The beginning of all travels for Usman was when he traveled during his university years for the first time with some of his friends. The little world Usman lived in seemed to expand with the bit of traveling he did. He explored different cultures, places, and people, which made him crave for more. During the time that followed after his travel, Usman found himself stuck in the daily patterns of life, which made him feel uninspired, unmotivated, and exhausted. As the regular cycle is undoubtedly capable of to make our life feel directionless and our selves purposeless, it is essential to break the pattern. The flamboyance of the city may seem glorious with skylines, flashes of light, and the fast-moving life; however, more often than not, it becomes tedious and sometimes chaotic. He criticized that we become so caught up in the daily routines that we forget to appreciate life for what it is.

“Going everywhere we would want to be for if you see closely, there are no boundaries except the ones in our heads, and once we learn to silence our minds, we are wherever we want to be, we are everywhere and yet at someplace where peace and happiness exists.”

He also believes that a calm and modest life brings more happiness than the pursuit of success combined with restlessness. And since then, Usman has made a case of working three months and living the nomadic life for the next month or so, to fill his heart and soul with wonder.

Travelling is of utmost importance to Usman as he claims he becomes agitated when the travel gap becomes a little too long for him. He finds himself yearning to pack his bags again and set out into the unknown. He has traveled to many strange lands, trekked to Wakhan corridor on his own among many other mountains, been on high passes above 5000 meters in Nepal and Pakistan, and biked solo on the Karakoram Highways. He believes traveling evolves an individual in ways a classroom never can. There are obstacles that you have to face and find solutions to fix the problems concurrently. He revealed that it makes you come out of the shell in your head and observe life around you, which makes you realize how minor your issues are. There is something wildly fascinating to Usman about returning to a place. “Each moment is in a new time and space, and we bring new thoughts and experiences that we share with the land, and the land shares its stories with us. This interaction forever holds my fascination.

Usman shared that sometimes to become more positive, we have to uncover and release the past negative experiences that one has been holding onto. He said traveling could help you discover and heal your soul and, it helps to build a more supportive and affirming belief system that can be used the next time you face any hardships. Such was the time when Usman went on one of his most daring solo trip in The quest of Finding myself in the pursuit of Mountains Exploring Gilgit Baltistan on my own.

“I wanted to separate myself from family and friends, find out who I am in this world and what I need to feel good alone by cutting off all the dependencies. I think the most important thing in life is to find a sense of self because, with that, you can do anything else”.

The most intriguing and exciting thing for Usman is that he never seems to run out of places to visit and nor does his thirst for nature.

How my Journey started?

They say if you have a laptop and a good internet connection and you are not a millionaire, it’s your fault and no one else and I can’t agree more.

Since I got the Pm Shahbaz Shareef laptop in 2012 in my 2nd year of engineering I learned about the freelance market and I learned skills related to my degree Computer-aided designing, CNC (Mechanical engineering), and started making money online doing 3d design projects.

I was interested in Photography too so I got a camera from the freelance earning and started doing photography and videography too, I polished my skills in video editing, photo editing and started my journey as a travel photographer, some of my short films have been shortlisted in various film festivals.

Working freelance gave me time and location independence so I traveled all around Pakistan and internationally taking photos and posting on Instagram building audience to who I sell them as prints and stock photos and do sponsored posts for brands such as Huawei, Samsung, Realme, Oppo, Daraz, Zong etc.

I believe there are 101 opportunities around you to make money, don’t limit yourself to one, learn and be consistent about it, we should have as many passive income sources as we can create so we don’t depend on a single source of income and diversify our portfolio, keep learning and growing.