What To Do When You Are Unhappy With City Life

Unhappy with city life

I received this email from a reader the other day and I felt compelled to write up a response publicly in case there are other’s who have asked the same questions:

“I typed in ‘unhappy with city life’ into google and I found your site and read everything you had to say and it’s the first time that I have found relief that someone else actually feels what I feel about London. I am so unhappy living here it is stifling and numbing every part of my life.
But no one else seems to know what I mean. And when people quote that ‘when you’ve had enough of London you’ve had enough of life’ thing at me I just wanna give them a punch! Because that’s just not true!

Before I moved to London I loved it, but now I’m a resident, well, all has changed. It depends on what the goal is, you have found that travelling like a nomad suits you, but for me, I decided on the strength of my skills to try to penetrate the acting industry and for that you need to be near a city because that’s where the industry is. So I’m stuck here!

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The World Needs Answers Not More Questions

Stop Asking Questions - Start Giving Answers

If your childhood was anything like mine, you were constantly pushed to ask questions:

“Remember, there is no such thing as a stupid question!”

“Smart people question everything”

…And other such sayings seemed to fly out of the mouths of teachers, parents and intelligent adults on an almost daily basis.

The adults were right, the greatest minds in history famously questioned everything, even seemingly logical facts that others took for granted (“the world is flat” for example).

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How To Actually Get Work Done From A Coffee Shop

Worm From Starbucks

I used to walk past my local Starbucks and look down my nose at the hipster types inside, with their ipads, netbooks and, god forbid, moleskine notebooks laid out on the table next to their $7 freakachino lattes. I mean… who do they think they’re kidding, if not watching films they’re, yet again, tweaking their FaceBook profile. I firmly believed that no-one produced anything of value sitting on a coffee shop sofa.

Just over a year later, I’m far less cynical and 90% of my day is spent in coffee shops and cafes of some sort, knocking back cups of black coffee (green tea lately – almost the same buzz with some health benefits and less of the jitteriness) and being just as productive, if not more so, then when I used to spend my days in a home office. I also own a couple moleskine’s that I write in when I want to feel like Hemingway without… you know… any of his talent! Continue reading

Why I Am In South East Asia

Mindoro banka boat view

Man, what a crazy start to 2012 hey!

I spent christmas 2011 with Joe & Justin from Adsense Flippers in Davao, Philippines. These guys are the bomb, and made a lonely traveller feel at home over the Christmas period (check out their latest podcast episode on AdsenseFlippers.com – great stuff that’s relevant to alot of entrepreneurs who battle with defining the value in their offering).

Justin organized a pre-christmas present run, where we drove around Davao in a Jeepney wearing santa hats, handing out presents to (surprisingly weary lol) kids, check out the video by John Paul Grant from LifeStyleBusinessDesign.com.

Joe then kicked my ass in a post-Christmas-glutony gym session, still feeling the effects of that two weeks later. Continue reading

Building & Maintaining A Lifestyle In SE Asia

Mindoro Waterfall

There’s a common trend that I’ve noticed among the travel blogger crowds that involves settling down somewhere, often in some cool bohemian location with fast internet connections and beautiful landscapes that inspire focus and introspective thinking, so that they can crank on work or a large project of some sort.

I did it (for 2 months instead of 4) in Cebu and plan to do it again in Thailand soon for a lot longer.

Erin & Simon from Never Ending Voyage, Johnny from Johnny Vagabond & Christine & her family from Almost Fearless have done it.

Even the Israelites in the bible times were known as ‘seminomads,’ often settling in locations long enough to build small economies and create agricultural systems during their 40 year exodus from Egypt. Continue reading

Planning A Trip To The Philippines? 4 Things To Keep In Mind

Geeks in paradise

I’ve been in the Philippines for 6 months now, long enough to feel like I’ve got a bit of a grasp of the place.

Before I came, I had the stories and advice of David Hehenberger & Dan to go off, so I thought I was pretty well prepared. 6 months later, and I realize that I knew NOTHING then. Here’s the advice that I would have given to past-me before he arrived in this country: Continue reading