Dev’s Adventure

YOUR ADVENTURE

One thing is saying that I want to be an adventurer and the other thing is realizing I am actually doing it. 

My name is Dev.  I am an adventure geek and full-time travel influencer from New Delhi , India. After completing the studies, I started my corporate career as a documentary producer in Birmingham, England. But soon, I realised that I wasn’t meant to live a corporate life. In 2015, I finally quit my corporate career to travel around the world. And almost one year later, in January 2016, the adventure began!

I started blogging in 2016 and in four years, I have worked with brands like GoPro, Germany Tourism, Nissan Motors, Indonesia Tourism, Cathay Pacific Airlines, Air Asia, Incredible India and more. Many national newspapers and in flight/travel magazines including The Times of India, Economic Times, The Statesman, and others, have also featured my journeys (click here to read the mentions).

I started blogging for three reasons: for sharing my adventure travel experiences, for fulfilling my travel-dreams  as it helps me make money and sustain my lifestyle and for helping others learn the art of blogging to sustain long-term adventure travels.

So Let’s Start With My Story In Detail, Perhaps!

Growing up in a confused and muddled neighbourhood, in New Delhi, I was never a big traveller. In fact, I was so incurious about travelling that despite living in Europe for a couple of years, I never tried exploring that beautiful continent. Then in 2014, I went on my first ever solo backpacking trip to the Himalayas, where I met a group of backpackers. They were on indefinite leave to travel the world, and a few weeks of aimless wandering with them opened me to a world of new possibilities. I explored my own country, and studied its rich culture, in a way I never did before. From that moment on, I was hooked on adventure travel. I came back home, continued my job in New Delhi for the next few months and saved all the money I earned — only to eventually quit the job, and hit the road forever. And that’s where I’ve been ever since.

This entire adventure began as a budget backpacker because I had to make my corporate savings last longer. But as my blog kept growing over time, I started getting sponsored trips. At the moment, this blog even helps me make money and sustain my travel needs. I run my blog to share my learning from the road and help others realize their travel dreams, as others have helped me in realizing mine.

Dev’s adventure continues… 20+ Countries, and 50+ Brand Partnerships later, the adventure still continues…

Why I Quit My Corporate Career To Travel?

I didn’t want to keep continue doing it until I turn 60, ready to be retired. I wanted something more than that. I wanted to see the world. Meet new people. Learn better ideas. Find out what’s wrong with this system of corporate culture, that it never made anyone happy – no matter what they achieved in their life. Simply put, I wanted to educate myself in a way that no school, no job ever did before. And I wanted to do that by breaking free.

Travelling is no less than a pursuit of happiness for me. Yet, throughout this time, I’ve often stumbled upon questions like “Why I quit my job to live my dream for adventure travel” or “How did I manage to make such a decision” or “What’s next”. And I think with all these questions, what people actually wanted to ask me was why did I not go for a two-week calculated holiday (or a couple of month’s sabbatical, if I am being pretentiously brazen about it) to quench my thirst of travel, as an averagely sane person would otherwise do.

The truth is, there is no fun in that. I have taken enough of those recreational holidays – as people often term them – in my life. When I was working I found myself escaping the boundaries of New Delhi almost every weekend, with a couple of friends, drinking a bunch of beers and returning with an unsatisfied soul. And I remember, the minute I entered the premises of my office, after completing that sweet, sally trip, it always felt as if it actually never happened.

So I realised that I wanted something more than that. Something bigger. Something permanent. I wanted a life of uninterrupted travelling, of permanent movement.

Discontentment Is Good

Discontentment is the very first step to a new beginning. My discontentment towards my job forced me to quit my job and start travelling. I had always loved India, but I never loved my life in India. I always loved my profession (of writing), but I never loved my job. It seemed I was just accepting things as they came because everyone around me told me “this is life and you got to learn to deal with it.”

But I think I wasn’t good at it. Though I tried to suppress my unsatisfied soul the traditional way, by changing jobs and running after money, it was just not enough. My audacious, fertile mind – discontented and grumbling – kept pushing me until I shifted focus.

Follow Dev’s adventure travels on: http://footloosedev.com 

Dev’s youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjdDJslD4xFdQCscVGRVGqQ

THIS POST IS COVERED UNDER ‘YOUR ADVENTURE’ INSPIRATIONAL STORY.