Travel + Career Empowerment

Chiang Mai, Thailand

Two months ago I took a flight from New York to Southeast Asia. I started in Bali; I’m currently in Thailand and planning on staying for at least the rest of the year. Two months ago, I also pulled the trigger on another idea I had been playing with. I decided to focus on full-time on a self-directed learning project, quitting my job and moving out of my Boston apartment.

Cheaper Than You Think
Traveling and committing full time to pursue a self-directed learning endeavor were two separate ideas that had been growing in my mind for a while. The two don’t seem in obvious alignment; traveling involves burning money while leaving a job eliminates an income stream. Where is the bisection between the two?

Well, I’m not the type of traveler who fills his days with typical tourist activities; I’d rather live somewhere new for an extended period to immerse myself in the culture and way of life of the location. I definitely enjoyed some tourist-musts so far during my time in Bali (I highly recommend catching the sunrise at Mt Batur), but my expenses resemble a typical cost-of-living breakdown more than a vacation budget.

This allows me to take advantage of the power of the dollar in a place like Bali where my monthly cost of living is cheaper than my Boston rent. I wasn’t even living in luxury. Sharing a four-bedroom apartment with three roommates. I thought I had a pretty good deal paying $1400 for a downtown Boston apartment. Today, I enjoyed a phenomenal Thai lunch for $5.
When I actually made my budget spreadsheet: flights, accommodation, and additional cost of living expenses, I realized I had already saved enough money to buy myself a decent chunk of time. At that point, it was just a matter of weeks until I would arrive.

The Trouble with Advancing at a not so Advanced Company
Graduating from Carnegie Mellon, and landing a Data Scientist role out of undergrad might sound like a dream to some, but a piece of paper and a job title are not what makes a career or life fulfilling. The term Data Scientist, like many job titles, has become overused and too vague. The company I worked at is in an old industry but was nonetheless trying to rebrand itself as a type of tech company. Unfortunately, from the inside, there was no incentive to innovate. I found myself crunching out tools for automated reporting instead of solving interesting data science problems.

It was clear to me that this would not be a place for me to grow, so I began seeking new employment as a Data Scientist at tech companies, many of them startups. The reasons I failed to land a job came down to a lack of production-level experience, which would prevent me from hitting the ground running in a fast-paced environment.

I decided I would need to get that experience. I began rounding out my software skills outside of work. To be the effective, hit-the-ground-running, data scientist I wanted to be, I had to be able to build the software necessary to support data science research.

Confidently Building your own Curriculum
The self-education pursuit was liberating. I was not constrained to pursuing solely resources that would directly benefit my current job. As I delved deeper, I was realizing where my interests were pulling me, and soon enough I had put together a curriculum for myself, that not only included books and projects on software and web applications, but also on cryptography, something I had been keen on exploring for a while.

These subjects were not only hobbyist pursuits but practical for the career I wanted to build for myself. Having begun work on my curriculum, I still felt like I was wasting 40+ hours a week at work, and wasn’t gaining anything from it. I knew I wanted to commit full-time to my new endeavor. Having no familial or other obligations holding me back, I knew this was the time to do it.

Leaving
As I would be leaving the states for a considerable amount of time, there were four things I had to say goodbye to. Two forever, one temporarily, and one that turned out not to even be real.

The two permanent ones were my job and my apartment. Like most companies, mine had a two-week policy. The process was relatively simple logistically. An email got the ball rolling, and then it was just a matter of transferring some projects and saying goodbye to my co-workers.
Living in a pretty popular city, finding a sublease was no problem. Within days of posting my apartment on craigslist, I had already scheduled enough viewings, and within a week I had my landlord drafting the sublease for the new tenant to sign.

Saying goodbye to my friends and family was the hardest, but with modern technology, keeping in touch is easier than ever, and ultimately they recognized how important taking this trip was to me. Honestly, what threw me off the most was how on-board my parents were compared to my siblings. I had grown so used to the opposite being true most of my life, that I almost second-guessed myself.

The easiest thing to part with was my stuff. It turns out, I didn’t really have much. I consider myself a practical minimalist. Maybe it’s just part of being a millennial, but I don’t have unnecessary physical things. My bedroom furniture was sold on craigslist as easily as my apartment was subleased. My few extra books, winter clothes, and my guitar I was fortunate enough to be able to leave with my parents.

Arriving
With the power of the internet, planning travel is easier than ever. I like Google Flights and Airbnb, but there are a plethora of other tools available to search and compare flights and accommodation. Doing research on the legalities of long-term stays is also a must. Again, this has made me grateful to be a citizen of a country with a strong passport like the United States. Travel visas for many countries in Southeast Asia (and many other parts of the world for that matter) for US citizens are either not required for stays less than a certain amount, or only require a simple process to extend.

Practical reasons aside, I cannot overstate how beneficial the environment I’ve found myself in has been to my effectiveness in my learning pursuit. I can easily transition from relaxing to working throughout each day. I’ve taken advantage of the abundance of co-working spaces and cafes to work in, and I’ve been able to fit in yoga, meditation, and Muay Thai classes, that, along with great weather, nearby beaches and other nature spots have done wonders for my peace of mind and creativity. It really has been an amazing experience thus far.

Going For It
​While I consider myself prone to hesitation, I also constantly challenge myself to actions to avoid regret. Experimenting with how you spend your time and money is the only way to figure out what works best for you. I am by no means rolling in cash, but I was able to take advantage of the buying power of the dollar to buy myself time. It’s a glorious feeling taking your destiny in your own hands. As to where this will lead me, well only time will tell. If you find yourself hesitating in a similar situation, my take should be clear. Go for it.

originally posted on my pseudonymous blog