3665: Travel, Tourism, and Living Abroad by Jacob Lund Fisker of Early Retirement Extreme on Personal Growth

Optimal Living Daily - Personal Development and Self-Improvement

Optimal Living Daily LLC

Education, Mental Health, Self-improvement, Health & Fitness

4.6 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 13 July 2025

⏱️ 12 minutes

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Summary

Discover all of the podcasts in our network, search for specific episodes, get the Optimal Living Daily workbook, and learn more at: OLDPodcast.com. Episode 3665: Jacob Lund Fisker challenges conventional wisdom on travel by questioning its true value beyond consumerism and social status. He argues that living abroad and developing useful skills offer far deeper personal growth and perspective than typical tourism. Discover why meaningful experiences come not from collecting destinations but from immersing yourself in new cultures and responsibilities. Read along with the original article(s) here: http://earlyretirementextreme.com/travel-tourism-and-living-abroad.html Quotes to ponder: “Having been to the other side of the world no longer means braving mountain ranges, running out of food, or being chased by bandits.” “I highly recommend living abroad though out of which traveling is a very very small part, that is, a couple of days of getting there vs a few years or more of being there.” “To see the world, get the skills first, then travel. Not the other way around.” Episode references: Doctors Without Borders: https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org Peace Corps: https://www.peacecorps.gov World Tourism Organization: https://www.unwto.org Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is Optimal Living Daily, Travel, Tourism, and Living Abroad by Jacob Lundfisker of
0:07.3	Early Retirement Extreme.com, and I'm Justin Mollick. Welcome back to our usual Sunday bonus episode,
0:13.7	where I share an episode from a different podcast in the Optimal Living Daily network,
0:18.1	usually overlapping with the kinds of themes that come up here.
0:26.5	Today's episode comes from Optimal Finance Daily, and you can follow or subscribe to that show wherever you're hearing this if you enjoy what you're about to hear. So with that, let's get right
0:30.6	to the post and commentary from Diana as we optimize your life.
0:39.0	Travel, tourism, and living abroad by Jacob Lund Fisker of Early Retirement Extreme.com.
0:47.2	A couple of weeks ago, I posted the controversial statement that travel is not worth it.
0:53.5	This elicited many comments and so it's obviously
0:56.3	something people feel strongly about. I think therefore I should clarify things a bit. First,
1:02.7	some definitions. Travel. The process of getting from point A to point B. Tourism. Using the World Tourism Organization's definition,
1:13.8	tourism is traveling to someplace and being away from home for more than 24 hours and less
1:19.9	than one year and not being remunerated from the destination. Being away for longer than one year
1:26.5	while being paid would not be tourism.
1:29.3	Living abroad.
1:31.3	Moving your permanent address to another country and staying there long enough to learn the language,
1:37.3	read the newspapers, get local friends, work, go to local doctors, file taxes, and so on.
1:43.3	By law of the excluded middle, it should be longer
1:46.9	than a year. In a stretch, the case can probably be made that if you are only home for a few days a
1:53.2	year or not at all, you're really living abroad, even if you have not set up a permanent address.
1:59.8	It's clear to me that unremunerated tourism is a leisure
2:03.3	activity, whether it's to see the attractions, study museums, hang out on bars, climb mountains, or scuba dive.
	...

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