Digital Nomad Stories

Freedom and Time Management as a Nomadic Lifestyle Entrepreneur

• Anne Claessen • Season 2 • Episode 192

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Learn how Rosie structures her day to maximize personal freedom, balances work commitments with a flexible schedule, and the significance of finding time freedom in a busy world.

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Speaker 1:

Hey nomads. Welcome to Digital Nomad Stories, the podcast. My name is Anne Klaassen and, together with my co-host, kendra Hasse, we interview digital nomads. Why? Because we want to share stories of how they did it. We talk about remote work, online business, location independency, freelancing, travel and, of course, the digital nomad lifestyle. Do you want to know more about us and access all previous episodes? Visit digitalnomadstoriesco. All right, let's go into today's episode. Hey, hey nomads. Welcome to a new episode. Today I'm here with Rosie Bell. She's a location-independent writer, editor and lifestyle entrepreneur. I'm really excited to have her on the show today because she is a long-term nomad. I mean, she's been nomading for years and years, so I know that she has so much experience to share with us today and I'm really excited to share her story with you. So, rosie, welcome to the show.

Speaker 2:

Hi, hello. Thank you so much for having me.

Speaker 1:

Awesome, so can you tell a little bit more about you? Like I just said, you're a writer, editor, lifestyle, entrepreneur, which is quite broad, so can you share a little bit more about what do you do on a daily basis? What does life look like for you?

Speaker 2:

Okay, well, thank you for the introduction. So I am a travel journalist first and foremost. That was my first nomad job and I'm a lifestyle entrepreneur in that I've created businesses. I run several online businesses that facilitate the type of lifestyle that I want to have. So lifestyle comes at the forefront of all of my decisions, whether that's the weather I want to have, the food that I want to eat, the languages I want to hear on a daily basis, the temperature that I want to touch my skin, the people I want to be around. That is what informs my decisions with everything that I do, essentially, and I help people who want to design their lives in similar ways.

Speaker 2:

So I've been a location independence educator for a couple of years at Discovery Sessions. I mentor people who want to travel and work online as well, because, as you probably also know, this is a really, really magical lifestyle, but there is a lot of confusion around it. You know, how do I begin, where do I go, what's a nomad visa? All of those questions that might be straightforward for us, but a lot of people have burning inside them and they think that there's so many things stopping them from starting to live their lives this way, and I try to demystify the information around that and I also write for publications travel publications on both sides of the Atlantic, so you've probably heard some of them already, like National Geographic, lonely Planet, formal Travel Guide basically, whoever will pay me to write about my experiences. But I've been doing that since 2017, which is when I started my digital nomad career in Central America.

Speaker 1:

Very, very cool, amazing. So you do a lot of different things, right? You start running several different businesses and mentoring and writing. How do you structure your days or your weeks?

Speaker 2:

Well, I'd say probably the most important thing or the first thing that I wanted was I always knew that I'm not a morning person. I always knew that I didn't want a job that would require me to go into an office and be very active in the morning. So I did have a full-time office job in London years ago it seems like centuries ago now and that was one of the most difficult things for me. So I start my days very, very slowly. I have a cup of tea, you know. I'll wake up, maybe around 10, maybe work out in the morning if I feel like it, start working on whatever it is that I have going on at the moment, whether it's a deadline or content for my blogs, or I also do travel trivia.

Speaker 2:

That's something I didn't mention, but we'll come up to that later. And yeah, and then I try to finish around sunset and go for a sunset walk or a sunset workout, but essentially I like to start my days very, very late and casually. No one's calling me, there's nowhere I have to be, and that's that's how I like it. That's exactly how I like it.

Speaker 1:

That's exactly how I like it. Yeah, no meetings, just working when you want to work, waking up when you want to wake up.

Speaker 2:

Exactly waking up when I want to wake up. I do have meetings in that, you know I'll have calls with people that I'm mentoring, or I also host virtual travel trivia, so I do have to be present for that, but I never schedule anything in the morning. You won't catch me there, nope.

Speaker 1:

Love that True freedom. Entrepreneur right. Location freedom, but also time freedom is what I'm hearing you say, because you know that you don't want those meetings in the morning.

Speaker 2:

I do not know. That does not work for me.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so you mentioned that that was right from the start. You did that, or did you? When you started nomading, did you feel like, okay, I have to, you know, work all day, every day, and like try to make this work? Or was that always a hard boundary that you had like no morning meetings, and also, do you work weekends? Or do you have any other kind of work boundaries that you set for yourself?

Speaker 2:

I would say the mornings are something I've always known about myself. I do tend to work on weekends because, for instance, if I have a deadline for my, deadlines for Forbes, for instance, tend to be on Mondays, so I will work on the weekend to get that in and I don't really mind because I might not work on a Tuesday or I might not work on Friday, so I don't actually mind that. But the mornings is really important to me because I'm also a night owl and just when I know I have to get up really early, it seeps into my brain and I never get the best sleep. And that's something that has always been this way from the beginning, because when I did start out, when I got into travel journalism, I was in a very comfortable position where, you know, I was on a one year sabbatical, I didn't really have to work. So generally my lifestyle was already at the forefront of what I was doing. So it was quite natural to keep to that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, cool. So can you share a little bit more about your sabbatical, Because you mentioned you started in Central America right when you started nomading in 2017. So did you save up for that? Or did you have a plan like, okay, this is going to be a year that I'm going back home, or like what was the setup that you created for yourself?

Speaker 2:

Well, actually it's a little bit of a convoluted story, but it actually begins two years prior, in 2015. When I went on my first ever sort of trip alone my first ever solo travels, and I went backpacking, that was. So I was living in London London is, I guess, where I'm from. No one ever guesses that because I have every accent and no accent. So I was living in London pretty unhappily for a while, I have to say and I went on that trip, which just was so mind opening. It was like that's when my life began, when I went to Central America and saw these beautiful places and these incredible beaches and I was like why have I been languishing in London all this time? I'm perplexed, anyway. So I knew that I was going to leave. Eventually, I knew I was going to leave. London had a bit of a family tragedy.

Speaker 2:

That happened in 2017, at the start of the year, and I was like, okay, this is the time now. Now I'm out of here and I gave myself a year to sort of fall back in love with the world and figure it out. And prior to that, what I'd been doing was I had my own swimwear brand actually. So I was designing swimwear. I was, you know. I had an e-commerce site, I was doing pop-up stores and I was doing everything by myself, but I had gotten quite disillusioned with working in fashion or just like the fashion industry and all of the you know the things that come with that, and I was looking for that next thing that I could do that was fully, completely remote, didn't require any products that needed to be shipped, didn't need a place that people associate you with being from, and I wanted to work completely online place that people associate you with being from and I wanted to work completely online.

Speaker 2:

So essentially I decided to go back to Central America and give myself a year to figure it out. But what I had noticed when I had the swimwear brand is the part of the entire thing that I enjoyed the most was actually writing articles for the blog. It was a Hawaiian branded swimwear company, so I was writing lots of stories about Hawaii and beach travel and I thought, okay, well, I really enjoyed that, so let's try writing. So I would set up a blog.

Speaker 2:

I was writing about Panama and Central American beaches and then a friend who I just casually mentioned this to sent me a link for world nomads looking for people to write about their lives in Panama. So I applied and I got it and I was paid $300 for an essay about just my everyday life and then I thought, oh, wait, hold on, people will pay me to write just about what I do and where I am. Okay, let's look into this. So, essentially, being in Panama actually kind of kickstarted my travel journalism career because I was there, I knew it inside out and there weren't many people actually who were English speaking writers, I guess, who also were writing for blogs and those big publications that lived there and before I knew it, lots of work was coming to me and now Panama is still one of my destination focuses for my writing and I just finished working on the Lonely Panama guidebook, which is kind of actually what led me to Panama just reading that guidebook one day, which I found in a hostel, so it's a really nice full circle moment there.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, exactly Full circle moment. That's so cool, amazing. So I love that you gave yourself that year to figure it out. It sounds like it was pretty relaxed because you had given yourself a year anyway. So then if there was a few months without anything happening, then it was fine, because you were expecting it to take a year and yeah, I think that takes the pressure off a little bit. Probably. I think that's so smart. That's not what I did, so don't do what.

Speaker 3:

I did no, I.

Speaker 1:

I was like okay, I need to make this work right now or I cannot pay rent. So I would not recommend that. Do what Rosie did. Don't do what I did.

Speaker 2:

Well, but I can understand that lots of people are in a position where they have to do that. You know, sometimes you don't control your financial situation and it is kind of a do or die situation and it feels. It very much feels that way. So of course I was, as I mentioned, in quite a comfortable financial position, that where I could do that. But that's not the reality for for a lot of people, Unfortunately yeah, true, but it's also, I think, seeing the opportunities right.

Speaker 1:

So you had an opportunity come to you by a friend sending that link, but then you apply right. I don't think this is luck. I just want to be very clear. I don't think this is luck. I think this is seeing the opportunities applying for that. And then also, you probably wrote an amazing article that then launched your career in this field. How did you go about Going to different places that are expanding from there? Because, you mentioned, you started writing about Panama, but now you write about loads of different places. So how did that go? Did you just move as in, like, physically move to different countries and then started writing about those and then pitch that to the same publications? Or was there another way? Did you travel more, like, did you travel to write an article? Did you write articles where you just happen to be traveling?

Speaker 2:

well, I was writing about Panama, but I was writing about the beach and the sunshine lifestyle in general. So I think it was quite easy to write about anywhere that was basically not miserable and dark like London. So, yeah, I was writing about other destinations in Central America and then now I kind of write mostly about Latin America and the Caribbean, so those tropical places. So Panama was, I guess, the springboard, but I did write about basically anywhere that you could go that could like soothe your soul with good weather, amazing people. I wrote culture stories as well. So Panama was definitely the starting point, but I guess I had that little bit of a broader niche. So it was I was able to expand and I'd also like to touch on something that you said earlier about it not being luck.

Speaker 2:

It definitely wasn't luck, but I think that we can sort of make our luck or help luck. You know a little bit along the way. So a friend told me about that, but then I applied for it or someone you know. You can't just sit back and let things happen for you. You kind of have to make, create your own luck a little bit as well, give luck a helping hand. I just wanted to add that, based on what you said, because I thought that's something people say Obviously. I'm sure you've heard this so many times You're so lucky as a nomad, you're so lucky, you're so lucky that you get to live in Mexico. But you know, there's hurricanes, there's earthquakes, there's, you know, whatever. There's going to places, there's border jumps, there's visa applications, there's all of those things. It doesn't just happen overnight.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely, and I think also oh, you're so lucky that you work remotely is what I get a lot. Well, it's not luck that I work remotely. I, like made a very, very conscious decision to not go into an office and not go for the career that I planned for myself and instead just go, you know, do a complete 180 and do something completely different, and that's why I work remotely now. But yeah, also, no luck like no. No luck involved.

Speaker 1:

There is all decisions and seeing opportunities, I think yes, and being open to them yeah, exactly how fast were you traveling at that initial stage of well sabbatical year actually? But like your first nomad year, were you traveling fast, as in few days in the place, or were you doing like a month in the place, several months? Can you share a little bit more about kind of your travel and also lifestyle around that time?

Speaker 2:

Yes, of course. So I went to move to Panama because Panama was the place I'd fallen in love with on that prior Central America trip. So I was going to move to Panama and then, luckily, within my first week, I went to a pub crawl on my own and then got along really well with the organizer, who happened to have a fabulous room available with Pacific views and gym and rooftop pool and all that stuff, and she invited me to come and live with her and I just moved in. So it was really really nice to have that base. So when I had to do other trips, I always went back to my house. I always knew that I had, that I never gave up that apartment and that they've become two of my best friends now and we're still very close. So I had that as my base and then I would do little trips here and there. So I went to Brazil for one month my first, rio carnival and then I went back to Europe for a while because I was in a couple of weddings and then when I would start getting, you know, press trip invitations, I would go, but from Panama. So I always had that base and I still like to live my life that way.

Speaker 2:

I'm very, very, very much a slow mad. I know that, you know, as it's all well and good to move around, but I do need to know that there is a place. I'm going and you know I've got my, I've got my toothbrush there and I feel comfortable and I feel grounded I something about the toothbrush. You know I'm not forgetting anything. I feel comfortable to actually unpack. If I'm not staying somewhere for up to a month, I don't unpack because I I there's almost no point. I don't think I don't feel like there's any point. I don't feel like I'm going to release and relax myself here. And I'm going to release and relax myself here and I'm probably going to forget something when I unpack, especially if you're moving around really quickly. So I definitely like to have a base and then go and do smaller trips from there. But how it happens now I'm actually probably so. I summer in Europe and I'm wintering in Latin America. That's how I'm doing it now.

Speaker 2:

I don't have one place that I stay for the whole year, because Europe was actually really nice. In the summer I come here and I spend time with my family in London. I spent lots of time in Spain, always try to go to Portugal as well, and then last winter I spent it in Brazil and the winter before that was Mexico. So definitely what you're hearing here is I need the warmth. I love the sun. You won't catch me in winter if I can avoid it, but yes, I do like to be comfortable.

Speaker 2:

So you know, if I can stay somewhere for three months, great, but I'd say one month is my minimum, unless I'm going to, you know, visit a friend or oh, you're in Valencia, see you there next weekend. But in general, I like to have at least a month somewhere just to feel grounded, because you know you actually have to work as well. It's nice to create a schedule if you're staying somewhere for a short period of time. It's hard to, you know, you can't sign up for a gym. There's no point. You know, if there is, they don't have these short-term contracts, just things like that that you know. You know, find your local supermarket that you like and start going to meetups and building community. If you're only there for two weeks almost, I feel like what's the point.

Speaker 1:

But that's just me yeah, I think you have a good point, especially because what you said, you'll be working and if you're there for a month, you only have four weekends. If that, right, because I often also travel on weekends, even if your weekends is not Saturday, sunday, right. If you have different weekend days within your week, that also counts. But, like, you won't have that many days to actually explore because, for most people, you'll spend still like, a lot of time looking at a computer screen because that's how we fund this lifestyle, right, which is very, very important. But yeah, that's something to consider. If you really want to get to know the place a little bit better, you'll have to have some days of exploring and enjoying the place, and a month is really not that long. It goes so quickly. Also, it always goes so quickly absolutely agree with you.

Speaker 2:

Fomo is real. Fomo is real if you're somewhere for two weeks. Let's say you're in Rome for the first time, of course you have to go and do all the Trevi Fountain and all that tourist stuff. Of course you have to do it. But then what if, know, a big work project comes in at the same time. You constantly are feeling pulled between different places and then you're not enjoying yourself, which is the whole point of why we're doing this so that we can travel and work but enjoy ourselves and you're not. If you're tired, burnt out, feeling like you're constantly pulled in different directions, don't have enough time for anything, the whole point of this lifestyle is to enjoy it.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, exactly 100%. So I feel like when you started nomading in 2017, which is seven years ago, right, that's really a while ago you already had quite a good idea of what you wanted, right, like sleeping in in the morning, super important warm weather and that's still what you do and also having a home base. That was really important for you, and that slow travel, so that's really cool. I think a lot of people need time to figure out what they actually want, but it sounds like you really had a very good idea about that. But what are some things that you learned in the past seven years, or things that might have been different what you expected?

Speaker 2:

Oh, that's a really good one. Oh, that's a really good question, something that I learned. Well, if I'd say one thing that I regret, or a regret that I have in a sense, is I wish I had tried to start doing investigations earlier into alternative ways of living, because I was very unhappy in London for a very, very long time.

Speaker 2:

But I guess I just sort of just accepted my fate. In a sense. I wish that I didn't sort of hit rock bottom before I went to go and seek out greener pastures. So I would say, maybe don't get too comfortable in your discomfort and you don't have to hit rock bottom to make changes in your life. And I'd say, another thing that I learned is you can actually start where you are. So, for instance, mistakes I made when I had my swimwear brand when I lived in London, and things that I did when I was a new guy. So when I was doing the swimwear brand, I was teaching myself everything. I was teaching myself everything. I wore every hat. I taught myself how to actually design this stuff pattern cutting. I paid someone 700 pounds to build a website and they ran away with my money. So I actually taught myself how to build websites. So I now can do that. You know I was going to meetings, networking, everything.

Speaker 2:

I did everything myself and I never asked for help, and that's why it also took me a long time to do it. Probably I didn't enjoy it as much because maybe, yeah, maybe to an extent, I was also perhaps burnt out. I wasn't enjoying it the same way because I didn't ask for help. I wanted to do everything by myself, and something that I've done differently now is, if I feel like I've seen identified business bottlenecks, I've reached out to a business coach. Get people to help you. You don't have to do everything by yourself. And then the second thing I would say is that you can actually start where you are. So again, comparing my swimwear with my travel journalism with my swimwear, I was teaching myself everything. It was an industry I knew nothing about, so there was quite a steep learning curve, whereas when I got into writing, it's something that I was already doing I was always already writing the content for my blog, for my swimwear my.

Speaker 2:

Hawaiian branded company. So, especially if you want to change your life and maybe if you are in a bit of a dire situation where it is do or die and your bank balance is low, you can start where you are. You don't have to completely retrain and, you know, do go to do a three-year degree or whatever. You can actually start with your existing hobbies, skills, passions, interest, whatever to help you pivot and redesign yourself. Just move whatever you do to a different avenue.

Speaker 2:

For instance, I was writing stuff for my swimwear brand and then I parlayed that into a career as a travel journalist and then, during the pandemic, when there was kind of no travel and also, therefore, no travel writing, I parlayed that travel journalism background to doing travel trivia online, because people wanted to play with somebody who was a travel journalist and could, you know, tell them stories and infuse some magic into the quiz, because anybody can host trivia by themselves. They do not need somebody to do it. They don't need to pay somebody to do that. But that was something that I was able to do. So you can actually use your existing skills and just find a way to move them to a community online where people want what you have to offer, and you don't actually have to restart all over again or redesign your entire identity. You can start with what you already have skills, wise.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think that's a great, great tip. And also, what I'm hearing you say is that you really was. You were like leaning into what you like doing. Right, because wearing all the hats for your swimwear brand, that was like not enjoyable, but then the riding part was. So then how can you do more of that and less of the other things? Well, for you that was travel riding.

Speaker 1:

But I think, even if you would have decided to keep the swimwear brand, or right, I think you can still then delegate a lot of the stuff that you don't like doing and potentially build a team around yourself. That's what I did in my business to also do more of the things that I like doing. So I think there's so many different ways to do this, but just that mindset of, okay, well, this is just again looking for the opportunities what am I good at, what do I enjoy doing, and how can I do more of that? And then, like you said, what do I have already that can set me up for that? So how did you, or did you actually also work on that skill set, and did you like take any courses? Or did you, or did you actually also work on that skill set and did you like take any courses, or did you work with people to improve your writing, or how did you go about that? Once you've decided, you know what this is. This is what I'm gonna go for um, yes, yes, I've taken.

Speaker 2:

I've taken online courses. Well, also because I was, I've created my own online courses about travel writing and I wanted to get inspiration, but also just for myself. I was signed up to every freelance writer newsletter how to pitch, how to land your you know, those big publications. I still actually attend those webinars. If you know, for instance, bbc Travel's editor is giving a webinar on pitching. Even though I've already written for BBC Travel, I can still always improve my pitching. You can always still get better. You can still keep sharpening your knife while you're already in that profession. So, yes, I absolutely still go to webinars. I have a business coach that I've worked with. Yeah, I absolutely still am improving, because I think, you know, we can't just rest on our laurels. If you are a good writer, you can still always get better. If you're're a good business coach, you can learn from a different business coach. Somebody always has something to teach you, whether they're in your same field or a different field.

Speaker 1:

So, yes, I'm definitely still improving as I go along yeah, exactly, a very growth mindset is what I'm hearing, which is very, very important. That's really cool, yeah, so what is next for you, rosie? Is there anything that you're I don't know working on? That's super exciting. Yeah, tell me more of what. What can we expect from your end?

Speaker 2:

well, I, as I had mentioned, have been uh, I've been a nomad for a while now and I've gotten a lot of questions about this lifestyle, everything from are you lonely or, you know, do you actually make any money, how do you make it money? How can I be a digital nomad all of those things some good questions, some bad questions, and so essentially, what I'm doing is I'm compiling all of that into an online course, a complete online course for digital nomads. That will be around six hours, with all of the information that I've got during the years, I guess, in a way, to sort of answer all the questions people have asked me, also when I mentor them. So that's what I'm working on now. So, within discovery sessions, it's more of just like what we have like informational articles, but I'm also building a whole entire location independence education emporium, so I'll have lots of different courses there for maximizing your freedom, freelancing, traveling.

Speaker 2:

That's sort of my next focus, while still, of course, completing my travel journalism responsibilities. So I've just handed in an assignment. Now I'm about to start working on another one about Panama, definitely juggling lots of things at the same time, but that's what's next. That's my main focus working more on discovery sessions and those courses, because you know so many times, especially when I go to nomad conferences or networking events, and people ask me for something and I didn't have anything to give them. Well, now I will.

Speaker 1:

Very cool, amazing. That sounds like a super valuable resource for sure. Can you share where people can find out more and where people can follow you as well?

Speaker 2:

Absolutely yes. If you'd like to follow me on Instagram, I am the beach bell, so like the beach is calling me ring, ring, ring, and so no E on the end. And you can also email me thebeachbell at gmailcom. You can go to discovery sessionscom for all of my location, independence, content and the courses will live at learndiscoverysessionscom. And lastly, also if you'd like me to host your fun trivia, I'm also available for that and that's on my portfolio website, which is rosiebellnet. You can also see all of my travel articles. Everything that I've written, or my favorite articles that I've written, are all listed there. So there's lots of ways that you can come into my world, get to know me, ask me questions, book your mentoring session, whatever you like. I'd love to hear from you if you are an aspiring nomad yeah, amazing.

Speaker 1:

Well, make sure to also add all the links to the show notes. So when you're listening, just go to the show notes. You'll have an overview of all the links so you can connect with Rosie however you want. Definitely recommend checking out some of her articles on her blog, because I think they're really interesting and and obviously very well written. You are very experienced writer, clearly, so that's very cool. Definitely recommend that, rosie. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast. It has been a blast to hear your story and share it with our audience today.

Speaker 2:

It's been such a pleasure. Thank you so much for talking to me on this beautiful summer day. Thank you for taking the time and I can't wait to hear the episode.

Speaker 1:

Yes, all right Well, thank you for listening. See you in the next one.

Speaker 3:

All right well, thank you for listening see you in the next one, and that's it for today. Thank you so much for listening. I appreciate it very, very much. I would appreciate it even more if you could leave a review on apple podcasts for me. That way, more people can find this podcast, more people can hear the inspiring stories that we're sharing, and the more people we can impact for the better. So, thank you so much if you are going to leave a review. I really appreciate you and I will see you in the next episode.