3 Life Lessons From a 21-Day Journey Around the World

Reflecting on what I’ve learned 5 years later.

I believe this was Day Two. At a Developer Conference in Mexico City. For the record, I’m not really that short, it’s just that everyone with me is so tall.

It was almost exactly 5 years ago this week that I returned from a 21-day journey around the world.

There were four of us on this journey. Together we met, interviewed and filmed developers, engineers and educators. These hard-working, passionate people were building amazing software and hardware in 7 different cities across the globe.

A software developer in Tokyo working on wearables for the Google platform (now called Wear OS)

The people we met were all unique characters, shaped by their upbringing and culture (and obviously their genetics). Regardless of our cultural differences, it was amazing how much we all had in common. Our similarities easily outnumbered our differences.

People. The ultimate energy source.

This was 21 straight days of getting up around 6am, getting gear ready, traveling to multiple locations and shooting until the light went down. Then offloading that footage and reviewing what we shot. Followed every single night by eating and drinking way too much and going to bed way too late.