I can highly recommend renting a co-working space once that's a viable option wherever you are in the world. These can be surprisingly inexpensive and often come with internet, electricity, etc. included.
Gives both the "short commute" benefit of work-from-home, as well as the "maintaining a clear separation between home and work" benefit of on-location-work.
And for me personally (as an introvert), it was fantastic to have people around that I could talk to socially, but who weren't directly involved in my work and who weren't going to make demands of me. Totally removed the feelings of isolation, and formed a bunch of new friendships that didn't rest on obligations to my employer.
The fact that we work on the same thing gives me more reasons to talk. I can't ask random people at a co-working space to help me debug an issue or to brainstorm a solution. They aren't familiar with my project the way co-workers would be. They also are not NDAed to look at what I'm working on
I don't understand. I work remotely and regularly debug issues and brainstorm solutions with my teammates. Their physical proximity is not relevant. Clearly I am missing something.
You're missing that the point of being around people for some of us is to "interact" with them. I can easily interact with co-workers. I can not easily interact with strangers at a co-working space.
Also I work on console games. I can't hand the person on the chat the controller and say "how does this feel?"
It's nice to work on a problem with someone and then go to lunch and shoot the shit afterwards. Or just hanging out drinking some coffee. The key is you have to have some coworkers you like though, which I'll allow that not everybody has.
For me, I've worked in full remote and full in office jobs. I favor a mix personally. Maybe 2-3 days in office and the rest remote.
Gives both the "short commute" benefit of work-from-home, as well as the "maintaining a clear separation between home and work" benefit of on-location-work.
And for me personally (as an introvert), it was fantastic to have people around that I could talk to socially, but who weren't directly involved in my work and who weren't going to make demands of me. Totally removed the feelings of isolation, and formed a bunch of new friendships that didn't rest on obligations to my employer.