We all have plans. We all have goals. We all have dreams. Mine have changed slightly since I was in high school and everything that mattered to me was to become an NBA player (no need to say that it didn’t work out, right?)
Today I dream of becoming financially independent, on being able to remain self employed until retirement and beyond, to own my own dream house and to visit the US. I have many dreams going in all possible directions and some of them seem to be very impossible to be turned into reality. Such as my dream of becoming a Digital Nomad.
In 2009, I watched a documentary about The Philippines and that country managed to put me under its spell: a beautiful culture, lush locations, people that always smiled and an incredibly low cost of living. That moment I thought: “it would be nice to take my laptop and do my blogging from there”. Back then, I had no idea that this is called being a digital nomad. Back then, I had no idea that many people fully enjoy this type of life.
I want to be a digital nomad!
Just like every other person out there, I love to travel. I love seeing new places, meeting new people and, most important, I love new cultures. This is why the idea of being a digital nomad – traveling the world, setting camp for a few months here before moving there, all while working at my online business… this is why the idea of being a digital nomad sounds so nice for me.
Can I be a digital nomad?
This way of living is clearly best suited for people who either have a huge stash of money or their work is location-independent. In my case, I can go with the second so in theory I would be able to become a digital nomad.
But now there is a little “problem”: I have a family. The good thing is that I actually love both my wife and my child and I would never dream of leaving them behind. So going alone on such an adventure is completely out of the question.
Fortunately, my wife would agree to take this step for me – she is not particularly thrilled about leaving family and friends behind to travel the world, but she would do it. However, our newborn is difficult to be dealt with. I know of families who do this with kids, but the lifestyle of the digital nomad seems to work better with single people or at most couples.
But still, I want to believe that I can be a digital nomad: even though I got itchy feet, I am not in a hurry. I talked to my wife and agreed that we should put this on hold for at least one year, take care of the baby and only then start thinking about this whole digital nomad thing. Until then I will keep dreaming about all these beautiful countries in the world I’d love to live in, even for a short period of time.
For this reason, I have recently launched my “digital nomad blog” called Nomad, Not Mad. Check it out if you want to see how things turn out for me and if my dream becomes a reality… or if I outgrow it.
What about you? Would you like to live the life of a Digital Nomad or you think that there’s no better place on earth than home?
- Short History of Bucharest, Romania: Everything You Need to Know - September 22, 2023
- What Is the Minimum and Average Salary in Romania in 2023? [Updated] - September 18, 2023
- Where in Romania Is Transylvania? (And Dracula’s Castle) - September 14, 2023
This would be so cool to do, but I’m with you: I’ve got kids. We get so much help from our family; becoming a digital nomad would most likely mean no babysitters ever. (I wouldn’t feel comfortable leaving them with someone I only knew for a few months.) We need nights to ourselves sometimes. Maybe we could go all digital nomad on summer breaks once they’re all in school.
Oh, yes! That sounds like a good idea, although in my case since our child is just 2 months old… there’s a lot of waiting to do until the summer breaks :))
Am actually living such a life…well, sorta. Unlike you I don’t have a family yet and my job is location independent 🙂 And although I do like structure to my work life, this year I decided to take 3 months, went to some other country and worked from there as I sampled life and culture. Am planning to be doing this at least once a year.
Perhaps what I can suggest is to start small and explore options. Start with a working holiday around the country with the family. Experience some of the challenges that come with such a life; crappy internet connections etc. All in all though, its fun!
It sounds so nice that you were able to do this, Simon! And I actually like the idea of starting it slow and see if it is indeed something I’d like to do (even though I doubt it wouldn’t). It seems that you really like this so… good like into turning it into an all year round thing 🙂
I also wanted to be an NBA basketball player growing up…oh well, that didn’t work out. I’d also love to travel with my family and not have to have a structured 9-5 job.
Good to see that there are so many like-minded people here. It was really surprising for me to find out that many of my friends consider the idea of leaving a 9-5 job behind not only impossible, but also something they wouldn’t like…