Work with your cycle and manage your energy while traveling
In this blogpost and episode of the Travel and Work with Human Design podcast, join Human Design coach Astrid as she interviews Holistic coach Christine Ofner. They met at Bansko Nomad Fest.
Christine, a 2/4 Emotional Projector and Digital Nomad, shares her insights into navigating the digital nomad lifestyle in this interview. Together, they explore the highs and lows of the location independent lifestyle and delve into the importance of working with your cycle to manage energy effectively.
Discover firsthand experiences and valuable tips for productivity and energy management in the digital nomad world. In this interview we uncover some keys to success in lifestyle by design, including the pursuit of freedom, building community, and the journey of self-discovery. We also talk about Human Design profiles and how that element of the Human Design system works in their daily lives.
Gain valuable practical tips and strategies for working with your cycle and manage your energy to increase your productivity in your entrepreneurial location independent journey. Join our conversation by reading the blog or listening to the podcast episode on Spotify or Apple Podcasts!
Key Take Aways
- Working with Your Cycles: Christine emphasizes the importance of understanding and leveraging the natural cycles that women experience, such as the menstrual cycle. By aligning tasks and activities with the different phases of their cycle, women can optimize productivity and well-being. This approach involves recognizing the ebbs and flows in energy and mood throughout the month and adjusting tasks accordingly.
- Embracing Freedom: Both Christine and podcast host Astrid share their journeys towards embracing freedom in their lives, whether it’s through location independence, time independence, or emotional independence. They discuss how freedom means different things to different people and how important it is to define it for oneself rather than conforming to societal norms or expectations.
- Personal Growth Through Travel: The conversation touches on the transformative nature of travel and living a location-independent lifestyle. While acknowledging the challenges and uncertainties that come with it, they highlight how these experiences provide opportunities for personal growth, self-discovery, and expanding one’s worldview. Traveling allows individuals to confront fears, embrace discomfort, and ultimately find greater fulfillment and freedom in their lives.
Quick Links
- Christine Ofner’s website
- Christine’s Instagram
- Bansko Nomad Fest in Bulgaria. Get 10% off your tickets by using the code astrid_bnf24
Can you tell me about your experiences at Bansko Nomad Fest?
I am so happy you’re here, Christine. I’m so excited for this conversation that we’re going to have. You are officially my first ever guest in my podcast, so I’m really excited that you accepted my invitation when we met in Bansko Nomad Fest. Can you tell me a little bit more about your experiences when you were there and how we met?
Thanks. Yes. So, first of all, thank you so much for the invitation, right? For everyone. I’m a projector, so I live on invitations, basically. So, the Bansko Nomad Fest was just amazing for me. Like, I’m a digital nomad and an entrepreneur, so I always I look for like minded people, basically, and for this year, my word or like the goal of the year was to network as much as possible.
So, of course, I needed to go to the Bansko Nomad Fest. And then we basically met at a table in the park setting, right? Yes. And we were just We were bonding over human design because I actually got to know a friend of yours and she referred me to you. She was like, you need to meet Astrid. Like you’re going to get along so well.
And then when she referred us basically and introduced us to each other, we were like, Oh my God, yes. It’s like the same wavelength. Like we know what we’re talking about. It’s so great. Yeah. I love how that human design is a connecting language. Like as soon as you’re a little bit more into the system and you meet somebody else who’s into it, like that’s creates an instant bond, right?
Exactly. So I really enjoyed going to your workshop. You are a specialist in energy management and especially working with your cycles. And we’re definitely going to talk a little bit more about that. But what do you do? Can you introduce yourself quickly for the audience that doesn’t know you? Yes. So hi everyone.
Introducing my Guest Christine Ofner a 2/4 Emotional Projector
I’m Chrisi. I’m a holistic business and mindset coach and I help service based entrepreneurs to really do business their way, like based on their personality, based on their unique energy and based on their goals, like I really don’t believe in these like six figures and six months frameworks, like there’s lots of, lots of blueprints and frameworks and advice going on in the online world.
All of it is perfect on its own way and they’re all right, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that this is what’s going to work for you, right? So I believe that business is only going to be successful if you’re actually having this foundation of self trust and self belief and basing all of it on your identity and your goals and how you work best.
That is how you’re going to be and stay consistent also through the low phases. Lovely. So that’s what I do. So, where are you from, where are your roots, and where in the world are you now? Yes, so I’m from Austria, and currently I’m also at my family’s place here in Austria, because usually I try to spend the summer and Christmas here with my family and friends.
I’m from a village, so I still have some strong bonds with some of my friends, and then Family is really important to me as well. So I usually try to have those like fixed points during the year where I’m home. But yeah, my next destination is going to be Spain and then the Nomad Cruise. So I’m very excited for that.
How did your location independent journey start?
What is your route to freedom in that sense? I love this question and this is a. bit more difficult for me because like I wouldn’t say I’ve been a digital nomad for this long, but I’ve been an expat and I’ve been living abroad since like 2017 actually.
So when I was 19, I moved to the US for one and a half years. I was an au pair there. And then I discovered my love for traveling and for, you know, just shocking myself into going somewhere else to grow. Basically, Gate 51, right? So I just, I discovered that this is my kind of like life path. And then.
From that moment on, I tried to figure out how I can go abroad again. So I came home and then I moved to the Netherlands to study there, did an exchange semester in Bulgaria. So like I was not really a digital nomad, but I was still abroad for most of my time in the last like six years, actually. And when I discovered that, you know, during the pandemic, they made my whole study program online basically.
So I was location independent already and I already had my business at that point. So I was like, cool, let me grab some like minded people and let’s rent some houses on the beach to co work. So I basically wrote my thesis on an island in Greece, like looking over the ocean.
Love it. Well, I think for most people who are sparked into that journey of location independent lifestyle or digital nomadism, I think the roots are in backpacking, right?
So for me, that was when I started, I went on a world trip for a year and in Melbourne, Australia, I met my first digital nomad. That was the first seed in my journey that eight years later, I actually became location independent, but it’s a process that’s going. And when I went back from going back into the rat race after having a year of freedom, and especially with my design, I didn’t know anything about human design back then, but knowing about.
What I know now, like, I was following my sacral all the time because the only things that I had to decide is, okay, are we going left or going right today? I was living in a car with a friend. We were doing, we, I’ve had multiple, uh, experience there. Some friends came over and But at one time, a friend came over for three and a half months and we just, we tried to do a circle of Australia.
Really cool. Didn’t work because we discovered that there’s only one road going from Perth to Darwin and that was flooded. So we had to go all the way back to Sydney. But being in Melbourne really. That was the first spark and a years later that evolved into, okay, I need to have more freedom in my life.
How important is freedom in your life?
It is so, so, so important. Like, you know, with the previous question, like my travel spark, I got that in the US when I went there for the first time. So like when I lived abroad for the first time, basically, that is where I got my travel spark. But the actual spark to be location independent for good.
Is really when I came back and I had a six months full time job here in Austria and I hated it. Like I was frustrated and depressed every single day. I came home and I was like, this is not it. Like there needs to be more in life than that. I really, really hated it. But this was a really important part in my life because this is the kick in the ass that I needed to look for all the different opportunities on how I could become free and location independent.
So freedom just means for me to like, Be location independent, time independent, emotionally independent, right? Because, like, freedom comes from within. You can always feel free at any point in your life. But if you cage yourself, like, mindset wise, being like, I need to do this job and I need to have it to sustain myself, you know, even though you hate it.
Then you cage yourself and you can’t be free, even though you could already be free in this point. So in this time, I really discovered, like, my values, what I actually want, what is possible for me. I’ve already had like a vision board since I was 16. So I’ve been on my self development journey for so many years at that point already, but this was where I really had to practice what I was practicing before just on paper in life now, right? This is, this is my time to truly embody it too. And this is where everything changed for me when it came to freedom. Like freedom is one of my five core values and I really had to define what that means for me. And for me, there was no other way than to start an online business so that I could be Location independent, half the time freedom, maybe at some point de financial freedom, and also feeling emotionally free from everything, from my own ego, basically.
Yeah, I think a lot of people really underestimate that, right? Perhaps they go traveling because they’re running away from something or they’re running towards something. But the moment that you are traveling, it’s hard because you actually will face your fears. You will be in uncomfortable situations.
You will encounter things that life bumps into you and it’s not always pleasant. And if you’re in your sad nine to five life, I mean, life is kind of predictable, right? Because you planned everything out and you’re living in your head. But if you’re more present in the moment. It’s an interesting journey.
It’s not always nice. You also encounter difficult moments when you’re traveling. Yeah, no. And what you’re saying, I really resonate with that, because that’s something that I felt as well, like the mental freedom. For me, that’s the freedom of basically learning how to tame your inner critic. Because that voice, that inner dialogue is happening every time you try something new.
But also it’s the freedom to travel because your body is healthy enough to travel, right? Because that’s, that is like, that’s my concept of freedom. Like it’s, it’s body and soul freedom. It’s doing what you love, doing something that fulfills you. It’s doing something that is healthy for you because you set healthy boundaries and yeah, it’s free to follow your passions and to do maybe five different things and not judge yourself for it. Hell yes. But yeah. So, you know, when, when people think about digital nomads, they think they have these like perfect lives, you know, all these pictures on a beach with the laptop, which is not true anyway, but like still.
“Yeah, but it’s so not true. Like it is a shortcut for growth.
And what it means to have a shortcut for growth is it’s got to be painful. For sure. Like, I hate the beginning phases of when I move somewhere, when I travel somewhere, and I hate the end phases. Really? Because, yeah, saying goodbye is like the worst thing for me. Because, like, I have to work on letting go of all of these people and, like, all of what I experienced and stuff, so I hate that phase.
And when I move somewhere, I also hate this phase, actually. I mean, it has its beauty to it, but I, I hate this phase in the sense that there’s so much overwhelm going in my head about all these new things and things that I need to figure out, right? If I’m in a country where I don’t speak the language, grocery shopping is going to take a while.
Right. And then figuring out where I can do my laundry and where I can meet people and where it’s safe for me to go. And like all of these things, they take up so much brain space, but you still have to do like your normal life stuff too, right? Your health routine, your work, all of these things. So. For me, the beginning phases, sometimes it’s a bit hard, especially when I move somewhere for like six months or so when I know, okay, I’m actually alone here.
I don’t know anyone. It excites me. But then also sometimes in low moments, I’m like, Oh, why did I do this to myself again? You know, like starting from zero again, after all of these years of doing it. I still don’t really, really like that face, but in between, it’s always awesome. So I still do it. I still do it.”
Can you share some challenges you face while traveling or being location independent?
“Yeah, but it’s so not true. Like it is a shortcut for growth.
And what it means to have a shortcut for growth is it’s got to be painful. For sure. Like, I hate the beginning phases of when I move somewhere, when I travel somewhere, and I hate the end phases. Really? Because, yeah, saying goodbye is like the worst thing for me. Because, like, I have to work on letting go of all of these people and, like, all of what I experienced and stuff, so I hate that phase.
And when I move somewhere, I also hate this phase, actually. I mean, it has its beauty to it, but I, I hate this phase in the sense that there’s so much overwhelm going in my head about all these new things and things that I need to figure out, right? If I’m in a country where I don’t speak the language, grocery shopping is going to take a while.
Right. And then figuring out where I can do my laundry and where I can meet people and where it’s safe for me to go. And like all of these things, they take up so much brain space, but you still have to do like your normal life stuff too, right? Your health routine, your work, all of these things. So. For me, the beginning phases, sometimes it’s a bit hard, especially when I move somewhere for like six months or so when I know, okay, I’m actually alone here.
I don’t know anyone. It excites me. But then also sometimes in low moments, I’m like, Oh, why did I do this to myself again? You know, like starting from zero again, after all of these years of doing it. I still don’t really, really like that face, but in between, it’s always awesome. So I still do it. I still do it.”
Let's talk about our Human Design profiles
It’s so fascinating to me a Human Design Coach I hear your profile shining through it because I know your human Design, actually I have your chart right in front of me here, but you are a 2/4 Emotional Projector. Yes. And I am a Sacral 5/1 Generator and I actually love the phase that you meet strangers, you have incredible moments and then you never see each other again ever.
Because that’s what usually happens. Yeah. Some people you connect and stay connected and you actually become friends and that friendship lasts. But a lot of people you have magical moments with and then you never see each other again. And for me, Yeah. I’m really at peace with that. Yeah, but knowing a little bit about a fourth line, having a fourth line in your profile, I mean, that community and that bonds.
And yeah, yeah, I think it’s really cool to hear that, um, to, to hear that shining to what you just refer to. So here’s the thing. It’s so funny. Right. With my four line, like I actually really like to meet new people. I love it so much, but if I know the context, for example, I knew at the Bansko Nomad Fest, I’m going to have a lot of conversations with people that I’m only going to see once. And then I don’t know if I’m ever going to see them again. And I really liked that because, you know, I had deeper conversations with them. I could ask them specific questions and I really liked that. But when I moved to a specific country, like for example, when I moved to Sofia, to Bulgaria, I was so frustrated in the beginning because it’s so hard.
To actually create deeper bonds with someone and it takes some time and my four line is constantly being like, but I need my inner circle and I need my community, right? So I’m kind of like impatient with the whole, like actually making deeper bonds and friendship or creating these friendships in a new place.
I’m just very impatient with that because I feel like I need this community wherever I go. So this is where it comes through for me. Beautiful. So, we actually deep dived in your chart already, but let me get back to your lifestyle.
Do you refer to yourself as location independent or a digital nomad?
How do you refer yourself as?
“Honestly, I don’t really know and I don’t, I don’t think we need to define it in a specific way. I mean, I call myself a digital nomad because I would like to think of myself as someone who is just free to like get up and go whenever. Yeah. Yeah. My goal is to like live somewhere else for four or five, six months, then come home to Austria for two months.
And then they can go somewhere else for four or five, six months. And then again, come home for Christmas again, this year, like real life happened and it wasn’t even possible. So I was just traveling month by month. So I feel like it’s going to vary. per year and what’s, what’s going on, but I will call myself a digital nomad.”
Nice. For me, having that home base was really important from the start. So I learned from my world trip that I, I had nesting urges when I came back. I knew like, okay, I need to have a settled place. But I think also what we learned in Bansko Nomad Fest is that there are so many different variations of doing this lifestyle.
Um, yeah. And everybody has their own view of it or own lens. So it’s, and there’s no right or wrong way. Everybody just basically live on their own terms and how that reflects or how that is. That’s different for everybody. So yeah, just, yeah, I think that’s really cool. Yeah. I think that’s beautiful because you know, we, we did hard work to get out of all of this conditioning and societal norms.
So we don’t want to put ourselves back into some kind of definition. So I think that’s why digital nomad is also a very broad term, and no one truly knows how to define it. You know, everyone defines it in a different way. And I think that’s beautiful. And it fits exactly what being a digital nomad is all about.
Like, you do you. No matter what that means for you or for others, you just do you. That’s why I think human design is such a good fit for the digital nomad lifestyle, right?
Hell yeah.
Can you elaborate more on working with your cycle and energy management?
So you were just talking about working with your cycle, and I know that you know a lot about that. Can you elaborate a little bit more about that?
“Yes. So basically what I discovered is we are not meant as women to work on a consistent or daily consistency basis. You know, everything that you hear with like, be consistent on Instagram, sell consistently, blah, blah, blah. That is actually based on the consistency of a 24 hour hormonal pattern of men.
We, as women, are actually meant to be consistent based on our infradian rhythm, which is our cycle, and this is usually like 28 days long. So we have what’s happening for a man on a 24 hour basis. It’s happening for women on a four week basis, 28 days. And we have specific phases where based on our hormonal fluctuations, we feel a different way.
We feel a different energy. Moods can change. Nutrition will be changed like needs for specific workouts or so or for specific self care or sex. This is going to change based on these like hormonal fluctuations that are happening in every week. So there’s different superpowers that we have every week.
So for us, it’s so important to leverage these superpowers because there’s naturally going to be ebbs and flows in your energy. But if you know how to strategically use every single one in every phase, then you can be naturally productive because your body naturally supports you in those tasks. And then you still have overflowing energy for the rest of it.
And if you still need to do things that are not, you know, meant to be in this phase or so it’s just going to feel a little bit more draining. It doesn’t mean that you can do stuff in a specific phase, but it just means that maybe these things might feel more draining. For example, I hosted an energy management workshop yesterday in a community and I was in my summer phase and that felt very different for me than when I was hosting it offline at the Bansko Nomad Fest because I was on my period, right?
Yesterday it was just flowing way more. Because I was in my go getter energy. I was in my summer phase. Like my hormones were very like high. My verbal and social centers were activated in my brain. So naturally I was like on. And afterwards I didn’t feel as drained, but at the Bansko Nomad Fest afterwards, I really, I slept for so long because I was so drained by it.
I still did it. I still loved it. I still felt high energy doing it. But afterwards I just felt way more drained than what I felt yesterday, for example. So. Yeah, I don’t know. Do you want me to elaborate more? Like, do you have any specific questions? Yeah, I think it’s interesting what you say. Like, I think for the people who are not familiar with, we use four seasons, right?
So winter is your period. Yeah. Then afterwards you get your spring. And if you start your ovulation period, that’s summer. Yeah. And then you have your fall period. Yeah. And I’ve been working with my cycle for about a year now and I use it in my business. Actually we postponed this podcast because we’re both in not our ideal, ideal phases.
But yeah, I really resonate with the concept. So how did you got into that? Like how did that came on your path?
“So that was basically during that time where I was in a really low phase in my business, right? That I was using at least like six months to dedicate to my business. So I took time off of my studies to really focus on my coaching pivot.
And I already had like two years of business experience at that point. So I honestly thought I would make six figures in six months because that was what everyone was saying, right? Like when you pivot to coaching and when you already have experience, you would just make six figures in six months. Well, spoiler alert, it didn’t happen.
Like I was working for 40 plus hours. I was. Part of three different group coaching programs. And I was busy implementing all of these strategies that based on them would work for my business. So I did all of this. And after six months, I saw zero results.
And I was so disconnected from myself and from the business, I was so frustrated
Aligning your business
So I decided to take some time off the business to really reconnect with myself. And I went on a deeper self development journey, deeper spiritual journey. And on this journey, I discovered a video of my former mentor, and she was describing all of these tools that have an impact on your energy. So she was talking about the female cycle.
She was talking about the circadian rhythm, about moon phases. And then I also later added human design to that. And I was like, Oh my God, this is such a different way of working. Let me try this out because now the only thing I did was writing my thesis. I was very free in how I would spend the rest of my time.
So I used all of this time to really truly experiment with how it impacted my energy. So I learned more about the cycle. I was reading books about it. I was watching all the videos I could find about it. And I was basically implementing what I read already in my business and also in my life then. So first in my life, and when I saw how, what effect it had, then I realigned my business also based on that.
I realigned my office and my business model and everything, how I do marketing based on what I figured out in my energy management tracking experiment. Basically, I was tracking every single day. So this is basically how I got to all of this. And I’m very happy that I did, because now I do work in a different way.
Like truly embodying the projector again, like I work in a very different way than what we’ve been taught to do. Is there any question that I haven’t asked you? Is there anything else that you wanted to talk to me about that we haven’t touched on just yet? Oh, I don’t know. We talked about a lot of things, actually.
Yeah. It’s really, really cool. No, I think it’s all great.
Interested in learning more about managing your energy as a digital nomad?
If one of your listeners or more of your listeners are interested in learning more about the energy management stuff, I do have a recording that I can send you about all of these things. So I’m happy to send you the replay of this, like energy management training that I did for my audience.
So if you’re interested in that.
Where can people find you? On Instagram? Uh, @christine.ofner, you can just send me a DM that you want the energy management training replay, and then I can, I’m happy to, to send you. Whatever I have. And I will make sure that in the show notes, all the links to your website and your Instagram handle are there as well.
So if you go to my show notes page, then you will find all the information that will lead you to Christine. Thank you for being on the show and I see you soon. Thank you so, so much. Thanks so much for this opportunity and for your invitation. I was really, really happy when you invited me.
Thank you so much for sharing a piece of your day with me. while listening to this episode of the podcast. Did you find it interesting and want to learn more about stress reduction, mindset, and human design? Be sure to check out the free resources at palmtreemoments.com. Have a happy morning, afternoon, or evening, wherever in the world you’re listening from, and until next time.
