How to Work & Travel: Our Guide to being a Digital Nomad

So you want to work and travel? This way of seeing the world is really becoming a way of life for many. It seems that after the COVID-19 outbreak, people have found more ways to work remotely, and therefore are working from wherever, as well as working from home.

‘Digital nomad’ has become somewhat of a buzz word, with many places using it to entice remote workers to venture to their spot, to stay at their place or work from their cafe. 

Being ‘Digital’ 

The first step in starting a digital nomad lifestyle, is to go digital…you can’t work and travel if you can’t take your work with you. 

Digital nomads work mostly online…this means that they can take their work and do it remotely. Instead of working from home, we work from wherever. Home can be anywhere you want it to be! 

Becoming a ‘nomad’

The second part to becoming a digital nomad, is the nomadic way of life. To us, this means having no fixed abode and travelling frequently. It’s becoming more common for people to settle into longer periods of stillness as they travel, too; stopping in places for upwards of 6 months. It’s really about figuring out what suits you best. 

Some of the things you need to take into consideration before you embark on longer-term travel are:

Your budget

Your motivation 

Your community 

Your work set-up 

Technicalities

Your budget: will dictate where you can go. If you’re just starting out, then cheaper countries will probably suit you more, as you can work on building up your business, without financial pressure. Of course, the actual travelling can be expensive, but settling in places with longer term rents can be a great way to make travelling more economical, with lots of places giving discounts for stays of 30 days or more. 

Your motivation: where do you want to go, and why? Travelling can be hard, and it can be isolating. Figuring out where you want to go and why you want to go there can help you to overcome the difficult days and remember why you started on this journey. 

Your community: are you a community-led creature or are you more of a lone-wolf? Figuring this out can really help you to plan around what makes you comfortable. Personally, we love to be in community – it gives us the opportunity to foster new friendships and connections, with the ability to take time to ourselves when we need it. This really comes into its own when you’ve been away from home, family and friends for a while. 

Your work set-up: Do you need to have access to stable wifi? Or does your work only require more occasional internet access? Figuring out what you need will help you to not only choose the types of accommodation that will suit you best, but allow you to make decisions that will help you to thrive on the road.

Technicalities: Of course it’s great to figure out what you need in order to personally thrive…but there are some rules that we’ve got to take into consideration too. Before you go anywhere, check the visa requirements! There is no point in planning a 6 month trip to somewhere where your visa only allows you to stay for 3…and if you do, you’ll need to look into visa runs or alternatives! This step seems the scariest, but generally it’s quite straight-forward with a little prior research.

There are a lot of things to consider when you begin the journey to becoming a digital nomad, and these are just some of them. We hope that this article was helpful – let us know if you’d like to hear more on this subject!