How to avoid social burnout and forge deep connections while traveling as a digital nomad

“We are all just walking each other home” — Ram Dass

The flame of human connection burns in different degrees of intensity. There is the full on house on fire heat of 250 people traveling, playing, and partying together in an exotic destination — a firework of new and renewed friendships and romantic connections, activities, emotions, nomad logistics, deep conversations, business opportunities... On the opposite end of the spectrum there is the intimacy of one-on-one friendships and romantic relationships. And then there is the slow burn — the fireplace on a cool November evening feeling — of an intimate community of a Coliving space. As a location flexible person, the world is your oyster, you can live anywhere as long as the timezones and money/logistics work for you, the question then becomes how to maintain emotional well-being through the rollercoaster of the nomadic lifestyle.

The social aspect of a digital nomad life tends to be polarized between times of extreme connectedness and loneliness. The many nomad conferences and events bring us together for a short time and pack a lot of activities and socializing, quelling our thirst for connection and at the same time, getting us hooked on the serotonin released during these intense bonding activities which makes the inevitable departures extremely emotionally taxing and even painful.

Coliving community — Coliving Community in Javea, Spain

Numerous studies have concluded that social connectivity is key to our survival as species. Oxycontin — the so-called “love hormone” — released through any type of social connectivity triggers the release of serotonin. In a chain reaction, the serotonin then activates the ‘reward circuitry’ in our brain resulting in a happy feeling. This reward mechanism triggers our need for more happy/connected stimuli which becomes a problem when events end and we disperse to our new destinations or go back to our home bases. While time alone is important for reconnecting with yourself and catching up on work and life, we often experience a feeling akin to jumping off a cliff when the intense closeness ends and we find ourselves on our own.

Staying at a Coliving can act as a “soft landing” — a gentle come down from the high of the conferences or intensely social experiences. As I walked into SundandCo — an award winning Coliving space in Javea, Spain — after a 28-hr travel from Cape Town, my body/mind/soul experienced a feeling of melting into the warmth of this community I just met. The stability and comfort of home calmed my nervous system while the friendliness of the team and members kept the serotonin flowing making me feel connected and welcomed. I felt at home in the physical and emotional sense of the word.

For centuries we have been conditioned to think that the only legitimate sources of connectedness are family we’re born into and the one we create ourselves. Friendships have been relegated a “nice to have” status and easily dropped or scaled back once romantic relationships become stable and families of our own are formed. However, this creates a mechanism where we either dump all our emotional needs onto our romantic partner or bottle them up to avoid overwhelming them. Either scenario often leaves us with a lack of social outlet, feeling isolated, or our partners’ emotional batteries running on empty, which can lead to unnecessary conflict. Living with others — coliving, co-housing, communal living — whatever label you are personally comfortable with — can provide the feeling of togetherness we humans crave so much that is independent from having and decoupled from the pressures of romantic relationships. Having a lighthearted chat while making your morning coffee or stopping your day to spend a few minutes helping someone though a rough patch as you see something in their eyes when they walk past you in the house can fill your heart with warmth and meaning and it is these moments that define the quality of our lives.

P.S. As I finished writing this, a Mastermind workshop was taking place in the room next door. It was quite a different one from the usual business oriented kind. The task was to help one of the residents figure out “what to do with his life.” The person in question is an accomplished engineer who recently completed an MBA, a professor in a prestigious university in Spain… the list of accomplishments goes on… He opened up so beautifully, unafraid of showing vulnerability, to a group of strangers he had met less than a week ago. And all of us put our lives aside and summoned our life experiences to offer ideas and ask meaningful questions. The moment that made me tear up was when one of the members, also a man in his 40s, offered his own perspective based on his experience of the disillusionment and burnout he himself went through a few years back and wrote a bestselling book about. Seeing these two masculine, accomplished men connect so authentically with each other and open up about failure, disappointment, and all the things men are not allowed to admit was witnessing first-hand the healing power of community.

If you are thinking about becoming or already are “location independent” or a “digital nomad,” and haven’t tried Coliving, I highly recommend it as a way to forge deeper connections with yourself, the people on your path, and the local community of the places you visit.