..focusing on enjoying others’ things without desiring to possess them means I am experiencing them in that moment only. Other people’s nice possessions become a positive feature in the present instead of making me feel like I am missing something from my own life. This mindset doesn’t always succeed, of course, but I find nomadism keeps it at the forefront of my intentions.

Traveling in an RV allows us to live with slightly more than a backpack- all that can fit in a truck and trailer- combining that freedom with a known place to call home, wherever we are. After all, though I love budget travel, having one’s own bed with you the whole time seems the ultimate simple luxury- no checking for bedbugs required.

Having less= spending less= trading less life for money. This is the simplest path I’ve learned for contentment (unless you do love your job and that’s how you want to spend your time). It is easy to state, difficult to put into practice. I’ve found this especially hard to do when I have a house or apartment and there’s room for things to sneakily make their way in. Mobility forces very intentional purchasing because not only can you not take it with you later, you can’t take it with you now!

Min-Maxing Our Money

While the majority of David’s income goes into our savings, my income usually covers the majority of our living costs. Our version of ‘min-maxing’ means minimizing our expenses drastically while maximizing our saving potential. David took on the latter, while I’m assigned to the former and going nomadic is our way of keeping the rising cost of living to a dull roar.

Even though RVing can be plenty expensive depending on your choices, the way we do it keeps costs low. We have no debt and many fewer bills than when we were stationary. We have less to maintain, less to clean, less to upgrade. Not having a permanent address means much less online shopping. Traveling across the country and having constant adventures costs us less than living in a house or renting in a city. It saddens me to see our peers struggling to buy houses or find affordable rent in the current outrageous market. While our lifestyle would certainly not be everyone's choice, I feel so grateful to have another housing option besides rent or buy.

Our first year of RVing was an experiment in learning how much this lifestyle actually costs for us. Since then, we’ve fallen in love with and adapted to boondocking, which is dry camping on public lands, without hookups, for free. This means no rent in the form of campground fees, which can add up quickly. Our only fixed costs are internet for work and insurance. Everything else we spend money on depends on our choices that month and we can increase and decrease as we see fit.

Down to Earth

One of my favorite things about living on the road is that I see the sunset almost every day. I watch ecosystems change around me and notice when landscapes and their inhabitants seep into one another as we slowly make our way from one state to another.

Being in an RV is being closer to the earth while still retaining some comfort. A small space, thin walls, and plentiful windows means nature is more present in your life than in a traditional home. The weather affects us more and I now have a better understanding of what various temperatures feel like and when the seasons change along different bioregions in the West. The RV is vulnerable, and as we’ve moved across the country, I’ve learned differences in wind gusts speeds, when and how a floodplain will actually flood, what plants and geographical features will protect you from storms, and how to identify a massive thunderstorm cloud that you shouldn’t drive into.

You definitely don’t need to live in an RV to learn nature’s daily rhythms and effects, as anyone who has a garden, farm, or rural property can attest to. But owning just an acre in Connecticut, while marvelously bringing me closer to my bioregion there, was so much maintenance to make sure we kept our yard looking presentable (our resistance to a monoculture lawn was a sure annoyance to neighbors), our trees alive and not falling on our house, and small wild animals out of the indoors. I loved our outdoor space, but discovered I didn’t want to spend my time controlling it. In the RV, we move through nature, living in actual wilderness with national and state parks as our backyard.

We also keep energy costs low by following the weather and not trying to survive in climates that require extreme artificial adaptation for large parts of the year. This is more and more important to us as climate change wreaks havoc on parts of the country. Being adaptable seems crucial to navigating the rest of our lives with dramatic changes to the landscapes and patterns we knew. We regard nomadism as a survival mechanism.

Learning resource management and being eco-conscious is another big factor in RV living and adapting to the new normal. We use solar panels, carry all our water with us, and dump our own waste. We are keenly in touch with what we use and what we produce. The average American family uses 300 gallons of water a day. We use 56 gallons in a week when we’re off-grid, because that’s how big our freshwater tank is. When we have hook-ups, we don’t use much more, because of our set-up and the habits we’ve made saving our precious resources.

While We’re Young

The number one response we get from older people we meet on the road when they hear about our lifestyle is that it’s great we’re doing this now while we’re young and before we have responsibilities. I agree it’s important to pursue your adventure when you’re young. But we are in our 30s and we’ve been adults for a while now. This may look like a vacation, but it’s actually just living life in a slightly different way, while both working on the road.

We’ve made a conscious choice about which responsibilities we would like to have in our lives now and chosen the ones we can take with us long-term. Ambition, power, wealth, and legacy are hailed as the markers of successful adults in our society. But these things are unnecessary for a fulfilled life and in fact, derided by most ancient world philosophies. What is passed off as ‘responsibility’ starts to seem less like a milestone for becoming a real person and more like yet another way to impress your peers, who are too busy with their own responsibilities to care. Of course, change is inevitable and some unavoidable things may come up, such as health issues, which is why it’s so important for us to seek freedom in the present.

The other unspoken (and sometimes spoken) responsibility people are referring to is having children, but like anything else, that is a choice, even though it’s so often treated as inevitability. One man asked us what we were going to do when “kids show up” like they might surprise us on our doorstep. We are happily child-free and will continue to be, leaving a huge space for all the other incredible things the world has to offer.

Our time on the road is open-ended, and 3 years in as of 2024, we are in love with this lifestyle. We have no plans to buy a house again or stay in one area permanently. Even if we transition from RVing to another form of nomadism, this kind of life is one that makes us feel like we are actually making our own choices in life, not just doing what is expected or accidentally falling into years of routine. We can go anywhere and do anything. We get to spend time with our friends and family across the country and make new friends on the road. Our time is slow, our lives simple, and our choices intentional.

Why We Are Nomadic