#30 - Rachel Carlson | Unschooling and the Power of Community

0:00:00 - Jesper Conrad
Welcome to Self-Directed. We are your hosts, cecilia and Jesper Conrad, and now it's time to welcome this week's guest. Today we're together with Rachel Carlson, who we met in France at a castle actually in Normandy, and Rachel to jump right into it. Then you have been arranging some world-school pop-ups for other people who travel. I would actually love to hear how that started in your life.

0:00:34 - Rachel Carlson
Fantastic. Yeah, so happy to be here. Guys, I've been looking forward to this. I've got three kids and we started full-time travels with them. I believe they were about 8, 11 and 13. And our first year was awesome, like we had so much to do, so much to see. And then, as the kids started getting into adolescence, they're like we're not completely happy with this. And I was like, oh, I'm completely happy, so what's up with you? And it turns out that they really needed more time to have autonomy. Of course, like, go off on their own, choose to stay home for a day.

But a big piece of the puzzle was peers, because their peers were we'd settled in a couple different states, so they had friends in Wisconsin, hawaii and Hilton Head Island, south Carolina, and we weren't always in those areas. So they were looking for peers that they could hang out with, who understood them. And we just decided you know what? We're not the only ones out there who are having this issue. There are a lot of families who say, oh, we were traveling with our kids and then we hit teen years and we had to stop. And it's like, oh, you know, we worked so hard to get to this point where we could be traveling and you know, to stop at this. You know, oh, it was just so frustrating. So I said tell you what we've got some friends world school friends who, in 2021, decided to buy a home base where they could Airbnb it when they weren't there and also being an area that was up and coming, and this is in Bentonville, arkansas, which is in the middle of the US. I never had any desire to go to Arkansas before, but it's a beautiful nature area, lots of bike trails, really fine museums, good food, good breweries. So he said you know what? We're coming for a month and then let's see if anyone else wants to come. So I just put feelers out there and said, all right, anybody in the US right now who wants to come? There's some campgrounds, there's, you know, plenty to do with the kids lakes, hikes, like I said, museums and we had eight families show up. I was like, oh, my goodness, this is exactly what we needed Within a day.

The kids said, oh, we have to do this again and the pop was for a week. So we just planned activities for that week so that nobody was going to be bored. There was plenty to do and we made the best friends and you would not believe, even with just the short week time period, and we were just able to jump into friendship because all of us were living outside of the box already, like we all stepped away from what does life normally look like for us and for our children, and to meet people at that level, it was like we could just dive into whatever conversation we wanted. We didn't need to chit-chat about oh, you know what's the weather like and what do you do for a living, but nobody cared. We're just like oh, you're doing cool stuff with your family, tell me more about that.

So that's where this all stemmed from. It was from my kids' need to meet other peers, but what I learned is I also need to be around like-minded people. So it just took off from there. We offered another one in August of that year and I was like, yeah, let's do this, let's get people connected. We all need each other.

0:03:46 - Jesper Conrad
Oh, yes, and that's actually why we're in the UK right now. It's not we're in the UK because the kids want to go here and we wanted to go here, but the people we are visiting, some of them we met one week four years ago and became super close friends with, and right now we are in our van, parked outside their home, where they are for half a year.

0:04:09 - Cecilie Conrad
Yes, to be specific, one of the families here we've known for like 10, 12 years?

0:04:14 - Jesper Conrad
Absolutely, because they don't know when they're going to come.

0:04:17 - Cecilie Conrad
Yes, yeah, happened to be from where we come from.

0:04:19 - Jesper Conrad
Oh yes, rachel, if we go even further back. Why did you start to travel with your family? What was the changing point? I know there isn't one specific and I sometimes hate the question myself. So what was the defining point that made you choose this lifestyle? I know there might not be one specific plan, but if you can take us along on your journey of how you started to live this life, Okay, I'll briefly put it together.

0:04:50 - Rachel Carlson
My husband and I met when I was 18 and we found out that we really enjoyed traveling. So we did not get married for five more years and didn't have children for another five years after. So we had 10 years of experience with each other where we would work positions where we could book our time into chunks and then not book ourselves and go travel. So we did lots and lots of traveling before we had children and then, of course, when we had kids, people said, oh well, you'll settle down, and I thought what? This is what we love, but when our kids also like to know what we love, and so, as we started adding children, we just continued traveling. However, we had a home base in Wisconsin in the US, so this is in the Northern area. Winters are cold, sometimes the springs are long and dreary, and we always found that we really needed to be somewhere sunny For at least part of the winter just to keep us going. Like you hit that seasonal affective disorder and the winters were long. So each winter we would try to get away for a while with the kids. We would pull them out of school. So I should say they were all in public schools for quite a while, but it was still difficult to leave the house. What if the furnace stops working? What if they can't plow our driveway while we're gone? It was just one of those we realized the house was holding us back. We would go longer, but we had the house. Or we would want more travel funds, but guess what? We need a new roof and a new well and new windows and new insulation. And though we loved the house it was fantastic, we had a great community we just knew it wasn't for us. So people talk about the American dream. Like you know, you become successful and you have enough money to buy a home and create your life. And we did all of that and it was wonderful. But something was nagging at us that this isn't what we want. This is maybe what somebody else wants, but this house is impeding our travels and it's impeding what we want to do like have more freedom, have more ability to be spontaneous. So we sold that house in 2014. And from there we lived in the US and still had the kids in public school. So two years in Hawaii and two years in South Carolina, and again we rebuilt our community, we sound our friends, we had a wonderful time kids having wonderful peer groups and plenty to do, and one day my husband's like you know, we're paying for fully furnished rental. We could be any rental anywhere, so we've already been working online since 2014. So that was like the aha moment. Oh, of course, we just need an internet connection and we can continue doing what we're doing.

The kids were in public school, so I was comfortable pulling them out. Let's just try a year, let's see how homeschooling goes. And in fact, we jumped right into unschooling. I'm a former educator and I had done lots of research on unschooling and, of course, peter Gray, who you guys have talked to, and a lot of influential people in that field. And I said, you know what it's a year. We can just try this for a year and see how it goes.

So the kids were just accustomed to traveling. We were always, you know, the oddball family like, oh, here, meet this new family in our community. I said, yeah, good to meet you. We're going to be in Namibia next week, so I'll catch up with you. They're like, what? You just do that. I'm like, yes, we do that. And so now we're not the oddballs anymore, like, oh, you've been there, cool, tell me about it. So, yeah, I think a lot of it was just we kind of did it in steps. We sold up our belongings. First we sold up the house. We didn't have a plan. We ended up moving to Hawaii, which was fantastic, and then, like I said, we just jumped right in and that was 2018. So we're into our sixth year now of full time travel.

0:08:35 - Cecilie Conrad
Isn't it fun how everyone started in 18?.

0:08:39 - Jesper Conrad
Many families did.

0:08:40 - Cecilie Conrad
So many families we talked to and so many of our friends. They did that transition to full time in 18, including ourselves. Same story. You know, you take the baby steps and okay, that's not very interesting.

0:08:57 - Jesper Conrad
I didn't hear it, I'm fine.

0:09:00 - Cecilie Conrad
Have we ever met someone who did it in 17?

0:09:02 - Jesper Conrad
No, not yet.

0:09:03 - Cecilie Conrad
Exactly or nothing yeah.

0:09:07 - Rachel Carlson
We were all feeling that.

0:09:08 - Jesper Conrad
People out there and having a little difficulties to turn back the time to start full time.

0:09:13 - Cecilie Conrad
Okay, you can do it.

0:09:14 - Jesper Conrad
It's never too late. No, the fun thing you mentioned about the household in your bag I remember in the start when we took on vacations we didn't live in a house that was Abbey and Beast style, you know where. Everything was fancy, we had small kids and we just and an old house.

And an old house and we just couldn't rent it out. It would take a lot of work in the start of our travels and I remember the dragging feeling of coming home again, because now the house had stood vacant for two or three weeks and the garden would be overgrown and stuff like that. So even the idea of leaving the house could be a oh no, I'm going to come back. That's a lot of work. So I remember how free it was to say goodbye to the house. But also we did do it.

Yeah, later, when we were more comfortable with it, not in the young, the early years. No, no, no.

0:10:11 - Cecilie Conrad
But I mean, we did do the transition, saying someone would live here.

0:10:14 - Jesper Conrad
Yeah, people would.

0:10:16 - Cecilie Conrad
But took some pictures and it worked.

0:10:18 - Jesper Conrad
We did lots of trips.

0:10:19 - Cecilie Conrad
So we did this we put it on Airbnb and if someone would book it, we would go on vacation.

0:10:24 - Jesper Conrad
Yeah.

0:10:25 - Cecilie Conrad
Because we didn't have the funds to do anything besides Monday to Friday, except if something extra would come in at that point, because I didn't work and we had all this many kids.

0:10:40 - Jesper Conrad
I was moving ahead to a point which I will go to, which is and I also remember the fear I had before pulling the plug. I was afraid if I couldn't make it. I know it's on your story. I can hear that your husband already had worked online for four years, so he was used to making money online. I wasn't, so I was terrified if I could support the family. And then the whole idea of selling the house and could we ever find a house so good and stuff like that. Was there any fear in your life in that period and how did you work with it if there were?

0:11:21 - Rachel Carlson
So, before we sold the house, lance was working at a software company and it was a really great position. He had great vacation and sentence, but again wasn't happy and wanted to be doing his own thing. So, yeah, I mean, it came in stages. There were definitely times when we had to face those fears. So, in 2014, we both sold the house and gave up the good job, which, also in the US, means you're giving up your healthcare.

So it wasn't necessarily a fear on my side, but there were a lot of people in our family and friend circle that were very concerned for us what's going to happen if this goes wrong, or what is. They had all these questions what are you going to do for healthcare? What about the kids? Schools in Hawaii aren't very good. So they had all these questions, of course, which come from a place of love, but it also comes from a place of fear, which weren't necessarily my fears, but it's hard to hear other people's input and then not take that into consideration.

So, yeah, I mean we just had to take the leap of faith at that point and both of us started working online and that all went well, but I think the turning point for us was well, if we try this and it doesn't work, well, we can always come back.

There will be another house for sale, there will be another place in this community for us. We were surrounded by really, really lovely neighbors and other families who love us and we love them and we could always go back. So once I realized this is not 100% all in or all out, we can just go try it, and if it doesn't work, so what? It doesn't mean we were unsuccessful or a failure. It just wasn't the right thing for our family at the time. So when I realized, don't put so much importance on it, we can just go back and that was the same thing when we left Hawaii and it was the same thing when we left Hilton Head Like, if it doesn't work, well, we just switch directions and we're not tied to this forever and ever. But I think it's how society makes us feel when we make big choices that it's do or die, and we don't want you to die. So be really, really careful about what you do.

0:13:28 - Cecilie Conrad
Yeah, and there's this illusion that you need the stability because that is what will give you the success in the end. So you need the kids to go through all the years in the school and you need to have one house and pay the mortgage and then in the end you'll be able to retire. And you need all this and if you do it and if you don't stop and you like keep your streak, then you're in the good, then you're okay, then you're safe. But it's just an illusion. Lots of things could happen, even along that path that none of us are living.

I think when we sold the house, we did, we did so. We what is that called? Rented it out the first year. So in 18, when we also joined the club of full time, we said okay, let's do this for a year. So we rent out the house and after a year we can come back. We can come back to the same house. Even your job was open to take you back after a year, and that was the same feeling. You know, we can just go back if we don't like it, and there was no way we were going back after a year and right now I'm so relieved we sold that house.

I really don't need to. I even have trouble maintaining this little van. I just don't really feel like doing the maintenance things. Imagine having a house like the room and what's that thing called when the rain goes? And it's always a little broken and you have to remove the leaves. And man, I don't want to do that, I really don't. But can I ask you, rachel, do you sometimes miss having a house?

0:15:06 - Rachel Carlson
So I thought I did and we just did a house sit in June of this year for one month for some retired friends of ours. They went to Europe and they asked if we would watch their house for them and we said, oh, yeah, yeah, we would love to do that. Great, I mean, summertime rent is high. Let's give us a whole month to just settle, be part of that community, see what that feels like. And the things that I miss about being in a stable community is having pets, having a garden and having access to like team sports, drama clubs, musical groups for the kids.

But one of the big things was having a garden. Well, these guys had a garden and it was beautiful. All the different flowers, everything was coming into bloom at different times. You know, this one would die back and that one would pop in, and then they also had vegetables and herbs. And I was so excited like, oh, we'll take care of the garden for them. And they're in a drought.

So we had to timer watering so that the city had an ordinance you could only water on even or odd days, depending on your street address. You could only water at certain times. On those days I was chasing rabbits out of the garden. We were reading all the time I was like I don't think I miss gardenings, you know, it's a maintenance of it. Now, I love having the herbs, I love having the vegetables fresh vegetables but I can do that at a farmer's market, I can do that at a like your own garden. So that was kind of an eye-opener for me.

And then at the same time there was also road construction on their street. They're getting curb and gutter put in, like oh yeah, sometimes you don't have choices and you know what the noise level is at your house and whoever's in the neighborhood has to pay for that curb and gutter. And it just made me realize, oh, and their water heater went out while we were there. So they got a new water heater while they were away. And like I don't miss this at all, it's big, you have to clean it. Like I just I like tinier places, I mean not cramped. We typically rent maybe a one bedroom place, for we have four of us now, so the oldest is out of our household and when you arrive at an Airbnb it's already clean for you. We straighten up before we leave, but we paid a cleaning fee, so we're not mopping and scrubbing or anything of that sort. It looks nice. You know we wipe out the fridge, but like having a whole house and doing all the so funny, I'm so spoiled, I guess, like I had to clean it.

0:17:29 - Cecilie Conrad
It feels exactly the same, it's exactly the same, exactly the same.

0:17:32 - Rachel Carlson
It's like you just scrubbed the toilet. Yeah, you left, so I don't. I don't miss having. Do we have after us?

0:17:40 - Cecilie Conrad
No, I just, but I think you're still doing this one month more or less, in each place you go.

0:17:49 - Rachel Carlson
So we are adapting it. So I really like the one month strategy because it gives us a little more time to get to know the actual location around us. It gives us a monthly discount on the rental it ends up. I think probably three weeks would be our sweet spot, with, you know, getting to a new area, getting really excited. What else is here, what can we go see, where are we going to do our grocery shopping, what are the markets like? But with my two younger kids they still feel like three or four weeks is too long. They want to be on the move all the time. Three nights, four nights, seven nights.

I'm like, oh my God, you guys we do it now and then to keep you know, of course, like they have a say in what we're doing as well, we're all cooperating with each other, and so when we have periods of travel like that, though, it also means that I want to be out of the house more and I want to be going and doing and seeing, because we only have three nights here, so we got to go squeeze it all in, and then we have four nights in the next place. We've got to squeeze it in, and then all those memories blur together for me, like I look back at some of our pictures and I know we were in Turkey, but I don't know if that was Quesidasi or Koss or you know where those ruins were. They were super cool and we loved it. But I feel like traveling a little more slowly is more of my speed, and I know people stay longer than one month too.

But I think, at this point, really like having change of scenery, change of activities, and it still gives us new things to experience, like now we need to figure out this bus system. Now we need to figure out, like I said, the groceries. I'm very particular about where I shop and I like to know, oh, good produce over here and good meats over there. So, yeah, it just. I like having new inputs and, like I said the kids. They would do two or three places a week if they could. So we're kind of compromising with all of our desires.

0:19:51 - Cecilie Conrad
Maybe they wouldn't if you were doing it, because we're like in the opposite of that at the moment. We've been basically on a road trip since February 1st and our longest day was our two consecutive weeks at the castle where we met you. Oh yes, beside that, we've been just moving around, moving around. Did we do two weeks, plus one day maybe in Sweden, but it's that's like our personal period for the past six months and we're really tiring out Like wow, would I imagine being one place for a month so that I didn't have that scarcity of feeling.

I gotta do it today, because next week I'm not here, tomorrow I'm not here, and I have to see that cathedral and you have to try that water park, we have to go to a real English pop because we're moving. So the sweet spot, I usually say, for us the sweet spot is the fact that we can change it. If we feel like staying in a place for a month, we can do that, and if we feel like moving fast, we can do that Right now. I think you said before that you thought you missed having a house because you thought you missed having a garden, and then you had a garden and you realized, oh no. So I sometimes think that I miss having a house, but I'm arriving at a point where I realized what I miss is having a little more time in a place.

0:21:14 - Jesper Conrad
Yeah.

0:21:15 - Cecilie Conrad
I think that's what I miss, because we simply move too fast and we've been doing it for the five years. Except for some of the lock downs, we've really been moving fast.

0:21:27 - Jesper Conrad
A wonderful thing about becoming a traveler is also revisiting your own city or neighborhood. For me, when we have returned to Copenhagen in the last five years I have actually seen more of Copenhagen and more beautiful spots in Copenhagen than I did while living there for 20 years. And right now we're in the UK and we just came from some friends and we talked to him about, oh, we will go see Stonehenge. And he's like, well, I've never seen it. I know himself she is. It's like, come on. And it's the, you know the classical feeling of I have all the time in the world, I can see Stonehenge next week. And I was just like, but it's Stonehenge, Come on.

0:22:12 - Cecilie Conrad
But I think I'm on Rachel's team with the one month thing that you would still get. You would still go see Stonehenge because you are leaving in a month, but you would shop in the same supermarket twice.

0:22:25 - Jesper Conrad
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean, that's the thing the time that goes into.

0:22:30 - Cecilie Conrad
what about the buses? And what gas station can I fit my big van into? Where can we actually park and sleep legally? And where can I get some gluten-free bread and all these things? They just absorb so much time. And it's fun. It's part of the fun to come to a new place and figure everything out, but in a way to do it twice a week. It's all we're doing it, I think.

0:22:53 - Jesper Conrad
But, rachel, for the people listening to two families, full-time traveling is in 2018. It can maybe be a little overwhelming and if you sit there with the dream of traveling, you can maybe listen to us and say how can I ever reach that point? That is my dream. So and I am pretty sure you have been asked this by many, many people you have met. So what is your advice to people who wants to go travel? What would you advise people who dream of this?

0:23:30 - Rachel Carlson
I think a lot of people are waiting for the right moment. You know, oh, if I just had this wrapped up first or if I just had that taken care of. So I felt more comfortable. But and I was talking to a friend about this yesterday like we don't know how much time we have, we do know that our children are only children for so many years. They will be adults at some point. We cannot stop that, nor would we want to. But you only have so many years with your kids. So my advice is make it happen sooner rather than pushing it off. And it's scary, it takes a leap of faith. It doesn't just happen. I mean, some people might choose spontaneously, but there's a lot of organizing in the background, there's a lot of fears that need to be faced. But I just, I don't know.

We kind of did hours in pieces, like we got rid of the house and the job at the same time and then we started the homeschooling and full-time traveling four years after that. So we did hours in bits and pieces. We didn't even know that was the direction we were heading. But I think you know just there is a little bit of urgency that you know. Sometimes you need that little push to just start and you can start small. You don't have to start full-time, you know whatever you can squeeze in, even if it's just going to a local campground, like going and seeing things like Stonehenge in your backyard, that you haven't taken the time to do yet, because these are experiences for your family to have together, so maybe a little bit of baby stepping of them. I think also because we need so many families through the World School Pop-Up Pub that meeting other people who are doing this and realizing, oh, they did that completely different than this family and they're also completely different from the other two families I talked to and honestly, we've met oh my gosh, I would say close to 200 World School families at this point and none of them are doing this the same way. Like you got to figure out your own group. You have to figure out what feels comfortable for your family, what works for your kids, and don't have a picture in your head like these are the six steps that I need to complete to make my World School journey happen, because your steps are going to be different than someone else's.

We have people with who are retired traveling. We have people with two full-time working parents traveling. We have people who are on disability and they're traveling, or they're a single parent receiving governmental funds and they're still traveling. So I mean, all of these lifestyles are so different individually from one to the next, but all the goals are the same that there was something in the traditional lifestyle that was built for us that didn't feel right. There's more for me out there and I want to jump in and explore that. So, even though you can look at all these different families and pick up bits and pieces of information from each one of them which is great because it gives you more tools in your belt and more strategies that you can use it still comes down to individually figuring out what works for each family, because I think there's not a cut and dried. This is the perfect way to do it.

0:26:46 - Cecilie Conrad
Can I add something to that? I think you're completely right, just go find your own way. But also, obviously, we also meet a lot of people who say oh, I dream of doing what you do, but this, that and the other, and I think maybe they don't. I mean, you can look at something and see it looks interesting and maybe fun, and realize but I wouldn't do it, which is perfectly okay. You can be inspired by it and maybe take your vacation days, do something different with them, or just take three months out and do a road trip and come back. It doesn't have to all be. I think a lot of people who say they dream about this life actually maybe they don't, because if they did, they might have worked a little bit harder for it and faced those fears and let go of that house.

0:27:40 - Jesper Conrad
And we actually have friends who visit. We visit every time we leave Denmark. Wonderful, wonderful friends, we love them a lot and they are like right on the border to Germany. So when we drive out of Denmark we stop by them and they are the husband he always says. He says when around when we leave, he says I love having you as friends. It's so wonderful to have someone in our life who do stuff totally different, and I can see that.

0:28:08 - Cecilie Conrad
I want to keep my house. I want to have a job. I will stay here, For him.

0:28:14 - Jesper Conrad
He likes to serve a little life. That's more for him. But in the back of people's mind it's pondering oh, travel full time. And it's like a dream or an escapism dream you can have, of saying I want to live totally different. But he actually doesn't. And, as Cecilia says, I think some people maybe have it as a dream, but when they hear all the ups and downs then because it's not all roses, you know it's also some times oh, we've fought with your drive three hours but it actually took seven, and we don't have an Airbnb tonight where we're going to sleep and everybody is tired and drained. And it can be really difficult to be diplomatic when you're drained and speak nice to each other. That's part of it as well.

0:29:07 - Cecilie Conrad
Or you can have a plane ticket or three lined up and a child with a broken bone.

0:29:13 - Rachel Carlson
Yes, that happens.

0:29:17 - Cecilie Conrad
It's not easy necessarily, but I think it's important. If we're in the advice business right now, an important piece of advice maybe for everyone, but if you want to do this leap of faith, one thing is the fear working with how to handle fear and worry but another thing is regrets. Those who I've met who give up, they also have this filter of regret going on all the time. You know I'd rather be in my house than this very late night where I can't find parking or, oh, I should never have done this. I should have done that instead. So I think all of the homeschoolers that I've met, they have this just the strategy of never regretting anything and never just trusting the process, not never trusting, but they do trust the process. They trust.

Okay, I'm here for some reason, I will learn something. This is part of the adventure, even when it's a challenge, like an emergency, physically, like medical one, or we've had so many. Yeah, you have stories and we have stories about when it's not fun and you don't do in that situation, to regret and say, oh, I wish I'd stayed home in my comfortable house, because once you start doing that, it's just well, just unravel the whole. I don't know balance yeah.

Yeah, well, I think John would advise.

0:30:48 - Rachel Carlson
Let me add to the regrets thing, though, because I think for us also, we had the opportunity to jump into full-time travel and I would have regretted not taking that chance when it was given to us. You know what I mean. Yeah, that's maybe the side of regret that gave me the push. We can do this. We're stable enough, our kids are willing, everything is lining up for us, and actually a lot of our travels, the way we roll, is that whatever lines up easiest, that's the direction we take. And yeah, we've been shut down before, and then we're like oh well, there'll be another path.

And the more and more we've practiced this, it is trusting the process and it's also learning that something is going to open for us and it will be okay. Whatever it is, it's going to be fine. And I've really learned to trust my gut instincts more and more as we've been on this long. Like I'm way more comfortable now than I was five years ago. You know, I was still in that what if? Phase and is this going to work? And now we hit a roadblock and well, we find our way around it and guess what? We found our way around another one and we did it again and again, so like we're also building and on that way around it.

0:32:06 - Cecilie Conrad
There's something fun, right Don't?

0:32:08 - Rachel Carlson
you have that experience.

0:32:09 - Cecilie Conrad
I thought it was a roadblock and now I have to do a detour but wow, there's a console or a friend or a restaurant or a view or whatever, something like oh I would never have been here, I did not burn for that roadblock and I'm just so happy to be here. I think that happens a lot to us. When we think that something fails, Then it's just we're just being pushed towards something really great.

0:32:38 - Jesper Conrad
Yeah, rachel, we spent a month together on this casting in Normandy where you had a range both a pop-up and some and a co-living experience, and I'm very grateful you did that. It was fun, it was super fun and it was so wonderful to see our teams hanging out and talking, talking, talking for a month, and what it also gives is friends in all places of the world and it can almost feel stressful because there's so many people I would like to go visit now and I'm just thinking about you sitting.

0:33:17 - Rachel Carlson
I'm really new.

0:33:20 - Jesper Conrad
But you have been arranging these pop-ups. I'm just thinking, oh man, there must be so many people you have a want to see but can't fit in. So how are you choosing your travels? You said that you are choosing the most easy path. Can you put some more words to it?

0:33:40 - Rachel Carlson
Sure. So the way we choose our travels, rewind a few years. Lance and I would make the decisions. We were coming from Wisconsin. We loved beaches and sunshine and seawater and all of that, so a lot of our travels were in the Caribbean or in Hawaii or North Island of New Zealand and as the kids have aged they weren't worried, but of course. So we've let them.

My daughter was big about visiting Turkey and I mean I was happy to go any for the most part and before I know it she's written like a 10-page document of all the places she wanted to visit in Turkey. And we looked at this like that would take about 300 days. We can get 90, but 300 is going to take some coordination. Plus we have a castle to go visit. So now with the kids they have a pretty big push on what they want to get out of the travels too. And the big draw with Turkey was she wanted to see ruins because she had heard someone else talk about them and I mean the amount of ruins there was just incredible. So I mean it was. I talked before about like boosting our confidence, like here we followed her plan. I mean of course we had to scale it down and pick and choose what was going to make the cut, but we all went and we all enjoyed the things that she picked out for us to do. And then, as far as our upcoming travels this year, so next month we fly to Tokyo.

My kids, my younger kids, love big cities, so whenever we can put a big city into the plan, they are 100% in. I don't love big cities. It's okay for me to visit. But what I've learned is, as we've added more larger cities. So, like I guess in the last year and a half we've been in Mexico City and Denver, new York City, washington DC, london, istanbul, we were in Florence, not too big Paris, like we've just been doing big city after big city with lots of neat stuff in between. But what I've learned is that I actually like big cities a bit up on Bustle all the time, and that's the like. The most beautiful thing is, I'm learning alongside them.

So we'll be going to Tokyo and then over to Seoul, south Korea, and we'll be staying in Southeast Asia then for at least the end of the year, probably half of next year as well. We have good friends in Kuala Lumpur and this friend well, this is Si Ming and who also has many world school friends in collaboration with us. So now we're like, oh well, we could do pop up in Kuala Lumpur and bring everyone to us. So now we know, like, which families we're going to see again and they might follow us a little bit, and then we split off and then we remeet up and it's just, it's made our travels like, it's enriched our travel so much because now we never feel lonely Like we always know. Oh well, we're not saying goodbye, we're going to see you in a couple months or, you know, I think in about a year we'll swing through this year again and see you again.

So as we're I mean your question was following the path of least resistance. There's definitely a lot less resistance when we have friends on the horizon, but everyone, those few people that we love and adore it just makes everything more exciting. We always have something to look forward to. With the kids we've spent some time on the Asian side of Turkey. They've been to the Asian continent, but we really want to experience more of the culture there. I think we'll have about a year in that area, maybe longer. We'll just see how it goes. We can't plan it out forever, but this will get us over there and then, once we're there, it's fairly easy to just move from country to country and, yeah, super looking forward to it, so it's fresh for all of us.

0:37:47 - Jesper Conrad
Yeah, the biggest problem with children, in my mind, is that they grow older and move away from the family. That's the problem. I do not like that fact. And when we started our travels, our grown-up daughter was living together with her boyfriend and her choice was kind of like so you want to live together with your boyfriend, whom you're still together with five years after, or do you want to travel with mom and dad? So we've luckily found a way where they come and visit us when we know we are a place longer, and this winter we are actually traveling to meet them, as they are going on an eight or nine months world travel and we will meet up with them in Mexico. And I just Maybe Mexico.

Maybe Mexico? Two people decided.

0:38:36 - Cecilie Conrad
Right for the pencil until you buy the plane ticket.

0:38:39 - Jesper Conrad
But I know your oldest has also transitioned into moving away from home, and how are you handling that? I found it terrible.

0:38:48 - Cecilie Conrad
I cried for a month.

0:38:50 - Rachel Carlson
Oh my gosh, yeah, I thought I was 100% prepared. So this kid at age probably 14. Oh, and his name's Jasper. So we got Jasper and Jesper, which tickles me. So about age 14, he wanted to be emancipated. He was done with the family, he knew it all. He was ready to be on his own and, honestly, the kid could figure things out. If he had to be on his own he would have been 100% fine. So fast forward a little bit. Of course, having the pop-up screws around was fantastic and everyone was making friends.

But he's very driven and decided he wanted a high school diploma and wanted to settle. And he thought I want to settle for three to five years. So we got him set up with my Indian laws in Wisconsin and enrolled in high school. So he just graduated last month. He didn't want the diploma that I was writing as a home schooler, he wanted an actual diploma from high school, and so he did that this past year and he excelled. He didn't love it. His original idea of staying three to five years was out the window. After a couple months he's like, oh no, this is not what I want. It's like me showing up in that house. Oh, maybe I missed a garden. Oh no, that's not what I'm missing, yeah. So I mean, it gives us the chance to sit with some of these desires Like, oh, I miss a garden. Well, what is it I'm actually missing? It's not the gardening, it's just the fresh produce and it's time outdoors.

So for him now he's looking at traveling. He's already done a couple of road trips in the US and then he will be going international we don't quite know when. So he's also added a girlfriend, which is lovely, and I mean I don't want to say it complicates things, but it gives you more things to consider as you're making your plans. So he's looking at working in New Zealand because you can get the young person's work visa up to age 26. And he's also looking at traveling.

He loves London and he thought, oh, that's a good stepping stone, and then I'll get into Europe and then I'll just go to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. And I was like, oh, I didn't even know you could well to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. I'm like, but if anyone's going to figure it out, you will. And since he said that, we have been looking at it like, oh my gosh, these places are gorgeous and you know, I always like finding that you know, something that hasn't been uncovered yet, and so now we're considering, when we leave Southeast Asia, maybe we'll go through Sri Lanka and then India, and then up into those areas too, and who knows, we might meet up with him again. But all right, so rewind. He moved out at 17 and a half, so I kind of felt that was a bit of a bit of a triumph on my part that I was able to keep him in our house that long, because he wanted to go on.

0:41:38 - Cecilie Conrad
That was not a house.

0:41:39 - Rachel Carlson
Yeah, yeah, household, yeah, what do you even say?

But I wanted, he really wanted to transition from here than that. So he transitioned out at 17 and a half and we knew it was happening. We knew for a long time and I thought, ok, I'm very well prepared for this, but, holy, you're not. It doesn't. You know it's coming, but you just you can't prepare. And and of course, it just means that we have a very strong bond and the more you love, the more it hurts and it's going to hurt.

But it's also super exciting to watch these humans step into adulthood and make some of their first adult decisions and and really advocate for themselves.

So of course, I wouldn't want to hold him back at all and I love the stage he's at, what I love it if he lived with us again and traveled with us. Oh, my gosh, sign me up right away, like I will figure why. You've just come with us, I'll feed you, I'll clothe you, but that's not necessarily in his plans. He said, well, maybe I'll stop in Asia and find you guys over there. And well, sure, you know there's always an open door, and he knows that and we know that. But, like you said, it is hard to give them up, which is exactly what we're preparing to do and and it. Yeah, I don't know how you can just be at peace I mean, it was a peaceful transition, of course but to just not feel the hurt and it's it's closing of a chapter in our lives Like we are never going to be living full time together again, and though we'll see each other and visit each other, I actually never smile, never.

0:43:11 - Cecilie Conrad
I mean, it can happen.

0:43:13 - Jesper Conrad
Yeah, and, and one thing I found that is really wonderful One. One thing I found that is really wonderful about traveling with having our grown up is, if I look back at the relationship I have with my parents and I mean, we lived half an hour maximum in a car away from them when I lived in Denmark and what in the two when you were young, when I was young, yeah, what ended up happening was I visited them. So it was only we didn't live together, it was just a visit and and. And it's totally different way of spending time together. Now when our grown up daughter come and stay with us because we live together for a week, a long weekend, maybe two, and it's just deeper in another way that you have these talks over the breakfast and then later you continue it over dinner. And it's the same thing I like about the co-living and the pop up situation, where you're together for longer time, is that you have this. It doesn't need to be rushed to be together and bond. It can happen slowly during the day.

0:44:28 - Cecilie Conrad
I think also, when you make these visits, especially with the young people, they come back for like an afternoon, the mind is not totally there, and you know there could come a text message oh we're going to this part with beer, are you coming? And they'll be like, yeah, I'm coming. It's it's more casual, it's less important and it's less committed, whereas the way we spend time together now with our daughter and son-in-law is we're here together now and we have this time and the plane ticket is in 10 days. So everyone agreed that now we make it work for 10 days or three days or whatever days, and that makes it more intense and and I really prefer that so we prioritize now. It's about this. Yes, yeah, I like that, but I would like a little more of it, though.

0:45:23 - Jesper Conrad
Yeah, of course.

0:45:25 - Cecilie Conrad
Completely happy with with going too long without seeing her. I don't like that.

0:45:30 - Jesper Conrad
Oh no, and did they grandchildren come? Oh shit, Life will change. Life will change.

0:45:36 - Cecilie Conrad
We will keep traveling. We will keep traveling. We don't know.

0:45:39 - Jesper Conrad
We need. We need to spend time with them.

0:45:41 - Cecilie Conrad
We don't know how, but you know what. We might end up having grandchildren on like four different continents.

0:45:47 - Jesper Conrad
Yeah.

0:45:48 - Cecilie Conrad
Yeah.

0:45:48 - Jesper Conrad
Same, then it would be a good way to travel.

0:45:51 - Cecilie Conrad
That could easily happen, couldn't it? So let's just take what's now and make the best of that. And when grandchildren are at it. And then the situation our daughter is in her mid twenties. I mean, it would not be 10 years from now.

0:46:06 - Jesper Conrad
Oh no.

0:46:06 - Cecilie Conrad
No.

0:46:10 - Jesper Conrad
So this is on the horizon? Yeah, I'm trying. I'm trying not to pressure her too much.

0:46:14 - Cecilie Conrad
No, I don't think.

0:46:15 - Jesper Conrad
No, no, no, no, I know I would. I would love to talk a little about the transition you experienced with your kids, moving them from from normal school to home school, to unschool to travel to travel to school. Can. Can you what changed? Have they changed and what have you seen, as a parent, happen?

0:46:39 - Rachel Carlson
Okay, so my university degree is in secondary education, for mathematics, so I've been in school. You know, I went to school, went to school more, started teaching in the schools. I'm a huge advocate of public education, especially for inner cities there's there's a lot that can be done via schooling. However, I'd also been interested in unschooling, like I mentioned. So when our kids were in public schools, I think I said that Hawaii public schools are not necessarily academically challenging and you get that where there's better school districts in certain areas and you know school districts that aren't as good, and others and people were concerned about our kids. Well, oh, you know, schools aren't so good there. Are you going to put the kids in a private school? I'm like no, no, I really I believe in public schools and what we want for our kids is to be part of the community. We want them to meet the neighbors, we want them to, you know, be part of the Lulele club and you know all of the school fun things. And it was, I think, at that point where I realized I don't necessarily need to rely on the school to teach my children, that I'm also able to educate my kids and they can just go to this school here and have a fun experience, and if they're missing out on something, we'll just adapt that at home and make sure that they're exposed and learn what they need to learn for adulthood.

And and when we decided to move to full time travel, it was kind of a no brainer, like our oldest was an eighth grader. So in the US, middle schools typically six to eighth grade and then high school is ninth to twelfth grade. So usually once kids get into high school then you need to keep better records of what they're learning and then you put it on a transcript which then turns into a diploma. But he was an eighth grade when we started and I said you know what? I really don't have any record keeping I need to do and I should just say as an aside, we are residents of Wisconsin, which the homeschool laws vary state to state.

So some states you have to record attendance and have a portfolio and state testing and those things. Wisconsin does not have that. So for us we didn't really need to create all these things that we had to turn and improve what we were learning. So I said let's just try unschooling for a year and what we realized is that of course you're learning every day. Ok, we just had learned nothing they like. Yeah, good luck with that. And as we're traveling, you know, we're maybe debated.

Yeah, I did it, I don't know. Ok, rebona, sorry. Right, you jump into everyday life when you're exploring and you're going to state parks and you're, you know, talking to people on the beach. And now you go and visit Uncle John and you hear his perspective on things, and then you go to the National Park and like there's just no way to hold back learning. All the stuff around us was changing all the time, like, oh, what's this, what's that, how is it connected? And it was just really beautiful to watch as an adult, because the kids engaged as much as they wanted to and nothing was forced or pressured.

I wasn't giving them. You know, she's your scavenger hunt, you have to finish this, or why don't? You know, let's talk about this and make sure you learn something. You know, typically I say to them like oh, here's some signs, why don't you guys go read that and check it out? And I'll tell them go learn that. And. But I don't have any quizzing, or you know there's no pressure to it. You know we're here, this is interesting and new for us. Let's just see what it has to say. No-transcript.

What I've noticed with them is now they're starting to be drawn to things that interest them. So, like with my daughter and the ruins in Turkey, like, okay, well, now we realize, oh, these ruins weren't built. They were built by the Romans and these ruins here came in from this other group and there's so much to learn there. And when we were in Normandy, we were right by the beaches the D-Day beaches and I'm not a history buff, but I tell you I was super intrigued learning about all of the D-Day history there, because we were right there and looking at it and this little bridge down the road. That was super important for the whole operation to be successful. And once you're there and learning on site, it's just so much more meaningful. And to see that transition for my kids was really amazing.

And then, with the oldest, he wanted to go to high school, so of course, there were some certain classes that he needed to complete and we just got workbooks off of Amazon and he took classes online through Arizona State University and Clown Academy and we got him caught up with all the academics he needed, which, again, if you're interested in learning it and getting it done, it happens really quickly. You don't need to sit in a classroom for 180 days to get it done. You know some of his math coursework he could get through in one month. You know, just bam, bam, bam, bam bam.

So yeah, I mean it's just it's trusting the process. Again, they trust that they're learning, trust that they're making connections and sure, sometimes you might want to help make a connection with them and then hear their input and watch the wheels turn, but for the most part it's a hands-off thing Like this is so cool that we're here and they see me excited about learning things too, and I think it's just a gift to give them that freedom to learn as they want to or take a day off as they need to. You know I give my kids days off all the time, like I need a day off now, and then why wouldn't they? Does that answer your question? Absolutely.

0:52:20 - Jesper Conrad
And then one of the processes for me that had been very interesting as a parent is the whole de-schooling that happens when you start to see that stuff can happen in a different way than the normal believe in. Well, how has that been for you?

0:52:44 - Rachel Carlson
Well, let me first touch on de-schooling, and I know for a lot of people that's like an actual process that they work through. I don't think I ever did, which is interesting because I'm trained as an educator. But I think we just jumped into unschooling and I was so willing to just be observant and we put a timeline on it. I said, ok, this is a year, let's try this a year. It was travel for a year, homeschool for a year, unschool for that year and see how it goes. And so I didn't really like continually question like, oh, are they learning, or shouldn't we be doing more, or are they reading enough? I guess part of it is they were reading on their own and you know I didn't feel like I needed to. You know, give them nudges and directions. I wanted them to go. So I think I kind of skipped the de-schooling stage, which is interesting because I was trained as an educator. So, yeah, I've had a lot of my former beliefs blown out of the water all over the place, like even owning a home, like oh, it's such a good investment in your building equity and you get a tax break on the interest you're paying, like why wouldn't you want a home? And I think a lot of people don't see the other side of the story. Like well, it holds you back. It means a lot of your extra expenses are going into the house instead of other things you want. You may feel pressured to furnish the whole house and then if you want nice looking furniture or you know fancy light fixtures and you know, and a lot of people don't see those things and I didn't see them necessarily until I lived it. So I would say, over the course of my life I've changed a lot of my opinions just from having new experiences. And oftentimes it's no fun, because sometimes we identify with what our thoughts are. And yeah, like you said, don't say never. Yeah, I've said a lot of things that I would never do this. And guess what? Now, 10 years later, after I have more life experience, this is what feels right. So I mean, and the thing I really love about it is that I'm open to changing my mind, and I know that sitting in those places where I make those big opinion, you know like flipping the perspective, it's uncomfortable, it's no fun to be looking back at what I thought and like, oh, I was so sheltered or I really didn't know what I was talking about, because now I know more. But you only can do the best with what you have and what you know at the time. And so not that I like sitting in those spaces, but I do welcome it when it happens because I know that. I know that it's pushed me to live more authentically. For me, like, what do I want out of my? What can I design for the kid and my husband and my grown adult? Like, how can I make what we're doing feel even better and, you know, create a future that they can step into without the worries and without the doubts that a lot of us do?

You know, when Jasper said he wanted to go to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, I mean, there's other people in the community who would say I've never had a passport, I've only been out of the state two times in my life and even the thought of crossing the border into Canada and Mexico might be really intimidating to them. And here's a kid. He's like, yeah, I'm just going to go to this place. I've never been before. I don't know anyone else who's been there. There's been plenty of people there, just not personally Do we have connections there. And he's just so comfortable with it Like, wow, if when I was 18, like my choices were, am I going to go to this university or that university?

Like I just didn't realize there was more out there for me. I was just following the path of kind of how I was told to live my life and I was doing really great at it. Like, okay, now I do school, now I do more school. And I just love that these guys are not like narrow minded with what's available to them, that it could be anything, and I know that they have the skills to go out there and do that. And to me that's like the number one best benefit of what we've done over these last five years, that my kids have that confidence in themselves.

They've seen us sort out problem after problem. I mean not that the whole world schooling is problematic, but we were continually on the road during COVID. That was a problem. We had flights canceled, we had, I mean, trip after trip after trip. We had to stop, regroup, find the next way forward, and we stayed on the road that whole time and found rentals and still kept exploring. So the kids have seen us through Tufts, perenns and they're like, oh well, if you persevere, something will line up and eventually something super easy lines up. You're like, oh, this is what we were waiting for. That's why there were so many closed doors. Okay, that makes sense now. And so having my kids walking to adulthood with that sort of attitude is really inspiring to me, and I certainly hope that they're inspiring to others too, because I think a lot of us have just taken life's goals at face value and, you know, we can make our own goals, we can design our own lives.

0:57:57 - Cecilie Conrad
And, yeah, I just can come up with new ones. Yes, yes, I think that's another game changer. We don't have to be world schoolers for the rest of our lives, just as we didn't have to stay in our houses and keep our jobs. And you know, we will change. I'm supposed we will change direction many times, maybe not core values, but like life strategy. This is what we're doing now. That will probably change a few times, and I like to. Also, we have a son who's 17 and a half and lots of people talk to him about adulthood, because apparently, when you're 18, you're adult. And he's like what are we going to do with that? And first of all, we told him you know, this is an arbitrary number. You just do life and you know, in whatever way you want, whenever you're ready for whatever step, then you take it and we'll be behind you. But we also tell him this imaginary idea that at this point in life, you have to choose what you want to do for the rest of your life.

It's just a weird idea. Choose what feels right, choose a path of not too much resistance, choose what makes your stomach tickle a little bit, choose what seems interesting, go where there's energy, power, fun, and that's the right thing and will always be the right thing to do. And I like giving them that perspective instead of trying to help them choose become a dentist or firefighter or whatever arbitrary life goal thing. We talk a lot about unschooling on the podcast, but with you obviously we talk a lot about traveling because but you said I give my children's children days off, which was for me a little puzzling as an unschool mom, because I don't demand, so we don't have days on and off, because my, from my perspective on schooling is my kids can do whatever they want, always within safety and health restrictions, but you know what you get the picture. So I wanted to ask what does that mean?

1:00:21 - Rachel Carlson
So for us, I kind of think of an on day as days where we're out and about in the community, going to museums, maybe spending an afternoon at the beach or coffee shop or whatever is interesting in the area, and occasionally and I think we're on the same wavelength that when I do.

1:00:38 - Cecilie Conrad
I think we two, you and I, are in agreement, but I think maybe some listeners could get this wrong and I wanted you to maybe elaborate a little bit. You give them a day off, could sound like you get to decide yes.

1:00:51 - Rachel Carlson
Right, right, so we'll come up with a plan for the day. So let's say we're going to go to a museum in the morning and then stop at the farmers market in the afternoon. And one of my kids would say, like you know what? I really don't want to do the farmers market. Can I just go home? And I'll say, yeah, sure, you know, as long as you know the way home, you have a key. But sometimes they want to stay home the whole day. That's also fine.

Like for a while I think I felt that over here we all need to go, experience everything, we need to explore together all time. But I realized that was what I wanted and not necessarily what they wanted, and especially when we had all three of them living with us, I mean there's, you know, personality differences and it changes Like who's getting along with who and who's under the skin of the other, and so, yeah, if one of the kids takes a day off, I mean again, they could have a read off. Well, maybe not. But you know, if we're out exploring and they're not interested in what we're doing as a family, they just want to sit home and chill, that's totally fine.

So I don't necessarily force them and make plans every day that they have to do and overall they choose to do most of what we're exploring with us. So it's not that they're going to sit home every single day. I might need to give them a nudge if that was the case. But yeah, right now that we have a plan and someone's really not interested or is extra tired or I mean whatever, it is like you're a teenager. You're going to have days when you're moody and things aren't working out right and just need some space. So we let them create that space. But I would say overall, like most of our explorations, that maybe they're interested in one thing during the day and then they peel off or they meet us in the afternoon and we have a meeting point and a meeting time and then we reconnect there. So that works out really nicely for our families.

1:02:40 - Cecilie Conrad
So they've got some flexibility, I have some flexibility and yeah, and as I understand it, it's actually not you as such making the plan to begin with, because you're doing it together. So in that way, it's not you giving them a day off, it's more like everyone negotiating energy levels. And yeah, I just wanted to clear that up.

1:03:01 - Jesper Conrad
I know for many people to dip the toe and start visiting and seeing other families and people who are actually doing it. It's really wonderful, both for people who start homeschooling and on schooling, but also for people who start to travels, and you have created this wonderful pop up community. So if people want to know more about where they can find the next upcoming, then what are the homepage and what are the Facebook page and how do they find you, rachel, and figure more out about it?

1:03:38 - Rachel Carlson
Oh, thank you. The best place to go is the website worldschoolpopuphubcom, and of course you can read all about what we do and then you can see the upcoming events. If you sign up for the newsletter it's in the footer. Then you get in newsletters. I send out that highlight what's coming up and everything's on the website. I have a Facebook and an Instagram. That's mostly just for posting pictures of what we're doing at the pop up so that you can see yeah, the community comes together.

There's one going on in Los Angeles right now. They were out at the title pools. Yesterday they went and saw the spaceship endeavor at the California Science Center. So it's just like showing you the different things that do at the pop ups. And I should also mention that I don't post them because anybody can do this. So I also allow other hosts to work with me and then we create an event together that fits kind of our standardized pop up plan and then I do all the advertising for them and then they get to run the event and then their family brings the world schoolers to where they are and get to explore that area together.

So I just think you know there's nothing special about me other than I just took the initiative to get out there and say, look, if we want these events for our families, we need to take ownership of it and we need to put the time in, and if anybody wants to do that, I'm just going to help them get to that next step. So yeah, and we have pop ups all over the world. So yeah, they had CMRAPE last week, los Angeles, this week, next month, we have Madison, wisconsin, malasha, georgia and Cincinnati, ohio. So yeah, it's just, it's super cool. So you can bump into people anywhere that you travel, and that's really what I want. That community is available wherever you choose to roam, and if you don't see something going on where you're roaming, talk to me and then we'll get something going on where you are.

1:05:28 - Jesper Conrad
Absolutely. And on that note, first of all, thank you for creating the pop up and community we were at. We have made friends we will see and know for life I'm sure of that, and I look forward also to win our road crosses again. And I also want to thank you for your time to talk with us today. It was a pleasure.

1:05:47 - Rachel Carlson
You're so welcome. I'm glad I could be here. Thanks, guys, thank you.

1:05:52 - Jesper Conrad
Thank you for listening. We hope you enjoyed today's episode and if you like that, then please share it with all your friends and family. We would also love it if you gave our podcast a review. Thanks, and if you want to support our podcast and work, then you can find us on patreoncom slash the Conrad family. We will continue to travel full time and if you want to tag along, then please follow us on Facebook and Instagram at the Conrad family, and you can also read more than 100 blog posts on our website. The Conrad family. Until next time, make a wonderful day, thank you.