Retrospective: 2010 – Don’t Get Trapped by Labels

Life is about change. That is how we explore who we are. It’s how we grow. It’s how we adapt to the world that is evolving around us.

And we as humans tend to like to assign labels to describe who we are.

You might take on labels that describe your career, your relationships, your hobbies, your passions. But you probably don’t take on a label as stationary house dweller? That’s just assumed normal in our society.

When you’re making big changes in your life, part of the process is to adopt new labels for yourself as you shed old ones.

And hitting the road has a whole new slew of labels to assume. You are now an RVer. A nomad. An explorer. A boater. A van lifer. A Looper. An overlander. A digital nomad. A boondocker. A technomad. A minimalist.

You might use these new labels as part of your proclamation to your friends, family and community as you explain the shift you are making. You use them as part of your motivation to do the hard work to make the change. You use these words to seek your new people and fit in. Your new tribe. It’s how you explain yourself in a new world you’re starting a journey into.

You might even register a domain name, Facebook page name or YouTube Channel.

It’s very easy to start to identify by these labels. And that’s fine.

Labels are meant to describe.

But don’t let them prescribe.

They can trap you, and halt future change and transformation. Even new ones you personally choose.

In 2010, after now nearly 3 years on the road together in our tiny travel trailers exploring the country – we had started to grow a community of those following along. Some of you are are still here today (thank you).

We were being seen as by what we had been presenting – RVers working on the road. Minimalists. Tiny trailer dwellers.

But we never prescribed our adventures together by these terms. We never intended to be RVers for life.

We intentionally selected the online name of Technomadia, based on the word Technomad – technology enabled nomads. With the intention of leaving lots of room for lots of ways of perpetually exploring the world around us.

But that didn’t stop even us even from identifying by the labels we had been using to describe ourselves.

We were mentally ready for something new – roaming around in a small trailer was no longer igniting our flames. But we kept at it, because, well – isn’t that who we are now? That’s the bill of sale we worked so hard to sell ourselves and others. We had put so much effort into hitting the road, building our story and having a trailer custom built just for us.

Thankfully, we had the tools to recognize we needed a change and break out of our labels. We were no strangers to adapting and shedding them.

We started to explore our next step – perhaps we were ready for our next dream of sailing? And then an opportunity came up for us to move to St. John in the US Virgin Islands for a season. In a matter of hours we shed our labels and shifted the course.

But not all of our audience was onboard with the change.

‘How could you abandon us??’

‘You’re RVers, you’re betraying us with this change?’

‘You’re moving in to a HOUSE?!?!’

It hurt to hear these words. From people who had placed us in a box. A literal box.

Our time on St. John was transformative. A remote island, reachable only by boat, that is mostly a national park. We lived in a tiny screened in porch on a mountain top that needed a 4×4 Jeep to reach. We had to cross an 8-mile mountain range to get food or fuel. We worked online during the day launching what would become a new career (our app Coverage? was born there), and we always ended the day with an amazing hike and snorkel.

We healed from tough times. We let our hearts re-sync, and our minds reset. We came back in the best physical shapes of our lives. And we didn’t share much from that time period. Just snippets.

We had listened to our hearts, not our labels.

Because this is our journey. Our path to carve and lead. And we will not be trapped by even a label we create. And we won’t let any of those labels keep us in a box.

That was our big lesson of 2010 – the reminder to use labels to describe ourselves, but not prescribe our path.

And we’ve been able to more freely shift from RV, vintage bus, train, cruise ship, backpack, van and boat. And there will be future changes – because that’s what life is – and even ones where the label technomad may no longer fit.

Technomadia 15 Years Retrospective Series

In the lead up to Cherie's 15th Nomadiversary on May 10, 2022 - she shared a retrospective post for each year with a lesson about nomadic life and our own journey.

Here's a video recap of the series (caution, it's over 50m long!):

And here are the individual chapters of this series:

Retrospective: 2007 – Overcoming Obstacles

Retrospective: 2008 – Scarcity vs Abundance

Retrospective: 2009 – Community