[Jackhammer]

Serious question, what do you do all day?

I'm a lover of seeing new things and sites and going to as many destinations as I can. It's why I cannot commit to a woman, I just get bored and constantly desire new things.

Yet I see guys here living in foreign cities for months at a time. What do you do to pass the time? Especially with no real social circle. I've never stayed in a foreign city for more than a week and I did typical tourist stuff, but I'm increasingly feeling the need to settle somewhere else for a bit. I don't know where. But I always come back to the question of "What will I do all day?"

Sure the thrill of assimilating into a culture is a constant source of excitement and adventure in itself, but eventually daily life there must become as humdrum as your ordinary life back in the States, right? Just with different (albeit MUCH BETTER) scenery. Or is a lot of time dedicated to just meeting women? Even that gets tedious after awhile.

[Roosh]

Relevant question: how old are you?

[Jackhammer]

(11-01-2011 02:32 PM)Roosh Wrote:  

Relevant question: how old are you?

25

[Roosh]

Sight seeing gets boring and even exciting cities like Rio won't keep you busy for extended stays. This means you MUST have you own project to keep you busy for 2-4 hours a day, along with a couple side hobbies like reading or practicing instruments. If I do the following, I'll be short on time:

-Learning a language
-Reading, side hobbies
-Going to the gym
-Writing
-Day game + 4 nights a week of night game

I find that younger guys get caught up in the boredom cycle because they don't have side projects. Before you leave the country, set two big goals of projects you want to complete, like learning a language and writing a book, and then get to work while you live abroad.

The main idea is not to look at the environment to keep you busy, but look at things you can do anywhere in the world. Even if you put me in a shithole city with bad nightlife, I'll have plenty to do on my own. If I am bored it's because I'm being lazy and procrastinating on work I can be doing.

[johnw28]

Learning a language can easily consume 4 or 5 hours a day sometimes more. Afterall you are in a foreign country trying to live a semi normal life with the goal of nailing girls from that country. Even if you speak the language of the country you are going to you will still want to learn some of their slang. What I have done is taken side trips for 3 or 4 days away from the city I choose to live in.

Example of a normal day I had

7 am wake up and have breakfast shower
8-1pm study at a language academy 5 days a week for a month after that spend that time studying alone or with a friend
2-5 take a nap
5 or 6 eat
7 read for a while or listen to music
8 til midnight go hang out at local clubs or bars depending on the day of the week.

The more time you spend on learning their language the better prospects you will have while living in a foreign country

Also you can sometimes pretend to teach them some english once you speak their language. As you don't really want them to speak to much of your language. Language is the greater power. If they understand everything you say to a friend it can and will get you into trouble if you have a longterm girlfriend.

[Soma]

(11-01-2011 02:05 PM)Jackhammer Wrote:  

Sure the thrill of assimilating into a culture is a constant source of excitement and adventure in itself, but eventually daily life there must become as humdrum as your ordinary life back in the States, right? Just with different (albeit MUCH BETTER) scenery. Or is a lot of time dedicated to just meeting women? Even that gets tedious after awhile.

Right, even paradise gets boring after a while. I used to live on an idyllic tropical island. At first it was completely surreal. After a year I was completely immune to it. After two years I just wanted the fuck out.

Daily life is as humdrum as you make it. If you're life outside of work is boring as hell in your home country it isn't magically going to get exciting and provide you with a deeper meaning because you're living somewhere for a while else unless you change your habits and make it happen.

Like Roosh and others have suggested, you should have a short and medium term plan of specific things you want to accomplish and this is obviously completely dependent on your personal situation. Typically, this means something work/career/business related (e.g. setting up an online business, making local contacts) or personal improvement (e.g. learning a language, learning to dance). You can use sites like http://www.meetup.com to find other people with common interests.

If you didn't have to ever worry about money then what would you do with your time? This is not an easy question and there's no panacea for happiness - you must figure out what it is you want to do with your time that is best for you. And, of course, there's always chasing women. If you get a local girlfriend you'll learn more about the local culture in a week than the typical traveler would in a year.

n.b. Not everyone is from the States.

[nomadicdude]

It's easier to travel long term if you have worked for a few years in a stressful job. I often spend my days not really doing anything, but I still appreciate it even after 1.5 years+ travelling simply because I know how horrible life can be when you are working. It's hard to be bored when you're in a foreign place even if you don't do jack.

[Jalouse]

The biggest thing is having to manage your own time, for most people with office jobs someone else is deciding what you do for a lot of your time so outside of working and commuting you don't actually have that much free time. Compare this to suddenly having nothing to do all day for months at a time, it can be daunting.
When I've done long stints backpacking and staying in hostels I never really used to do anything very productive, I'd always be meeting new people, there would be lots of partying going on and it was easy to fill my time without getting bored.
Now that I've been staying in apartments more I find I need a little more routine because if I make local friends a lot of the time they're busy during the week working so I've been taking Spanish classes, hitting the gym etc

[Entropy4]

My life abroad is basically the same as it is back home.

- Work (online)
- Go to the gym
- Go out, meet people, hang with friends
- Learn languages, learn a skill, read

I'll usually knock out the tourist stuff in the first few days. I also make a point to spend the first week or two making friends and building a social circle, saving game for after I've met some people.

[Jackhammer]

(11-01-2011 03:04 PM)Roosh Wrote:  

Sight seeing gets boring and even exciting cities like Rio won't keep you busy for extended stays. This means you MUST have you own project to keep you busy for 2-4 hours a day, along with a couple side hobbies like reading or practicing instruments. If I do the following, I'll be short on time:

-Learning a language
-Reading, side hobbies
-Going to the gym
-Writing
-Day game + 4 nights a week of night game

I find that younger guys get caught up in the boredom cycle because they don't have side projects. Before you leave the country, set two big goals of projects you want to complete, like learning a language and writing a book, and then get to work while you live abroad.

The main idea is not to look at the environment to keep you busy, but look at things you can do anywhere in the world. Even if you put me in a shithole city with bad nightlife, I'll have plenty to do on my own. If I am bored it's because I'm being lazy and procrastinating on work I can be doing.

Writing music would be a huge one, as well as learning new languages, or even one of my lifelong dreams of writing some sort of travel memoir (even if I'm the only one who ever gets to read it). I guess at home I'm used to calling up a friend when I have down time, or even just driving around listening to music. It's been forever since I've had TIME to just do whatever the fuck I want. I'd seriously probably be happy just walking around a foreign city all day for a few months, listening to music or whatever.

[Jackhammer]

(11-02-2011 12:56 AM)Soma Wrote:  

If you didn't have to ever worry about money then what would you do with your time? This is not an easy question and there's no panacea for happiness - you must figure out what it is you want to do with your time that is best for you. And, of course, there's always chasing women. If you get a local girlfriend you'll learn more about the local culture in a week than the typical traveler would in a year.

n.b. Not everyone is from the States.

Thanks for the reply. If I had unlimited time/money I would just motorcycle around the Earth and be a nomad for as long as I could find the energy to do it. A girlfriend in each new location would be pretty awesome as well.

[KingofScotland]

Quote:

It's hard to be bored when you're in a foreign place even if you don't do jack.

I feel the same. Just walking the streets or sitting people watching keeps me amused when abroad.

Quote:

When I've done long stints backpacking and staying in hostels I never really used to do anything very productive, I'd always be meeting new people, there would be lots of partying going on and it was easy to fill my time without getting bored.

Same. Actually sometimes don't even end up seeing any of the touristy stuff or things I'd went to the particular place to see because I spend all my time hanging out, partying or sleeping off the party and then deciding to leave because I'd been there too long.

[nomadicdude]

[/quote]

Thanks for the reply. If I had unlimited time/money I would just motorcycle around the Earth and be a nomad for as long as I could find the energy to do it. A girlfriend in each new location would be pretty awesome as well.


[/quote]

I'm in a position financially where if I really wanted to I could live and travel abroad for over 10 years and still go back to the US with a sizable amount of cash. I'm not going to do it - I'm stopping travelling after 2 years out of the US. I love travelling but living out of a backpack does get tiring after a while.