Help! I'm Location Independent

“Location independent” is a phrase I, frankly, loathe. Though, with its implication that anyone who’s not travelling has somehow failed to think about what they want in life, “lifestyle design” is worse.

Like “digital nomad”, another way of saying the same thing, it’s a phrase you don’t often find in print.

“Location independence” is more of a tag than a term. A handle for tweets. An SEO search term. And, all too often, a frankly cynical hook for pyramid-selling a specific lifestyle dream to people who will, most likely, never achieve it.

What does it mean? Well, it’s the wired answer to “expat”.

When you’re location independent, you can work and travel at the same time. Work wirelessly from a beach, a rice field, overlooking a glacier. Set up your office in any wifi cafe on the planet.

An appealing concept to many who are stuck in the cubicle of cliche – and plenty who aren’t. And one that should, in theory, work easily for anyone who’s ever worked freelance or remotely.

Well, I love travel. So I’m giving it a go.

Z and I have been travelling for over a year now. Our original plan of six months in Asia then six months in Latin America has segued into two years exploring Asia, broken by a stint in Australia, followed by exploring Europe and the Middle East from a base in Spain.

Quite how? Well, that’s another story. But you see more of the world travelling slow than you do travelling fast. And we kind of fell in love with Indonesia.

Despite the hospitality of family and friends, Australia – not to mention our fondness for non-budget activities like diving, eating steak and drinking beer (me) and milkshakes (him) – has left something of a dint in the old travel budget (which was, in any case, only intended to last a year).

After more than a year out, I picked up my first job in December, have had a couple more since then, and am beginning to focus on it seriously now. Which, I guess, means I’m becoming location independent.

Or back at work… In a foreign country.

The bulk of how I’ve earned my living over the years has been through journalism and copywriting.

I love travel, good food and good drinks. I’ve previously written on food and drink, so the plan is to develop myself as a travel writer, pick up more writing about food and drink and do a little light, low pressure copywriting.

I’m also beginning to make a little money blogging. Which is nice, and something I intend to do more of. (As my best friend in the UK observed, “You love doing it, and you’re doing it anyway, so why not make money from it?”)

And I’m working on the fiction project I was intending to complete this year until, well, travel intervened…

On the one hand, I’m really excited by this. It’s a beautiful thing to sit in a beachside café, my son playing in the water and work from there. It’s lovely to sit here, with my view over the rice fields of Bali, and be productive.

I really enjoyed bouncing around Sydney and Melbourne’s best bars for work. I’m looking forward to more of the same in Singapore and other cities later this year.

On the other? I’m, well, I’m, honestly, scared. After a year of living high on the hog, spending the travel budget, the return to earning is a real shock.

You mean, I have to do this? For the rest of my life?!

Now, I walked away from journalism a few years after Z was born. Because, until you build up longstanding relationships with editors and acquire regular gigs (which takes time) freelance journalism is an extremely tough way to make a living.

It’s about persistence. About pitching stories. About handling rejection. About reading mangled copy. And, sometimes, about having the balls to reject a rate that counts as ludicrously low.

By which I don’t mean the internet $5 per 1000 words sweatshops, like elance.com. I don’t mean the increasing number of brand and indie websites populated entirely by free content in return for “exposure”.

You’d be surprised by how many legitimate, sometimes well-known publications, both online and offline, pay not that far above the minimum wage.

There are well-paid jobs out there. But they are few and far between.

The rates many book publishers, for example, pay their non-fiction authors for an entire, intensely researched book wouldn’t cover a year’s rent on a studio flat in the cities they are based in. Many travel guide authors traipse around the five-star hotels they write up from a base in a hostel dorm, an activity which, I’m guessing, is the working definition of “dispiriting”.

Anywise… I figured out a while back that the two of us can travel much of the world very happily for a total monthly figure rather less than the cost of a London rent.

So, given the lower cost of living, I should be able to work much less than previously, and at things I enjoy, and have a better quality of life. Enter location independence.

Now, in theory, it should be easy enough for me to become location independent. All I need is an internet connection, a laptop and a camera.

I have some existing clients, a range of contacts, a few advertisers on this site. Oh, and I just scored my first travel writing gig.

Which, I guess, makes me location independent already.

But I’m also a single parent. I’m responsible for Z’s education, his wellbeing, his happiness, his meals, his laundry…

And I don’t want to return to the traditional freelance pattern of working all the hours god sends, just in a different location.

Because that, whatever you may read about four hour work weeks, is what a lot of freelancers do.

Particularly since the vast majority of clients in many industries expect you to be constantly available, no matter what. You know.

They don’t want to wait for their website until you get down off that mountain, or back from that deserted island. Conference calls are on their time, not yours. And many would kind of like you available for face to face meetings too.

So, paradoxically, my first steps to location independence involve, erm, having a base for a couple of months.

Why? Well, firstly there’s the internet thing. Our next destination is Papua, a region better known for chaps with bones through their noses, gourds on their penises and charming collections of not-that-antique heads than for 24/7 connectivity and mobile working.

I don’t want to be pitching to new clients or restarting work for old clients when I don’t know when I’ll next get online. Or stabbing at the reload button for ten minutes down a Jayapura back street surrounded by gaming teenagers while trying to send an email.

I want to be able to respond fast, establish a relationship, develop a history of delivering. Then I can go back to being unplugged.

Now, I know folk who have achieved location independence by working for a few home clients while travelling, and support a family solely by this. There’s some folk out there, though fewer than you’d think from the number selling “make money online” schemes, who earn their living blogging.

I know others who have struggled with it, finding they have to pass on jobs to others because of the vagaries of internet access, and never get them back again.

Secondly? The not-so-small matter of Z’s education. We’ve been unschooling, which has delivered fantastic results despite its patchy nature.

Right now, we’re studying Bahasa Indonesia together two mornings a week, and he’s done courses from fruit-carving to gamelan, via silver-smithing, with more to come.

But as I begin a relatively intensive period of re-entering the working world and dealing with the practicalities around that, I can’t simultaneously deliver his entire education.

So we’ve found a lovely little multicultural primary in the rice fields a mile or so from here, with a playground by a stream and bamboo classrooms, which takes drop-in students and follows a British-ish curriculum.

He’s going there two days a week at the moment, and we’re considering a third day. He’s enjoying the fun classes like yoga, music, art and swimming, and the assault course in the playground.

Formal lessons like science, maths, English and social studies aren’t a stretch. And he’s loving the playground interaction with other kids.

Thirdly, there’s the old payment issue. In location independent working, or any form of freelance working, chasing payment is a fact of life for most.

I am not mad keen to head out into the wilds of Papua with invoices awaiting payment and no guaranteed access to Skype calling with which to chase them or online access with which to confirm payment.

Particularly since I intend to work very significantly less while back on the road than I am in our little house in Ubud.

Fourthly, there’s learning. Having traveled in regions of Indonesia where barely any English is spoken, equipped with only a spectacularly crap dictionary, two pages of guidebook phrases and a gift for blagging, I’m quite keen for both of us to get a better handle on the language before we head back.

And I’d like to shed my motorbike fears and conquer the art of riding decent distances on Balinese roads, before we negotiate, say, China.

Taking a base, of course, doesn’t mean we’ve stopped travelling, though it does mean we can move with a smaller pack.

We’ve been all over Bali in the last couple of weeks: from the beaches and national park in the far north-western corner to the temple of Ulu Watu at the island’s southernmost point.

We’ve wound through the centre of the country, rising up from sunny beaches into mist-filled craters and vertiginous crater rims, zipwired in the rain, had hot chocolate by an open fire (it rains a lot in those central mountains!), stayed in a beautiful garden by the beach…

I’m planning trips to a bunch of islands, considering Lombok, and we’re developing a social life round here, too.

It’s a good place to be. And I’m grateful for it.

But it’s a scary one, too. I’ll keep you posted how it goes.

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28 Responses

  1. “Obstacles are what you see when you take your eyes off the goal”… or something like that. I have no doubts that you can make it work. Just keep on doing what you do best. You’ll make it happen.

    -Wes

    • also, is ‘blagging’ a slang word I don’t know or should it be ‘blogging’? If the latter, please delete this comment 🙂

      • admin says:

        Ah. I think you, sir, are playing me for the gullible fool who twice believed said word had been removed from the dictionary.

        Blagging is a fine and thoroughly British word, and some might say it’s not coincidental that it is only one letter removed from blogging. it refers to acquiring stuff to which one is not entitled. Like guestlists for premiere after-parties (or premierse, for that matter, though I’ve only ever been to kids’ movie premieres, due to being the first of my social circle to procreate and therefore muchly invited), free drinks, free stuff, press trips, etc.

        Check out the oeuvre of mockney auteur Guy Ritchie for more hardcore uses of the term. Or don’t, of course…

    • admin says:

      Aw, thank you! I’m optimistic, too. Have earned more than I’ve spent since I started working, which is a bloody novelty to me as a Londoner, I can tell you.

      How’s life in Thailand?

  2. Natalia says:

    Great post – glad to see a few of us are writing about these kind of things lately!

    When we moved to the UK two years ago due to various circumstances I couldn’t get a job that paid above the basic wage. So I thought ‘I’ll just freelance’ as an editor (my old job). Hard, hard work, and I have regular access to internet, am able to call people, even head in to London now and then to accost them if need be. But hard to get work (admittedly I had moved to a new country that due to the GFC was laying of editors at newspapers and publishing houses, who were now also competing as freelancers) and what really surprised me, hard to get paid! Even well known, established organisations took FOREVER to pay. I’m talking blood out of a stone. Which is bad enough when you are in a position that you have other sources to pay the bills. I can’t imagine the stress if you are relying on an invoice being paid to put food on the table or pay for accommodation and it drags on for 12 weeks (as it did in one case for me).

    That said – you are an amazing writer, and seem to have your sh*t squared away, so at least on that side I am sure you will not have problems! I hope the logistics work out for you as well.

    • admin says:

      I think it’s especially bad in the UK, to be honest. There are places in the US and Oz, I believe, that pay the magic dollar a word — you have to be a star columnist in Britain to get anything like that.

      And, yes, British companies are utterly crap payers. I used to routinely have to threaten to sue, or even issue court letters, to get paid within 90 days. Interestingly, most people will respect you after that, continue to employ and pay promptly.

      But, that said, if you’re not tied into the London cost-of-living cycle — where the vast majority of freelance women are single, or have another breadwinner — I’m optimistic it’s a lot more doable.

      • Natalia says:

        I have a friend who is paid that rate to write – she writes for a B2B publication for the media industry – but she got the jobs through having lots of contacts in the industry to start with. But yes, the pool in the UK seems bigger, which seems to make it a ‘race to the bottom’ in terms of rates.

        • admin says:

          By dollar a word, I guess I meant pound a word (for the UK) — but I wouldn’t be surprised by an expert B2B person getting around the dollar mark.

          Though unglamorous, it’s a good place to be, though you do need to cultivate the insider expertise — rather than, say, researching one topic extensively…

          I was amazed, incidentally, in Oz, by how thriving your media industry is compared to ours. All those regional papers with solid news content, lots of ads and decent features — and your population is a third of ours…

  3. Before I dropped out in 2007, I went to a freelance journalism conference in Sydney. The star speaker was untrained as a journalist, a gung-ho young woman who decided she would find a way to make money following surf carnivals. What was meant to be an uplifting “you can do it too” session was incredibly depressing. I am a journalist. I trained to be a journalist. I’ve been a journalist for years and I’m good at it. So why should I spend my time, as she did, baking muffins to deliver to editors to make her memorable (I’m not kidding), pitching stories and chasing invoices. She hinted that if her husband didn’t have a good job she wouldn’t be able to continue with her “little hobby”.
    I gave it a shot, though. I pitched an idea, had it accepted, ran around chasing extra pics, fact boxes, you name it. And the story just never ran. After six months the travel editor stopped replying to my emails or answering his phone.
    So I taught English instead. Then worked nights subbing bad English. Easier but much more boring and not feasible as a single mum, that’s for sure. And I couldn’t leave my home base of Ho Chi Minh City because I ended up working six days a week.
    Now I’m a few steps behind you, Theodora. I’ve got to find a way to earn money on the road. I will go nuts if I have to keep working full-time.
    By the way, I like the terms location independent and lifestyle design. I think they’re much nicer than the old fashioned words for the same thing – irresponsible layabout hippie backpacker. Or, heaven forbid – a dropout!
    Good luck to us! You sound like you’re going to kick some right royal butt as a LIP. 🙂

  4. admin says:

    Oh Jesus. Yes, one sees a lot of that with mummy bloggers, too. Not the baking muffins thing, which makes me a little queasy just to contemplate.

    But the utter smugness about a form of success that’s entirely subsidised by hubbie.

    If I had to put money on it, I’d guess that one reason travel writing rates are so low is that there’s so many women out there doing it as a status hobby job…

    I haven’t explored the subbing/copy-editing route — it’s something I’ve done, but as it’s reactive it’s not conducive to the way we operate. I’ve considered teaching English as a fallback position. Or, for that matter, Latin. But, harshly, the optimal way to do things is to continue to earn what one might at home, while being based in a lower-cost economy. How easy that is to do, time will tell…

    It’s interesting that you like these terms. I wasn’t averse to them, in fact, until I saw them used as pegs for so many get-rich-quick schemes…

  5. Mark Wu says:

    Another great post. You tell it as it is, both good, bad and in between. Unlike other travel sites which promote a sugar-coated ideal.

    It’s a great way for your readers, myself included, to see if your lifestyle is a practical one to adopt too. I’m back where the money is for now (London – where I can still find good work), though am trying to shift my income online more.

    Regard’s Z’s education, are you mapping it to the GCSE syllabus and so on so that he eventually achieves the usual “formal” qualifications?

    • admin says:

      Hiya! Great to hear from you… I’m keeping an eye on GCSEs and similar — I’d guess he’d end up doing iGCSE at 16 and IB at 18. I don’t have any particular concerns about English, because he can read Dickens, the Guardian and the FT weekend magazine, and can write very sophisticated prose when he can be arsed.

      He’s doing work for the year grade above the one he’d be in the UK at his current school in science, and I think maths too. In terms of English primary school history, he’s read all the Horrible Histories series, so knows all the Roman / Egyptian /Tudor stuff they cover there… With science, we use the BBC bytesize site to check that he knows what he should know for leaving primary, and to teach stuff he doesn’t know — but again, he’s devoured all the Horrible Science series.

      One learning I’ve got is that 30-45 minutes 1 on 1 with a parent or, for that matter, grandparent (we’ve had a lot of time with my parents over the last few months or so) equates to about 3 weeks of lessons in a London primary school.

      Major issue we have is handwriting – he’s a lefty, started writing at 3, making the letters the way he felt like making them, then school only got around to showing him how to form them aged 6, and they showed him the right hand way, so he loathes handwriting. He’s actually doing calligraphy as an attempt to get around this, because I don’t want to spend hours of time badgering him about writing, or forcing him to handwrite, which will only make matters worse. He does prefer to write on screen, which isn’t so much a problem for a millennial child.

      Gosh. Long answer. But, in essence, I’m keeping an eye on his progress by conventional metrics. I got him do to some SAT papers this summer, the ones he’d sit at 11, and he got the top grades in all of them, which was reassuring… There’s more about what we’ve done schooling wise here: http://travelswithanineyearold.com/2010/12/30/our-world-school-an-end-of-year-report/

  6. Good idea to stop moving for a bit and settle the business side of the things…and to do it in Bali! Well…I loved it there and could definitely see myself working from there! As for the motorbike…just do it…it’s not that bad! Cheers!

    • admin says:

      It’s the precious cargo on the back, who also wriggles, that worries me most about the motorbike. But we’re going to brave Gunung Kawi today, which is about 20k there and back (I’ve done that sort of distance before), then build up to visiting folk we know in Canggu…

      I’ll also do some longer trips around solo while he’s in school.

  7. good for you – and ugh welcome back to the real world, i guess. i am glad you’re looking into STILL more traveling and living abroad, and yes those concerns are real. good thing you found a great place for Z to be whilst you work, and there’s still enough time to play! 🙂

    • admin says:

      Yep, it was a bit of a nasty shock realising how far I’d depleted the bank account — and also the return to the real world stuff. But, yes, Bali feels quite serendipitous as a place to be. I could, to be honest, live here quite happily, but Z’s not keen on living in Asia — wants to do Europe and Spain — plus it’s actually quite expensive to get resident visas &c…

  8. Rachel says:

    I’d love to be LI in Asia but I guess I’ll put up with Spain! Remember the idignation I felt at having to earn a living again. Being self employed sure is scary in a foreign country hey? Glad you’ve found a little school for Z, I bet he’s loving having some kids to play with. BTW I will not be baking any muffins, ever 😉 xxxx

    • admin says:

      One of the huge pluses of freelancing in Asia is the low cost of living. But, yeah, the back-to-reality gut punch of having to earn a living, albeit a relatively weeny one, is very, very annoying. Will see how I feel about it all next week. But swinging towards positivity at the moment…

  9. Diane H. says:

    Great post! I enjoyed the “4 Hour Work Week” as a read, but it’s simply not realistic. There is absolutely no way that guy wrote his book and became a best seller in only 4 hours a week!!!!

    In corporate US there is a standard piece of advice that every working mother gets “You can have it all, just not all at the same time”. The first time I was first told that it annoyed the hell out of me, but it turned out it was pretty much true. The travel/work thing has been similar. When we travel, business suffers. So our approach is like yours – pick a home base for a school year, travel from there, and be ok that we make significantly less money that we could if we’d just stay put. When we travel we do that and do it well, and when we don’t we make sure we’re doing the best we can for our clients to keep the money we need for travel coming in.

    (Oh, and that payment thing – SO TRUE!!! How can it be so hard to move money around the world in this day and age!!!)

    • admin says:

      It’s interesting that you’re managing to combine work and travel in that way. I’m hoping I can combine money earning with travelling, just work less while we’re on the road — but I’m still only in the early days of it.

      I’m just starting to grapple with the realities of Paypal and foreign exchange economics. In that: it costs you to receive the money on Paypal. They change it to your home currency at some unflattering rate. Then you transfer it into your account, and you have to pay again to take it out in the currency of the country you’re in.

      Still, mustn’t grumble. I’m a bit scared still but I do like the way we’re living and have been living…

      • Diane H. says:

        You said it! I have a complete love/hate relationship with Paypal.On one hand you can move money around easily, and it’s less expensive than the alternatives. But it’s still HORRENDOUSLY expensive. Our “workaround” is to clients send checks to a (very, very good) friend and she deposits them to the bank account we opened with the best deal for international withdrawals. Lots of trial-and-error to figure that out though – it seems to be quite different depending on your home country and your host country.

        You will figure out what works for you. It may be painful – just like traveling can be – but the payoff of having the lifestyle AND making an income is a pretty sweet. I’d wish you luck but it’s pretty clear you’re the kind of gal who makes her own luck, so I look forward to hearing how it goes.

  10. Great article! I’m another who isn’t fond of the term lifestyle designer, although digital nomad and location-independent don’t bother me. It can be a scary notion, especially when it’s just you caring for your child. What a great life you’re providing for Z!

    • admin says:

      I’m not averse to digital nomad — I think it’s quite an encapsulating term. What I do object to, as I guess you do, is the number of people selling it as a product… When do you guys set out? Excited for both of you!

  11. Very good read. Congratulations on deciding what you want. That is the hardest part. I used to always say “if only I knew what I wanted to do with my life” It is wonderful that you have had such an incredible year and your son will have a richer life because of all that he has experienced. You raise a lot of valid points and concerns, but I am sure that it will all fall into place. Good luck with your new path.

    • admin says:

      Thank you! I have my fingers crossed… Though it’s still a rude shock returning to the world of the working, can’t think of a better place to be than here…