digitalnomadgirls.com

This is a list of everything I’m working on, what the status is (waiting on review from X, will be working on when I get back, ahead of schedule so on hold, etc), as well as any other info that someone would need to know (who to contact in my absence, if it’s a team setting; pieces of info I need from the client, etc). I’ve found that this method helps me a lot not only stay organized with everything I need to do before taking time off, but it’s also a great tool to provide a client so they can have easy access to what’s up when I’m gone (instead of sending me emails or texts 🙂 )” Sally Townsend, co-founder and editor of The Bride’s Tree, had some great advice for me, specifically about the Christmas holiday season: It’s like this thing I heard once early on in my working life: there’s no point taking a personal day if you’re going to spend it feeling guilty. What I’ve learned over the past few years is that the key to taking time off successfully and guilt free as a digital nomad girl is to allow yourself to actually do so fully (no checking emails, no quickly posting on Instagram etc) and to plan ahead accordingly.

Also, this post is going to be a bit rough around the edges as I’m writing this the evening of the 6th October 2019, before heading down to London in the morning (by train 😉 to join the International Rebellion by the global climate justice movement, Extinction Rebellion. See, for the past 6 years (nearly to the day) I’ve been travelling around the world with my boyfriend, first as backpackers, then as working-holiday-ers and for the past 4+ years as digital nomads. We only have around 8.5 years of carbon budget to burn as a society, after that we’re heading straight for at least a 2°C warming (and that’s a conservative estimate) at which point feedback loops and tipping points will kick off leading to runaway climate change which we won’t be able to stop anymore. And after the rollercoaster of emotions had worn off a little bit, I realised how grateful I am that I created a business and lifestyle that allows me to spend a week away from my laptop (almost a whole week, we’ll be running a live event from the Rebellion together with my brilliant friend Sophia Cheng, read her Titanic-themed blog post about becoming an activist here) and join this movement.

Now, there are a bunch of ‘How to Become a Digital Nomad’ books out there, I’ve read a few but definitely not all. So I put together a list of 11 books for aspiring Digital Nomad Girls, but honestly, most of these are still great books to read even if you’ve been working online and travelling a while. When you work for yourself, you’re totally in charge of your time, you decide when to work, where to work, what to work on. Now, most digital nomads aren’t technically backpackers, but I do think that if you don’t have much travel experience yet, then these two books can be really helpful.

But sadly there’s hardly any information out there, so over the next months, I want to invite different members of our community to share their experiences of travelling sustainably and ethically. So I have decided to join Extinction Rebellion’s #XR52 challenge to say no to fast fashion for a whole year. I actually already eat a lot of vegetarian meals, but I just want to be more aware and actively plan my meals to avoid falling back to fast food, and cheap meat. It’s terrifying to think about it and learn about it, but once you know it, you can’t