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Because the future of your business lies in exotic, faraway lands..
This is a function of the tools, resources, technologies and similar that we have available and access to now right, in the palm of our hands. To be able to travel and live anywhere we choose to be or want to be at any given time, right around the world, and yet still be able to contribute in a connected way, still be able to provide our skills, services, thoughts, insights and work, to various projects, ventures, partnerships and what have you, in ways that just never used to be possible is a thing of the present.
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Of course, when our grandparents were younger they didn't have things like the internet and wifi and a mobile phone and cloud computing and on and on. These things just didn't exist of course. Since they've come to fruition over the last ... I don't know, what are we? When I was a kid I was using a computer for the first time and it was running on DOS, it was simplistic but interesting and effective, and I guess I was young. Let's say 30-some-odd years of the emergence of computing, of mainstream computing tools, the early, early days of all of this stuff. I grew up with a lot of this.
To be able to travel and live anywhere we choose to be or want to be at any given time, right around the world, and yet still be able to contribute in a connected way… is a thing of beauty.
Chad McMillanEven still though, a lot of the most recent technologies, the most prominent technologies today, have really only come about in, what, the last, what should we say, 10 years I guess, 15 years maybe, max.
Social media, how long have we been using Facebook? We had Myspace before that. These were kind of different iterations of the intention but improved upon. Now Facebook is an example, counts, I don't know what the latest number is, but certainly over a billion users worldwide and growing continually. These types of tools have never really been around. They weren't around certainly when your grandparents were working and going to school and building businesses and all this good stuff.
Really let's just say maybe the last 15 years, give or take, we've been in this range. We're in 2018 and we talked about the tech bubble in 2000, so we're like 15 to 20 years in this range, where all these things are possible. But then even 20 years ago we didn't have smart phones, we didn't have mobile apps, we didn't have all these different tools and solutions that we could leverage to support deeper and greater potential freedoms. To support deeper and greater potential for automation, for data storage, for communication, for collaboration, all kinds of things. This just continues to get better and better.
As soon as I spend too much time in an office, and I like offices, they're grounding and you're working with cool people and you're having fun and collaborating on amazing things. Insofar as that's the position that you've set up foryourself, but for others that's not necessarily the case. They're in an office because they feel they have to be.
You may be one of those people that feels that's the only option you have for yourself to live and work in a certain way and contribute in a certain way. This is part of the old pattern, old paradigm, that precedes us from generations, so it's not surprising that maybe the case for you, given that your grandparents and even your parents may never even have considered that this type of a lifestyle is possible.
For my part, I am a nomadic entrepreneur, in the respect that I like to travel, explore, get outdoors, and at the same time still contribute to the world, not needing to give one up for the other. Of course, in the past if we weren't connected, if you were working out of Vancouver and you were traveling in another country, there'd be an exceptional number of challenges for you to be able to keep up your work and continue to flow and contribute. But nowadays you can literally go almost anywhere you want, and sit and spend your morning working, and then close your computer up, and once your work is done go on some sort of an amazing hike or adventure, or in some completely different far-out country. Which is unreal.
We're talking about a lifestyle here, we're talking about freedom here. Quality of life, we're talking about unlimited and limitless potential, we're talking about empowering ourselves to do whatever we want to do in our world.
As a function of this we need to develop, I feel, some courage. We need to develop some confidence in the how we do these things, especially for those that have been nine to five at their desk for a long time.
For my part I've been exploring and living this lifestyle and testing it in many different ways to see what's possible, see what the limitations are, to see where the challenges are, and refine them accordingly to ensure that I'm still efficient and effective in the work I do, and with the things I do, in all areas of my life and my business activities.
Let's talk about this. Let's talk about what's possible. First off, I suggest to you that, as a personal objective lifestyle, both for your personal journey and your business, you should seek freedom. Why not? Why work nine to five if you don't have to? Why fix yourself to one location if you don't need to? Why limit yourself to one type of business or venture if there's more you could deliver? Why limit yourself, just period? Why should we limit ourselves at all, on any level, when the tools of deeper and greater empowerment for us continue to emerge and broaden our potential in ways that empower us? To do anything we want, and see anything we want, and to dream at our greatest and highest levels?
This is an exceptional time to be alive, and this is a very special time for entrepreneurs, for solopreneurs as we call them, for small business entrepreneurs, for independents, for freelancers, all over the world, to be able to live without borders, without boundaries, without restriction, without a ball and chain tied to your ankle, without any sort of attachment to a desk, without even the necessity of long-term commitments to a particular project or venture.
You could come in and really guerrilla a task, and that could be sufficient for you to earn gainful employment and income. Or income through consulting, that we'll say will replace, or serve as, an alternative to employment. That allows you the freedom to do whatever you want and whatever you love. This is what this opportunity presents.
Iam a believer of the philosophy that we should be embracing and seeking freedoms, personal freedoms. In that, I lead by example. I think if you follow me or you've seen any of my stuff, this is the way I live.
Sometimes I take breaks, sometimes I come to Vancouver and stick around in Vancouver and do some creating and building with friends and otherwise for a while, and then I get a little bit restless. That's all I'll say. I say, "Okay, time for an adventure." It's time to change the scenery, it's time to just reinvigorate my spirit, because I feel it getting heavier, or tired, or a bit fatigued, or drained from the potential monotony, or whatever I've established as a rhythm for the period of time as I recharge. I set some new foundations, try some new things and build some new stuff. Then when I have those in place I'm like, okay great, where's the backpack? or where's the suitcase and where's my computer? and that's about it, let's go. The philosophy is to embrace these ideas, the philosophy is to consider these ideas and their potential for you, and how you could alter what you're doing with your existing businesses in a way that provides and allows you these kinds of freedoms.
As it relates to this lifestyle, how do we get into this? How do we embrace this for ourselves, and how do we make some shifts from where we're at, from the nine to five to the kind of freedom-living nomadic vision of the world? Let's talk about this. Firstly, it's up to you how you want to live. This could be just the difference between you working in an office, or you are working from your place that's a few steps out of town. It doesn't mean you need to go explore Asia and work from there. It could just be down the street, an adjustment for you, but even the most miniscule shifts provide such incredible flexibility in the way you live your life, and the abilities you have to live your life in certain ways. Even just considering some of these principles in their most modest ways can have profound impacts on the amount of joy, peace, love, and happiness you find in your life on a day-to-day basis. That's a very, very cool thing.
Firstly, let's say this. Where are you at? I'd suggest the first step for you is to take inventory of where you're at in your life and say, how am I living? What are my patterns? What are the things I'm attached to? What are the bill payments that I'm paying every month? Where do I need to be to work? What am I working on? Do I love it or do I hate it? What would I love to be working on instead? What are my skills, what's my own unique magic, what do I offer to the world? Am I offering that to the world? How can I offer that to the world from different locations, no matter where I am, as opposed to just in one location? Where am I attached, or where am I anchored to things? Really explore this for ourselves, to find some insights and answers about ways we can make adjustments into our world towards a more flexible and free lifestyle.
There's nothing to fear in this. This is opportunity, this is opening, this is flexibility. There's so many great things that come from this, it should be relatively obvious what the potential is if you make these adjustments. Need to review our own lifestyles and figure out where our attachments are, and then begin to explore the way we can realign those attachments in ways that are conducive to supporting the flexibility we seek in living a more nomadic, entrepreneurial lifestyle. That's the first step.
Are you in a nine to five job? Can that nine to five job be provided, could that task or those roles that you're fulfilling, could those be provided from anywhere in the world? Do you actually need to be sitting at that office? Is that culture of a company that you're working with one that empowers you or enables you to work in a freer way or a more liberating way? Some aren't. Some are very traditional and restrictive, and they like to see their people in the eye face-to-face every day to make sure that they're working.
For my part, my teams are virtual. They're all over the world, the people that I work with, and we connect from all over the world, from Europe to South America to Asia and back around. These are the people that I contract and that I engage for various services to contribute to all of the things I'm doing.
I don't really care if they're at their house, if they're at an office, if they're in Vancouver or if they're in Paris. It doesn't really matter, so long as the work is being achieved and the task is getting done, which is most important.
Equally I'll suggest that with the people I work with, I find that they are much more enthused and passionate and engaged and productive when I also provide them that flexibility. It allows them to work from a place of comfort, and from a place of fulfillment, a place from positive energy; as opposed to a place of feeling that they're plugged in and being drained every day. It allows them to fill up their own tank with activity and adventure and spontaneity and good energy really, from whatever it is that they love to do, without feeling restricted to a location with saps that away from them, more often than not. It's important.
As it relates to you and your business and place that you're connected to in your business, how can you shift some of these patterns, just to be more flexible? You don't even have to move right, you can just sit in that chair, but just to have the ability to leave that chair, does that exist for you in your business? If it doesn't, why are you taking on tasks or jobs or roles for yourself that don't give you that freedom and flexibility? Look at how you can apply your skills to other scenarios that would provide you more flexibility, to be able to live a more free and adventurous lifestyle. Because they exist. It just actually requires you to consciously explore and consider these things. That's number one, the full inventory of where you're at.
A couple other things lifestyle-wise that are supportive of this lifestyle that we need to make adjustments of or that we need to embrace.
The adventurous spiritOn some level, in its greatest ways, you could be but don't necessarily need to be an adventurous spirit, but it's helpful. Part of that courage, or that love of travel, of the unknown, of exploring the universe, is what fuels you to do amazing things, so certainly would suggest that that's a strength. Do you have an adventurous spirit or are you stay-at-home? Even stay-at-home, that's a telecommuting kind of a gig, that's a remote working type of a gig, which means you can work from home and hang out with the kids, as opposed to having to go into an office every day. Is that something that is available to you?
Your current arrangementsFlexible living arrangements. If you're traveling, do you have a mortgage? If you have a mortgage or you have heavy payments that are similar, for your car and other sort of lifestyle items, keeping up with the Joneses so to speak, this type of structure, how can you make adjustments to those, so those payments are not necessarily so cumbersome? Or, how can you leverage so that if you want to leave to go travel, and continue working as you travel, that you won't be carrying all these heavy costs while you're away? You could leave for months, you could leave for as long as you want and go on an adventure, you could leave for a week and come back. How do you take the burden of attachments, which are part of the paradigm of time-based payments?
There is a function of entrapment in these things that keeps us locked in and keeps us dependent on these certain lifestyle systems and these certain lifestyle arrangements, so that we don't just take off and go on amazing adventures, and that we do stay at home and keep just working nine to five every day. For the man, as we say, which is not the way we really need to do it, at least as defined in that sense. So how can we make adjustments to provide and create more flexibility in our world and our lives? So that we can explore more, that we can travel more, that we can do more cool things that files our bucket, that keeps us high-vibing and keeps us enriched in our life experience and our journey, this high-vibrating lifestyle which I've talked so much about and will continue to.
FlexibilityAgain, an open schedule, another great point to consider in relation to embracing a more nomadic type of business and personal lifestyle. Do you have an open schedule? What are the time constraints and requirements as it relates to the activities you're involved in? Which ones of those are negotiable, which ones of those aren't negotiable? Which ones of those can you still complete from other locations? Which ones do you need to be at in person? Do you really need to be in the boardroom for that meeting, or could you call in via Skype from another part of the world? I use Skype and video conferencing for all kinds of things now. Wherever possible, I am looking and using things like that to help me just continue to live freely, and really just enjoy what I want to do when I want to do it, but at the same time from cool places, so I don't feel like I'm stuck in a boardroom, a windowless office, all day, just draining my life force. Because sometimes that's what it does, or that's definitely what it feels like.
Think of that, an open schedule. Do you need to be in certain places? If you do that's great, but when that's done can you go anywhere you want? Play in and out of that. Maybe there's a conference, you'd be at the conference, and then maybe you're off over here, and then maybe you're off over there. Then maybe you're gone a week to Bermuda and then back into Vancouver for another special event and then off you go. This is the flexibility, and this is kind of the fun of the adventure and the lifestyle that is possible if you seek it.
The toolsCarrying on a little deeper. This is about working remotely. Obviously, we've touched on this. The nomadic lifestyle is about working remotely, so what type of remote working tools do you have? Smart phone, mobile phone, laptop computer, if you're a vlogger or solopreneur or similar, video recording equipment, photography equipment, potentially. What else in alignment with that? File storage. A lot of the things that I also use for working remotely are cloud-based solutions tools, and similar for cloud-based organization, which means that in my pocket I don't need to really carry a ton of stuff. All of my stuff can be hosted on the cloud, I can pull it when I need it, I can collaborate it when I need it. Everyone can be all over the world and we plug in and contribute as we go fluidly in stride.
Really there's all kinds of tools for that, so keep an eye on my tool list as I share other great tools that are supportive of this lifestyle as I live it, and as I demonstrate how it works and the ways I do it. All kinds of great tools that, truly, the people you work with won't even feel you're gone by the way that you'll be able to connect in and collaborate and correlate as you go. Very very cool, and very important to explore the tools you use, and explore which ways those tools can be accessed from anywhere. Very great on a whole bunch of levels, these things, cloud-based solutions.
Digging a little deeper. Nomadic-friendly sources of income, this is another great thing to think about. In what ways do you make money now that require you to be in a fixed location? Touched on this a little bit earlier. And in what ways do you make money that don't require you to be in a physical location? Which ways are the ways that you're earning income that require you to be in a physical location can you shift the way you provide those services so that you don't have to? It's all about flexibility. Here are the principles of nomadic living, is about flexibility, is about no connection to time however and whenever possible, no connection the location however and wherever possible. It is about freedom of what you connect to and the projects you take on whenever available on an as-needed basis.
There's so many different ways to consider this. It is about having all the tools you need wherever you are and wherever you feel like being. If you want to go sit by the beach in Costa Rica that's great. You have your computer with you and the coffee shop is right on the corner, so if you need to go work for a couple hours, boom, there you go. You pack the computer up, you go to the beach, you jump in the ocean. Let's go! This is the type of stuff, this is the type of potential that's available to all of us if we want to live that way.
I for one definitely do, so I am embracing it fully, and I have been testing it out for years, and I will continue to as I go, because this is freedom and I deserve it, and so do you.
Some of the ideas here are the principles of nomadic living and the nomadic lifestyle. I'm introducing the concept to you today and some of the quick ways that you can explore whether you can make adjustments in your life, in your world, in your business, in relationships, that provide the greatest amount of flexibility, earning, income potential, and similar, for you to enjoy and experience your life at the highest possible vibrational levels. You deserve it, I deserve it, many others deserve it, and it's available for us now, which is a very, very cool new opportunity, and a very cool new paradigm shift about how we all work together and contribute and collaborate in this world on the things that we care about, and the things that we're interested in building.
Fantastic, you'll see companies that I'm involved in participate with this type of philosophy in mind. You will see my own personal activities reflect this type of spirit as we go. There'll be lots more I'm going to share on this topic, but for those who may not be aware or not have really deeply considered these types of things, I want you to start considering how you can adjust what it is you're doing if you're sitting in an office nine to five attached to your test. Because you don't really need to do that anymore, depending on what you're doing. In many realms of opportunity and business, you don't have to. So, don't worry about that. Let's explore what's possible. I encourage you to explore what's possible for yourself, and I'll continue to provide tools and resources and ideas and insights related to this lifestyle as we go.
This is Fresh and Raw, Episode nine. I'm Chad McMillan, sharing with you things that I think I know about, all kinds of stuff related to business and high-vibrating lifestyles, conscious living, creative arts, entrepreneurship, money, and more.
Hit at me if you like what you're hearing and seeing here. Let's explore collabs, let's put the good vibes out there, let's help power people up. That's really what I am envisioning and working to do here. Please like, comment, share as you see fit any and all of my content that may resonate with you, and until the next time, we will talk to you soon.
Chad McMillan is an independent venture capitalist and creative artist focused on personal growth and exponential entrepreneurship. Connect with Chad at chad@chadmc.com.
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