How to Live the Digital Nomad Lifestyle

The digital nomad lifestyle fascinates me.

Of course I’m living it, and I’ve known and been around other travel bloggers who are too for years now, but just recently I’ve been learning more about all the different types of laptop travellers. People who’ve managed to achieve freedom from the 9-5 and are making the most of it all over the world.

Nomad life

– Just a little ‘sea break’ in between work

Basically, if you haven’t heard the phrase ‘digital nomad’ or you have and don’t quite get it, it just means you travel nomadically and work online, digitally, to pay for your flights, accommodation and pad Thai / pho / ceviche in whatever country you’re in. The ‘working online’ could mean working for your own business, for clients, for a boss you’ve managed to convince to let you work remotely or a mixture of the three.

Digital nomad hubs are popping up all over the world – Chang Mai in Thailand was one of the first, especially for travel bloggers, but other popular places include Medellin in Colombia, Ubud in Bali, Saigon in Vietnam, Berlin in Germany and, the place I visited most recently, Tarifa in Spain.

Digital nomads flock to these destinations for their high speed internet, decent infrastructure, cheap living and start up prices and possibly most importantly, ingrained digital nomad community. See that’s the biggest downside to this digital nomad life – long term friendships, your own established community and solid relationships, but more on that next week.

The Digital Nomad Community

From the Digital Nomad Exchange (DNX) conference I went to in Berlin in August to the week I spent in Tarifa last week I’ve met so many inspiring and awesome digital nomads. People who are so passionate about what they’re trying to achieve with their work they’re willing to leave their jobs, sacrifice their possessions and comforts and move to a cheap destination away from friends and family to help them afford to chase their dreams. I love a good tale of determination, meeting new nomads, hearing what they’re working on and their stories of how they got there.

Digital nomad community

– Photo courtesy of Alisa on the right, who’s working on a brilliant, top secret project, soon to be revealed

In Berlin and Tarifa I met software developers, bloggers, musicians, language experts, product developers and more – all with an entrepreneurial spirit and the balls to make some attempt to follow it through, rather than sit around talking about maybe, possibly, one day, giving their dream a go.

In Tarifa last week there was no one directly related to the travel blogging world, and that was part of the fun and the learning, and one of the whole points of going. I went to a three-hour mastermind class and within my group of five we shared ideas, concepts, learnings and knowledge and all of us came away with a lot of plans and ideas to action. So interesting, so useful and so generous of everyone to join in.

The digital nomad community I’ve been involved in is awesome. I love the sharing, I love the caring, I love the fact that even though we’d only met in the Tarifa Digital Nomads Facebook group before, suddenly we were all going out for tapas, cocktails and beers to learn from each other. On arrival I had 10+ new friends. I plan to go back to Tarifa in May next year, for our reunion.

Check out the The Tarifa Guide for Digital Nomads on WebWorkTravel

Travel bloggers as digital nomads

Travel blogging

– Photo courtesy of Or Kaplan, in Israel

From Tarifa I flew to see some friends a little closer to my travel blogging world. My buddy Cailin from TravelYourself – who I was in the Adirondacks with and at Oktoberfest for a day – had a villa in Mallorca and invited me over to join her, Candice from FreeCandie.com and Kate from AdventurousKate.com for a chilled week of work and sun.

So that’s where I am now. We’ve spent the past few days walking in Pollenca, eating all the tapas in the town, drinking all the wine, but, for most of the time, chilling in the villa and working on our projects. Sometimes when you’re the only one travelling and working in the hostel it can be a little isolating.

The more travel bloggers and digital nomads I befriend I know that I’m building up this awesome network of people around the world who have the same work / play life outlook as me, and the same means and ways to get them there. Just like in a regular office it’s so good to get together now and then just to work side by side and learn from each other and have some fun too.

‘Vicky No Job’

Travelling and working

– Just casually working on my site, captured by Or Kaplan

As a digital nomad myself I know the scepticism. My best mates’ family call me ‘Vicky No Job’, in jest, kind of. They think I just fly around the world having fun and drinking with people I’ve only known a few days. And they’re right. What they don’t see is the hours of work that go into this site in between, and into client work, and my projects on the side and into making sure I’m laying the foundations to live this life forever.

I still work about 10-60 hours per week, depending on what I’m up to in the world. The difference is I can do it when I want.

If I don’t work, I don’t get paid. Turn the life view around and to me it looks like all those people on a salary who can rock up and get by looking busy making tea and faffing with the printer all day and still get paid are the ones who don’t work.

My digital nomad inspiration

Drinking in Tarifa

– Cafe del Mar, where I worked from last week in Tarifa

I think I was meant to live this way, as a digital nomad, but I just didn’t know the term or the concept before. Reading The 4-Hour Work Week by Tim Ferris in 2012 changed my life. It was then that I realised this was ‘a thing’. I read that book nodding along with all he said about productivity, the unfairness of the 9-5 and how work should fit around life, not the other way round.

I’ve been made redundant twice, I’ve had to be a manager at a time when my staff were being made redundant – all 3 occasions when the company was not doing well through no fault of my own or my staff – I’ve freelanced at companies, I’ve worked 5 years on a till in Boots and I’ve worked some pretty shitty jobs. All this has instilled a work ethic in me that knows that to keep on living the awesome life I’ve made for myself now, I have to get on with it.

It’s instilled a complete distrust in employers who by hiring you have taken on the responsibility of paying you, only to cut you loose when they can with a short and final meeting and a complete lack of sympathy or respect for all the work you’ve done for them thrown in.

It’s also cemented my number one life goal of never going back to work for someone else on their terms. I’m my own boss until the end now.

Making it as a digital nomad

Living as a digital nomad isn’t a pass to lie ins, all day PJs and afternoon movies. If anyone thinks that they’re not going to last long.

The people who make it as digital nomads are the ones who are up and ready to work. The people who have worked their ass off to find and retain regular clients and who stay innovative in their field, and keep an eye on other people’s to see where they can insert themselves in the system, before doing the same again to work out how they can be indispensable. They need endless self-motivation to avoid all the temptations of a freer life – sunbathing at the beach all day, drinking at noon or sitting around chewing the fat – because no one’s going to tell you off if you do. Slowly and surely though, you will lose your ‘job’ and all the brilliant privileges it offers.

LIving as a digital nomad

– The view in San Pedro, a trip financed by my travel writing work

Life as a digital nomad is awesome though and well worth all the effort to strive to achieve. Depending on your travel style there can be a lot of admin and logistics to sort out – having a second passport can be a good idea if you’re moving around a lot for example.

The freedom of the lifestyle being a digital nomad is just incredible though…

After the mastermind session I mentioned in Tarifa a group of us walked the hour back along the beach watching the kitesurfers as we went. We reached the other end and decided to siesta before heading back to the co working hostel we were at for an afternoon of inspiring work that we actually wanted to do. That night we headed out for a group dinner at a delicious vegetarian restaurant. For me, that was the perfect working day.

The people I met at DNX, the people I met in Tarifa and all my travel blogger mates will remain friends, thanks to the groups I’m in on Facebook and the nature of our work, I’d predict forever.

There are challenges of course – relationships, finances, moving around, family life, where to go next (!) – but with practice, compromise, Skype and an emphasis on learning about every part of your business there’s definitely a way to progress.

Life as a digital nomad

Digital nomads design their own lives. Most don’t care about possessions, houses, security, mortgages and materialistic consumerism. There are bigger things to think about. Many will travel to follow their passion – in Tarifa it was kitesurfing, in Bali it would most likely be yoga and in Saigon, I’m guessing it’s the food. They can locate themselves wherever suits them and their lifestyle best.

The digital nomad life isn’t for everyone. For some people it lasts a few years and for others it’s a lifetime. But if you have the motivation, the means, the savings, the ideas and the passion, I’d definitely recommend you give it a try.

I’d strongly recommend you sort a self employed pension out while you’re living the high life. You’ll thank me later!

27 Comments

  1. I think you hit the nail on the head with this post, Vicky. You have to work hard to achieve your dreams – it’s just that most people will only see the glamorous / fun parts of the lifestyle and not the many hours of work you put into it all. The 4-hour-work-week was a huge inspiration for me too. I wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing now if it wasn’t for Tim Ferris!

    1. I love Tim Ferriss! He will have left such an incredible legacy, inspiring all these people to change their lives. What a guy!

  2. Great story Vicky! I am living as a digital nomad also thanks to what I’ve learned at http://homeofseo.com

    I you wanna be a digital nomad the I highly recommed to read and apply their SEO tutorials and money making tutorials.

    Right now I am in Thailand in a hotel 🙂

    Being a Digital Nomad Rulz!

  3. I wish co working spaces had private rooms! My work involves talking all day so I need space where I won’t interrupt people. Currently I’m shifting between volunteering and hostelling as ways to keep social. Otherwise I rent a private room somewhere and it can feel a bit dull!

  4. Great insight. I love your blog and I love your post. I’m like you and I do the same kind of work and is very interesting. Keep up the good work and I’ll keep following your blog.

    1. Thanks Marc – I’m glad you like my work 🙂 Your blog looks great – just been reading about Neuschwanstein. I missed going there when I was in Munich sadly, and even more so now I’ve read your writer’s review!

  5. Hey Vicky

    thanks for this article. It was a pleasure to meet you. I’m looking forward to next year, meeting you (and everyone else) again 🙂

    Natha

  6. Great insight on the digital nomad life! I am grinding away at the 9-5 but am currently in the process of giving my blog a much needed face lift and focused content– very exciting! Right now, I do not have a car payment, nor rent, I am staying with friends, family, and house sitting in town while I save some money and focus on being able to quite my job! I am really looking forward to more post! Cheers,

    1. Ooo exciting times Emily! Sounds like you’re going down the road the right way. It can be good to work it out slowly, rather than just making a snap decision and leaving everything. My digital nomad life was definitely a few years in the making. It helped that I had clients built up before I left rather than leaving myself with nothing and hoping for the best. It will be brilliant when it all works out!

  7. Hey,
    Love the post ! I started reading about the ‘digital nomad’ lifestyle recently but still can’t see how to do it on my own.
    I did the first step if opening a travel blog 🙂

  8. One question. Probably an important one for all the people trying to get into it. If you don’t already have a remote job how to you get paid for the part time / temporary jobs you do? Do you have a single proprietorship company set up so you can give invoices or what? Or are you officially unemployed living on welfare? How does that work out?

    1. Hi Matjaz, thanks for your comment. I’m registered as self employed in England, so I still pay taxes to HRMC. I’m not sure how it works around the world, but in the UK we do a tax return every year to work it all out. I have a lot of clients and jobs and invoice them for the work, then keep a record of it all for tax time.

  9. Hey Flip Flop! It’s great that you mentioned option 3 “working online for a boss you’ve managed to convince to let you work remotely” as I hadn’t really thought of that one and assumed all digital nomads were freelancing/working for themselves. 🙂

    Regards not caring about “possessions, houses, security, mortgages” I was torn on that one as there might come a day that “if” a digital nomad wants children then their “other half” might expect their own roof over their heads (not an extortionate weekly rent paying somebody else’s mortgage) and a school close by for the children, and if you haven’t got two Pound coins to rub together you won’t be providing much stability … but a mortgage, partner and 2.4 children isn’t necessarily “the law” in the “rulebook of life” that everybody thinks we all have to adhere to 🙂

    1. Hey Biggsy, quite a few of the people I met in Tarifa were working for old bosses they’d managed to convince or started in a job knowing that they’d be able to do it remotely. I think there are some forward thinking bosses out there these days.

      Maybe I was a little brutal there – different strokes for different folks and all that. For me that kind of lifestyle just seems a million miles away right now but I’m pretty sure I’ll want a few aspects of it as I grow up. I do plan to buy a house, I’m just not sure which country I want it in yet. 🙂

  10. Love this so much, Vicky. What you’re doing is so amazing and I feel very lucky to be able to see you a couple of times a year… whenever we cross paths, that is! I love that you stress how much work really goes into being a digital nomad, because I can’t stand when people think this is “just lying around on a beach all day.”

    Can’t wait for the next instalments x

    1. Hey Brenna, thank you, that’s so nice to say! Hopefully be a bit more in the next few months. Yeah people always say that about me, that I sit around, but I like to think I use my time wisely. I get work done, obviously, I wouldn’t live this life I do if I didn’t, but I also know how to make the most of my time off and to be super productive so that I get a lot of it.

      Let me know if there’s anything in particular you want me to write about and I’ll see what I can do!

  11. Hey Vicky, great summing up of digital nomads. Having previously been a consumer and attached to a permanent place & things, I know the feeling of uncoupling from that way of life and how it feels on the other side. I wouldn’t give up the flexibility and freedom of being a digital nomad for anything.

  12. I love the post! You have an amazing blog:)
    What about following each other on Instagram, Bloglovin, Twitter? Let me know:)

    irenethayer.com

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