How to become a digital nomad: a Beginner Guide

What to learn how to become a digital nomad? Let’s start from the basics, what it means, and how to travel the world working from anywhere.

Hi! This is Isabella the founder of this blog. I have been a digital nomad since 2017 and never looked back. I love my life on the road with all its challenges and rewards. It’s a winding and rough road sometimes, but full of excitement and I wouldn’t want it any other way.

In this post, I will tell you how you can achieve it too, if you really want it.

I hope this guide will help every woman who wishes to work location-independent make the switch and believe in herself and the universe because that’s all it takes, besides hard work.

me

Read more about my journey.

What being a digital nomad means

Most people get confused about the semantics. So let’s get it out of the way.

Being a digital nomad, by definition, means working from a laptop from anywhere, no matter if you work for somebody else or you have your own business.

The main point of being a digital nomad is to have the freedom to travel everywhere you wish.

There is a catch though.

The life of a digital nomad can be very frugal. We don’t need an office, for example, we can work from a coffee shop, a co-working space our temporary home, or even a bus. The only MUST is a good wifi connection. This is an essential and cannot-live-without element of the digital nomad life.

Spoiler alert: if you imagine the digital nomad life being on the beach all day with your computer, you are completely wrong. Whether you have your own business or an online job, you need to stay focused and work from a clean and tranquil environment, which is certainly not the beach.

Besides, I already picture all the sand sneaking through the keyboard gaps and completely damaging the laptop. No thanks.

The expatriate (friendly known as expat)

But if you work from your laptop from your own home in a foreign country, you are not a digital nomad. In that case, you would be an expatriate who works from home.

The Nomad

The nomad is anyone who travels and lives either on savings or on jobs they would pick up along the way. It’s tricky because it’s usually not legal to work in a foreign country even for a short period of time, with some exceptions. I have a below 30-year-old friend who managed to travel around Australia with a working visa. I found out when I was already in my forty. My bad!

Or there are work exchange jobs that you can easily find online. You don’t get paid usually, but you get food and a place to stay in exchange for 30 hours of work per week. I will talk about it more later on.

You can also find jobs where the company pays and arranges your visa, for example, on Cruises. I will talk about it in detail in another post.

I was a tour rep for about four years, and I changed my destination every six months to 1 year, and my company would help me arrange my visa and permits.

The Freelancer

Freelancer works for companies on a contract base, but it’s not necessarily a digital nomad, as they can easily work from their home. In this post, we will talk about how to achieve a nomadic life both digital and analog 🙂

Are you still with me?

Before you decide if the digital nomad life is for you, you might want to read about the benefits and the downsides of being a digital nomad.

The PROS and CONS of a Digital nomad lifestyle

The Digital Nomad lifestyle has its pros and cons, just like any other kind of lifestyle. It’s not always rainbows and unicorns. We all have different priorities, and we love and cherish other things. Here below, I am sharing the benefits and downsides of being a digital nomad according to my experience.

The benefits of being a digital nomad

I have been a digital nomad for about 3 years and for me, the benefits outnumber the negatives. Here they are:

• The freedom of working on your own terms, even when you have deadlines, you still decide which part of the day is dedicated to working and which part is to rest or fun.
• The freedom of being anywhere you want in this world because the only thing you need is a good laptop.
• The most amazing feeling is that you own your life and your time. This one is priceless.
• You meet beautiful people, some of whom become friends forever.
• You expand your limits.
• You are free from the toxic environment of the office and all the politics of the corporate world. This one was making me seriously sick.
• The costs of living can be meager if you want.

The downside of being a digital nomad

• Not being able to have my own pets – but that’s why I housesit to spend time with the furry ones.
• Not being able to bring lots of clothes with me, although I always exceed a reasonable limit, and I never understand what traveling light means. I get bored by wearing the same clothes and love fashion. But since I have to optimize space, I have to give up on the stuff I love and be practical.
• Sometimes it’s lonely. I miss having a reunion with my closest friends of a lifetime, even if I meet amazing people on the road.
• Sometimes I don’t have the lure of traveling that I used to when I was waiting for a year to go on vacation because I am always traveling. So instead, I can’t wait to have some stability.
• Being constantly on the move is exhausting. Trust me, it’s true. Besides the packing and unpacking part, it’s also the planning and searching for where to stay, what to do, and all the things you read in my blog. And that’s why blogging is a full-time job and really tiring. The amount of research, walking the talk, and testing and trying is incredibly huge.

Are you a Digital Nomad? What are your pros and cons? Or would it be that you would miss the most about a stable life if you were one? I look forward to hearing from you.

Prepare for the leap

Once you know that you want to take the leap, you will need to prepare yourself. Make a plan or plan that you don’t want to have a plan. But at least get your finances together. In other words, save money.

It took me 2 years to decide whether I wanted to leave my fancy 9 to 5 job or not and in the meantime I started to save money…just in case. I didn’t know at that time that I would want to stay on the road for so long and I wanted to make sure I had enough money to stay on the road as long as possible.

If I could turn back time I would make fewer mistakes but I am very proud of the way I could save.

I wanted to live on the road for a while without worrying about making more money, so I preferred to stay on a budget and enjoy my freedom at the very beginning.

However, I had some low-paying gigs now and then, and I spent a lot of time working from cafes or my Airbnb while traveling, which made me understand that it was the life I have ever wanted.

I also started a business with a few friends, but I had to let it go because I realized it was not for me, and I regretted spending two months of my time working hard for nothing. But, hey, you learn from mistakes.

My take from that experience is that you set the sail to head in that direction if you know what you ultimately want.
If you don’t know what you want, you go where the wind takes you, and you run the risk of running in a circle and not going anywhere. And that was my biggest mistake, in a way.
You can also decide that you want to go with the flow. Anything works, as long as you know the consequences.

So before taking the leap, have faith and do the math.

Also, keep in mind the following:

• If you are scared, think that you can always go back, maybe not with the same job, but you can still use your skills to find another one (unless another pandemic strikes – “facepalm”)
• The nomadic life is not for everyone, and you might decide after a few months that it’s not for you. Many people do. There is nothing wrong with it. It’s not a failure. It’s about self-awareness and being true to oneself.

How to earn a living while traveling

So now that you have decided that the digital nomad life is for you, it’s time to find out what kind of job will allow you to work remotely.

However, before even taking that step I would first figure out what are your skills and, most of all, what you enjoy doing, and what you are passionate about.

Basically, what do I want to do for a living? Do I work better for a company or do I want to become an entrepreneur?

Of course, I cannot tell you what to do, but if you haven’t figured it out yet, here some books that might help you ponder and brainstorm some ideas:

Start with Why – Simon Sinek
Reinvent yourself – James Altucher
The four hour week – Tim Ferris
100 $ start up – Chriss Guillebeau
The happiness of pursuit – Chriss Guillebeau
Vagabonding – Rolf Pott

Mind that they are not manuals but inspiring books that give you food for thought.

To help you brainstorm job ideas, I also wanted to share the jobs that I know of that you can do from anywhere.

Freelance jobs

Now that more and more companies appreciate the benefits of contracting freelancers, there are more and more jobs that you can find and get paid by project or by hours.

The main one that I can think of is a writer. Many websites outsource writers. Mainly are in English, but I am sure that any country needs local writers for their sites. It’s a matter of understanding where to find them. Of any topic.

So, if you are an expert in finance, food, DIY crafts, flooring, painting—you name it—or you are a techy person or an expert on a destination, you can find websites that need writers for their content.

I just hired somebody to write about California on my blog, and I am working as a travel writer for a company that wants Mexican-related content.

There are many other freelancing jobs, such as photographers, web designers, artists, social media managers, project managers, and engineers, to name a few. There is a relatively new professional figure that has become very popular among the remote workers’ community, and it is called Virtual Assistant.

The virtual assistant is basically the person you want to outsource if you want to delegate some aspect of your business that is not your forte to focus on the core business of your company. One thing could be social media management and project management or staff coordination, customer service, and e-commerce management, to give you a few examples.

Here below is a list of sites where you can find online jobs:

Upwork
Fiverr
People per hour
Flexjobs
Powertofly

Full time remote jobs

Unlike freelancers who work on assignments, full-time remote jobs are for an undetermined time and have specific hours, and of course, they are paid by the hour. Some of them still give you a freelance contract, but you are treated as a remote employee.

I used to have one for some time before the pandemic happened. Although it wasn’t exactly my ideal system as I was still tight to a schedule, I still had the freedom to be anywhere as long as I respected my shift and had good wifi in a quiet area since I talked to clients over the phone. That was a customer service position.

In this case, you can decide your field (in my case, it was tourism, for example), search for the biggest company in that field you are an expert, and search in their Career section if they have any openings in a remote position.

Otherwise, the links mentioned above are also useful to find this sort of job. Just make sure you use the right keywords to search for what you are looking for within the platform.

Blogging

Blogging has become quite a popular way of making money, and although the market might be saturated, I believe that if you have the right niche and start in the right way, anyone new in blogging can succeed.

I have been blogging for about 4 years now, although only in the past 2 years. I have treated my blog as a business (part-time business), and I am still working hard to make it profitable. But if I had to start from scratch, I would have grabbed one of the many online blogging courses to avoid wasting time in correcting the mistakes.

Many Facebook blogging groups allow you to mingle with other bloggers and exchange ideas, and there is always one expert blogger who is willing to help and share some precious pearls of wisdom.

However, remember that there is always a catch, and the group’s founder is selling something. Normally a blogging course or a book.

Sometimes it’s worth it, but always make sure it’s a good fit for you. There are so many experts and so many courses out there, and it’s challenging to understand right from wrong. And sometimes, even if many other bloggers have benefited from them, it might not be a good fit for you.

I know for a fact.

I have bought three courses and two blogging books, and I managed to get a couple of insights from each of them but definitely not worth the outrageous amount of money I have paid. In both cases, it was because a trustworthy person suggested the course, and in both cases, I felt that it was not a good fit for me.

So keep it in mind when you choose. Ask around, ask specific questions, and if you are not satisfied, use the refund guarantee if there is one. I didn’t, because I felt bad and now I regret it.

Also please consider that blogging can be fun, I still love it after 4 years of ups and downs, but it comes with lots of frustrations and there are days when you just want to throw the laptop off the window.

But I guess it’s like any business, there is a lot of trial and error factor but if you love what you do and you believe in what you are blogging about, you will always fall on your feet and carry on.

Just take these blogging tips that I have also gathered from other (successful) bloggers:

• Chose your niche wisely and make sure you are an expert
• Learn the technical part and the WordPress basics from the beginning so you don’t waste your time correcting the mistake after. (If you are not a web-savvy, hire a web designer from the beginning)
• learn SEO right away. You need it.
• I think the most complete and professional are the free blogging guides such as Briand Dean’s Backlinko.
• Join an FB group for bloggers to exchange opinions and updates from the blogging world.

Become an entrepreneur

Bloggers are entrepreneurs, but I wanted to leave it as a category on its own for some reason. Marketing agents, virtual assistants, translators, and photographers, to name a few, can either work as a freelancer or open their businesses as “solopreneurs” or contracting collaborators. It is a possibility, and, as usual, it always depends on what you want. I believe there is a subtle line between the two positions but a considerable difference in taxation, I guess. That depends on your country of residence, and you should talk to a financial consultant to make sure you do things right.

Non-digital jobs

If you are not one of those people who love to spend all day in front of a laptop, there are also tons of jobs that require you to travel. For example, you can find a job on a cruise, or on a sailing boat.

There are tons of jobs out there, and even if you don’t have the experience if you know a couple of languages and you are a people person, you can surely get a chance as a first-timer. Yoga instructors can travel the world and ask to collaborate with different yoga centers or hotels. Many luxury hotels offer yoga and fitness teachers an exchange for a week or two stay in exchange for yoga classes. Not a bad deal.

English teachers can find jobs online on different teaching platforms.

What skills do I need to become a digital nomad?

Well, that depends on what kind of job or business you are interested in. You might have already identified your area of interest, but you might not have the skills or feel like you want to improve your knowledge. Worry not. The queen of courses (me) will help you. I love to take online courses and develop my skills. Well, my problem is that I want to learn too many things and get overwhelmed. But if you are more disciplined, you can check out the below sites that offer amazing online courses where you can develop the skills you are more interested in.

Creative Live – it’s a great platform with very professional courses – I especially took photography and Photoshop courses, illustrator, and a couple of art courses, and were very professionally put together. If you keep an eye on it, sometimes you get amazing deals and the chance to watch the courses on streaming for free.

Udemy is another exciting platform with thousands of courses of every sort. It’s not so selective as CREATIVE LIVE, but it’s much cheaper, and you will have many comments to browse through to help you understand whether the course is worth the money. From Social Media to UX Design and art, you name it.

Domestika.  I love it because the teachers are professional, and they give you so much information and tips on other sources and inspirational competitors of theirs. However, the courses in themselves are pretty basics, and the majority of them are in Spanish with subtitles in English.

Coursera is an American online learning platform since 2012 that offers massive open online courses, specializations, and degrees from many universities across the US.

Courses on Coding – Learning how to code is a very demanded profession. It’s a long journey, but you will never be left without a job. The better you get, the easier it will be to find employment or work as a freelancer. This site offers free courses from the basics. But there is a catch. You need to like it a lot. If you are not passionate, you will get lost along the way. It’s super freaking difficult. I gave up after a week. It was not my thing.

Lettering course with Loveleighloops – I have recently started a new addiction to Procreate, the iPad app, to create amazing drawings and lettering. The amount of artwork that you can do with that is unimaginable, and I love it so much that I  made myself believe that one day I will do such beautiful works that I will live on that. Crazy right? Watch me!  In any case, whether you want to become a pro or kill time if you like drawing and coloring, this is an amazing tool that you can use.

For those who don’t know, lettering is a kind of calligraphy but more creative and artistic.

Skillshare is another fantastic learning platform that offers online courses, from digital art to painting, social media management, coding, photography, you name it.

Learn a new language with Duolingo. I use it to learn Portuguese. The app is super funny and friendly.

The legal aspect of being a Digital Nomad

I am not going to get technical here because I do not offer advice on this subject. Every country has its own rules. However, to make sure you are acting according to the law of your own country, I am just suggesting to find a financial counselor or expert of your country of residence and do all the necessary paperwork that will keep you out of jail when you go back 🙂

Meaning that if you have your own company, register it and pay your taxes, or if you are a freelancer, do whatever you need to do to play by the rules. If you hate this part of the business, I hear you. Find somebody who does it for you. That’s the best-spent money for your sanity.

Where to travel as a digital nomad?

Now that you know you want to join the digital nomad’s life and plan your departure, you might want to decide where to go. This Travel Resources guide will help you organize your trip. However, before deciding where to go as a nomad, you must understand a couple of things.

Read on.

Traveling on a Tourist visa

Here comes the tricky part. When you enter a country as a tourist, technically, you are not supposed to work, but since you are a digital nomad and work from your computer, it’s difficult for the local authorities to control.

Besides, you are not stealing jobs from locals because you are working on your own business, or you have your own clients, so, even ethically, you should be good. However, the tourist visa expires, normally every 3 to 6 months.

If you want to stay longer, in some countries, you can go out for a couple of days and go back in. But rules change and it’s different for each country, and it also depends on your passport.

So it’s essential if you check the country’s immigration laws before even traveling there. Some countries also require that any visitor shows a return ticket to make sure you are not overstaying. So you must check that out too.

Digital nomad visa

Many countries are ahead of the game and have just instituted a visa for digital nomads that allows you to live in the country legally for a year and work as a digital nomad.

This is cool. It feels like the digital nomad style has finally been globally recognized as a real thing. I expect more and more countries to implement such a visa soon.

So far, here are the most popular countries with a Digital Nomad Visa and where you can apply.

But please remember that you DON’T HAVE TO apply for a digital nomad visa if you don’t intend to stay for more than the tourist visa requires.

Besides the Digital nomad visa is not for everyone and you need to fulfill all the requirements in order to be entitled, including a minimum monthly income (and show proof.)

Digital nomad’s favorite countries

Since I entered the digital nomad world, I have joined different Facebook groups for Digital Nomads and Entrepreneurs to familiarize with the lifestyle. One of the things I have realized is that there are particular destinations that, for some reason, are dear to Digital Nomads, so I am sharing them with you just FYI.

Bali – Indonesia
Chang Mai – Thailand
Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Barcelona – Spain
Lisbon – Portugal
Tallinn – Estonia
Playa del Carmen – Mexico
Oaxaca – Mexico

I have never been to Asia, but I know that Chang Mai is incredibly cheap and has a vast digital nomads community. It’s been the starting point of many nomads that I know (virtually) and a great place to start your new life if you have a low budget.

Playa del Carmen in Mexico has mid-range costs compared to the Asian destination, but Digital Nomads love it. It’s a great place to mingle, meet up, go to the beach, awesome party scene and food, and a great getaway to the Yucatan Peninsula and the rest of Mexico.

Getting Around

You can move around either by plane or bus, or I love to rent a when I switch into the explorer mode. I tend not to use flights if not necessary because I have become a digital nomad to travel the world, and if I travel by plane, I feel like I am missing out on the landscape.

However sometimes flying is necessary and to find my ticket I use aggregators, which means sites that compare rates from different airlines, which is great for you to see all prices on one page.

Compare prices among the aggregators and the airline website at different times of the day or night, so you will make sure you are getting the best possible fare.

If you see a reasonable rate to you, book it without hesitation because you never know when the offers end. Always search from an incognito window.

Finding Accommodation as a Digital Nomad

Booking.com is a favorite site of mine, especially when I am exploring and need short stays. In this case, I might use hotels instead of apartments. The platform is super user-friendly and straightforward, it offers reviews from previous clients and has a thorough description of the properties, not to mention the great deals that you always get.

I usually use TripAdvisor to check reviews of places and tours; however, it has also become a booking platform for the past few years that you can use to compare rates. Many digital nomads love to stay in hostels for their social life, but I am an introvert, and I love to have my own space.

A new kind of stay that is getting popular among digital nomads is a coliving, fully furnished, and high-end private apartment with common areas where people can interact and socialize.

Become a housesitter – many digital and non-digital nomads do it. It’s a way to save money on rentals and spend some time with pets, which you can’t have if you travel the world (some travel with pets but the majority don’t). I do a lot of housesitting and I will write more on this topic very soon.

If you feel lonely

Living as a digital nomad and traveling alone is amazing and I wouldn’t change it for the world but I know that sometimes it gets lonely.

I am a very introverted person, and I love my loneliness; however, I love to connect with like-minded people on FB groups virtually.

Sometimes, it happens to be in the same city and meet, which is fantastic (sometimes).

Among the groups I love, there is a Digital Nomad girls community where you can connect with lovely ladies and network for your biz, ask questions exchange ideas. Also, Digital nomads around the world.

If you want to connect on a different level, there are always dating apps such as Tinder and Bumble, among others.

Digital nomad insurance

Just like for every trip, I always suggest having travel insurance. No matter how much it costs, it’s always less expensive than paying hospital fees in case of an accident or a serious illness. I don’t want to be negative. But things happen even if we are extra careful. So we need to prepare for the unexpected. There are many different travel insurance companies out there.

✔ Do I need travel insurance ? – Yes, you do!
Among all the multiple reasons why you should get travel insurance, is the peace of mind it gives you! Knowing that whatever happens, from medical emergencies to lost bags, canceled flights, theft, and more, your bills are taken care of. I have been using SafetyWing as I found it to be the best for what I need. I have recently found TRAVEL INSURANCE MASTER which is a great site to compare different insurance companies. Make sure you read carefully what’s included before making the purchase

Safetywing now has a new type of insurance for Expats, which is called remote health. It didn’t travel-related issues such as lost bags and missed flights, but it might cover pre-existing conditions in some cases and in case you need to go to your home country for some time. It’s worth checking it out.

Get a free quote

Is it easy to become a digital nomad? Final thoughts

I don’t think there is a general answer to these questions. It all depends on your skills, first of all, if they match the Digital Nomad lifestyle and with the online jobs available. Whether you are starting a business or working as a freelancer, it takes time to build authority for yourself.

Of course, it requires lots of trial and error, patience, and determination, with some exceptions. Still, as in all things in life and in all professions, if you put your heart and soul into it and work hard and smart, I assure you that you will eventually get there.

It might sound cheesy, but an essential asset for your success besides hard work is the mindset. If you set your mind to making it and you work towards your goal, you will.

100% guaranteed.