The Truth About My Life In Central London As A Digital Nomad

I’ve lived in Central London for nearly six months now. It’s a childhood dream, since I’ve always loved this city, and previously I’ve only lodged in outlying areas.

Right now, when I go downstairs and open the front door I walk straight out onto Shaftesbury Avenue, slap bang in the middle of the West End and right next to Soho.

Just down the road is Piccadilly Circus. Behind the apartment is Leicester Square, where the imposing W Hotel squats like some green-flecked, benign monster.

I’ll be here until the end of June and then I’m packing my bags and heading for Europe—at least for as long as they’ll allow me to stay until the sunlit uplands of Brexit kick in and my freedom of movement in the EU is stripped from me, that is.

So how has it been living right in the middle of the action in London? Here are some bullet points:

• Expensive
• Not as noisy as you’d think
• Tourist-engorged
• Convenient for travel
• Picturesque (when I’ve been undistracted enough to take notice of my surroundings)
• Great for running in Green Park and Hyde Park etc.

Aside from that, I have to report that there haven’t been any enormous advantages. The thing is that I’ve spent so much time working this year—writing FIVE books, plus a bunch of articles, Tweets, emails and so on—that I haven’t had a hell of a lot of time to do anything else.

To be honest, I could have been in Timbuktu and it wouldn’t have made a great deal of difference.

Berlin

Those of you who have followed this blog for a while may recall that I moved to Berlin back in November last year. But there were a few bumps in the road, and, for a number of reasons I was compelled to reverse that decision and return to my home city to sort things out.

As such, I’ve been renting this current place since January.

My current plan is to return to (continental) Europe in July. Since I have a flat in Berlin, this makes sense. I can live there with extremely low overheads, and get on with building up my business.

In London, meanwhile, I am paying over £1000 a month ($1330 USD, €1,138 at current exchange rates) for a room in an apartment.

That may sound like a lot, but actually it’s a steal given the location, and the place is quite pleasant all things considered. Also, I’ve developed a good relationship with the landlord, who owns several properties around this area. The plan is that I will ship out for a bit, and then as and when I need to return he will arrange somewhere else for me to stay.

But to be in London at all is an abdication of my original plan, which was to throw myself into the digital nomad lifestyle. After all, I now make the bulk of my living through book sales and consultations with private clients. As a result, I could be based anywhere in the world. To be sitting in the city where I’ve spent most of my life is a tad unadventurous, to say the least.

But I underestimated the nostalgic pull that London has for me. For one thing, I have many good friends here who I’ve known for a very long time. That is not something you can easily replace. Also, since I’ve seen so much life here that the very streets bear the resonance of my former encounters, my former existence.

Again, that’s not something that you can just replicate elsewhere.

That said, I also love Berlin very much too. I have many friends there. I’ve spent a lot of time there and created memories. And I own a property there outright (which is quiet and great for writing, by the way). I would be an absolute idiot not to take full advantage.

Furthermore, it’s not just Berlin. Because of that city’s location, it’s a great place to base oneself for travel throughout Europe, particularly Central and Eastern Europe.

Again, I would be an idiot not to take advantage of this.

Grand Tour

Perhaps it’s to do with my age (40s) and having been set in my ways for a long time, but I would caution people looking to travel and to become nomadic to consider this. My view for a long time was that location doesn’t matter, as long as I have my laptop and an internet connection.

In many ways that’s true. My experience so far in 2018 has proved to me that my being in Central London hasn’t made a great difference since most of the time has been spent sitting at a desk typing.

However, what London has given me these past few months is support (both business and personal) and stability. Those things must not be underestimated. Travelling and living abroad is fun, but it also knocks you completely out of any normality and routine that you may have had.

In many ways that’s precisely what I need. But I also have to remind myself that I’m an addict in recovery and I have to be careful about my sobriety and about the external stimuli that I expose myself to.

Still, we’re coming into summer now, Europe is heating up (everywhere except London) and I am itching to try something new. Therefore my new, extended European Grand Tour will begin very shortly.

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