[NovaVirtu]

(11-15-2013 05:39 AM)InternationPlayboy Wrote:  

I'm trying to figure out a way to make it work better. My goal is to start some type of business online or do something remotely where I can be time and location independent.

For the last 6 years or so I have been working in hotels, which works alright for traveling, as you can work anywhere in the hotel industry, and the places that pay the most are usually great places to live. In the hotel industry, it's common for people to move around a lot, so as long as you have a few places on your résumé that you worked for a few years, you're looking pretty good. One company I was with for 4 years and another 2 years, both were in pretty impressive areas for the industry and one being among the top 10% of hotels in the area. Both of the companies loved me, especially the higher profiled one, so I have great references. The money has been pretty good for not much qualification other than a good résumé and being able to speak a few languages. With my résumé and language skills I can pretty much get a job at any hotel I choose. I just got a new job and will be making right around $1000 a week and should I stay 6 months to a year I'll be making more like $1500 a week. Not bad pay for a man in his 20's. It affords me enough to travel for a bit of each year. This new job gives me 3 months off a year as the hotel is closed for those three months, which is great for traveling, but I also have to spend the rest of the year in a small town, which I like the small town, but it gets old after a while. If I could find this same job in a place like Miami, I'd probably never quit. I just need to find that middle ground. I wouldn't mind getting 3 months off a year to travel if the rest of the year I could live in a place I truly wanted to live in. But prefferably, i just want to be able to live and work where the hell I want to when I want to. Money is important, but if I'm making 50 or 60k a year for life, I'm totally fine with that so long as I get to see the world in the process and not just have 2-4 weeks a year off.

I think the way I'm doing it now is alright, but it could be better. This coming year I'm really going to push to better my situation. I've been held back these last 8 months or so because of funds and other things. Now I'm finally back to were I was before my last South American trip financially. It's going to help give me a little more motivation now that I have a little more cash flow coming in. I'm going to start reading up and try to figure out how I can make it work. I'm playing around with some ideas, now I just have to figure out how to implement them.

When I really think about it though, I feel pretty accomplished for seeing the few places I have seen and learning a couple of languages. I'm currently back home where I grew up for a couple weeks, and most of my friends lives seem so damn boring. Most of the kids I grew up with I don't talk to anymore, mostly because we can't really relate. I tried meeting up with my best friend growing up, and it just doesn't seem like it's going to happen. We kind of made plans but when I hit him up he says he has plans, then I think about it, and I don't even know how we'd relate anymore. He's still living with his dad and doesn't have a job. I'm pretty sure he just kicked a bad drug habit that's probably been consuming his life for who knows how long, and he's deciding to enlist in the army at the ripe age of 27. Half our other friends have kids and are working shitty construction jobs, doing the same routine day in and day out, all so they can take a hunting trip or go out on a boat once a month. I just can't do that shit. These kids hang out with the same people and fuck the same girls as in highschool. I think I would have shot myself by now had I stayed in the small town I grew up in. The only ones I still talk to are my friends that decided to move to Vegas proper (or at least Henderson). Only a handful of my friends growing up are actually living, and they're the only ones I've hung out with since I've been back. Not surprising, they also like to travel, are mostly single, and if not single, they still hang out every weekend and like to have fun. So after coming home, I feel like i may not be doing everything perfect, but I'm not doing bad either. I could be stuck trying to fuck the girls I went to highschool with that have 2 kids by now. I felt before I came that I was kind of at a turning point and I need to figure shit out, but coming back home made me feel like I'm doing pretty well. While I don't have it all figured out, I'm feeling confident that it will all fall into place soon if I work for it.

Wow dude...you hit the nail on the head with that paragraph. Every time I visit the little town I where I grew up in New England it's the same thing...nothing's changed. I left when I was 18 for school and aside from a few months of financial difficulty which forced me back into the parent's house, I've been gone ever since. It's difficult to relate to relate to old friends...you have these ambitions, dreams of travelling you share with them but they don't have any interest beyond what car accessory, gun or expensive toy they want to buy next. Which of the same ol' bars to go to next. Which dumb girl we watched from afar in high school is back on the market. I tell them about my plans to quit and travel and most of them can't wrap their heads around it. This topic alone deserves it's own thread.

Back on topic- OP- you've had an amazing travel experience, which I would think by default makes you the most interesting person in the room 9 times out of 10. That is an asset that cannot be measured in money.

I would focusing on saving and networking right now, pick up whatever work you can find in the meantime. Check out that supplemental income/hustles thread. Right now I'm selling stuff on cragislist and just signed up for a bartending course. When I get back from my own SA trip, this will be a good skill set to have, since they are always in demand.

While traveling in Italy I met a Canadian girl who worked in a hotel in Australia. There is a big demand there English-speaking workers in hospitality because all the young people go for the higher-paying mining jobs. Minimum wage is around $18 USD/hr down there. Told me she saved up a nice chunk of change (no rent since the resort provided housing) and used it to travel. Not a bad deal.