I love working remotely.

I love it so much I get defensive about it, the way people get defensive about oat milk or their decision to live in a converted sprinter van. I will sing the gospel of pajama bottoms and Slack emojis. I will tell anyone who will listen that I am never going back.

And I mean it.

Remote work gave me my mornings back. It gave me light, quiet, and the joy of making my own lunch without Brenda reheating fish in the shared kitchen. It gave me control over my day, my energy, my boundaries, my background noise. It gave me breathing room.

But it also took something.
Or maybe it just left something behind.

Because as much as I love being remote, I sometimes find myself missing things I didn’t think I cared about. A shared eye roll. A birthday cupcake. The knowing look during the 3pm meeting that absolutely should’ve been an email.

I miss the we of it.

Not the open office plan. Not the commute. But the sense of belonging to a group of humans who all silently agreed we were in this mess together.

Now, I have a team. A great one. They live in my laptop. They have profile pictures and time zones. We send each other gifs. I know their dogs’ names and their favorite productivity tools. It’s lovely.

But it’s not quite the same as being able to spin your chair around and say, “Do you think this email sounds unhinged?” or “Is it just me, or is today weird?”

And the hardest part? The loss of spontaneous creativity.

Those lightbulb moments that used to pop up while waiting for the kettle to boil in the breakroom. The accidental brilliance that came from riffing out loud with someone who was just close enough to overhear your bad idea and made it better. Remote work doesn’t hand you those moments – you have to manufacture them. 

Which sounds… awful. But actually? It’s doable.

You just need the right mix of tools, routines, and social practices. Like:

• Standing “no-agenda” calls where your team can just talk. About nothing. Or something.

• Scheduled co-working sessions with a shared Spotify playlist and no pressure to talk.

• A swipe file of inspiration – memes, screenshots, headlines, quotes – that you actually revisit.

• And Slack channels for half-baked ideas and “what if we just…” energy.

None of this replaces the hum of an office, but it can replicate the spark – if we stop waiting for creativity to happen and start inviting it in.

So yes, I love working remotely.
But sometimes, I miss you.

The coworker I barely knew but always sat next to.
The one who kept snacks in her drawer.
The one who made me feel like we were doing this job together.

Wherever you are, I hope your new team knows how lucky they are.

And if you ever want to co-work on Zoom in total silence and mutual resentment of our inboxes – I’m around.

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