Picture this – how would you like it if you get to work for at least a few months on the endless white beaches of Bali while the turquoise-emerald waters splashed against the shore? You could even work out of a dreamy village tucked away on the alluring coast of Spain. Take your pick. No daily commute in the traffic and no rush. Sounds unbelievable right? Believe us when we say that a new breed of techies is doing just that. They are called ‘digital nomads’.
It is a combination of 2 words – digital and nomad. Here the digital part means someone, who is tech savvy and nomad is someone preferring a nomadic lifestyle compared to a regular one. These are people who have let go of the comforts of their home and offices to live nomadic lives. They are just like you and me but prefer to live location independent life.
Meaning they have chosen to let go of the stability and comfort of living in one place; either with or without a regular income. There are several kinds of digital nomads – people who have jobs with regular organisations but happen to telecommute; freelancers and entrepreneurs. All of them move about from place to place and complete their jobs using a laptop and with the help of high speed internet connectivity.
There are a couple of advantages of living like this. It helps not being tied down by organisational rules and responsibilities and experiencing the freedom to travel and explore new cultures. Most of the nomads are more focussed on eventually becoming online entrepreneurs or freelancers by leveraging the advantages offered by technology, such as high-speed internet through which it is possible to create a viable career online in almost any location.
There are increasing number of careers that have been created online, jobs such as web design, software engineering, programming, graphic design, English teacher, travel writer, SEO consultant are some of the careers an aspiring digital nomad can look forward to. There needs to be a certain willingness to let go of the familiar and embrace the unknown. Excelling at a particular skill and being able to make money out of it happens to be the most important trait for a nomad.
It is especially meant for folks who are tired of a 9-5 grind and want freedom from it. They prefer to have the luxury of freedom to travel on their part and would not like to be tied down by a regular office job. Freelancers among them happen to work on their own schedule and complete the task assigned to them.
If you are successful at becoming a digital nomad, then your workstation could be under the blue sky on sandy beaches. There are a number of possibilities available such as being able to meet new people and explore new places every few months. There is also a flip side to being a digital nomad. Getting used to the idea having to deal with no internet at times and coping with different cuisines, having to continuously deal with booking your own hotels, flight tickets and other living arrangements in the new place. You also tend to miss the birthdays and parties hosted by your loved ones. Getting to date someone becomes a luxury, since you are not around in a regular place most of the time.
If you happen to dream of having a life like this, then it is important to find organisations that will help you in this endeavour. There are sites that help hire freelancers through their portal. Next there are sites that help in finding accommodations. Then there are sites that help compare the cost of living in cities around the world.
There are also organisations like GetFriday, to whom you could assign a chunk of mundane tasks that you want someone else to do on your behalf. Stuff like booking your tickets and hotel reservations can be taken care of by a virtual assistant (VA), while you focus on the more important core job that you are good at. Suppose you’re good at writing, you could assign – answering emails, calendar management, blog posting to a virtual assistant (VA), thus ensuring you have enough time to do things that you enjoy the most. It is about finding out what your non-core tasks are and then assigning these tasks to a VA to have more clarity and focus on your core tasks.
