In my last post, I told you why I traded life as a lawyer to become location independent. I thought I’d follow up with how I did it! Firstly, I want to explain what location independent/location independence means!
‘Location independent’ is a term I’d never heard of before I tried it myself!
Being location independent means not being tied to a particular geographic location. This can be for any reason but this usually relates to work. Becoming a digital nomad usually involves becoming location independent to allow you to travel.
At the moment, Aaron and I would probably fall within the digital nomad bracket. The purpose of us quitting our jobs was to be able to travel more. However, our goal overall is to become location independent. That might mean we have a ‘base’ somewhere without being tied as such. This would then allow us to travel for part of the year.
So many people say “I wish I could travel more” or wish they had more flexibility in their working lives. That was also us up to the point that we committed to trying this location independent life.
It is possible and it’s not as hard as you might think. It’s just having the balls to make the decision and start the process that is the hard part! I thought I’d give a little run down of how I became location independent for those people wishing they could do it too!
How did you become location independent?
After Aaron and I had made the decision to attempt to achieve location independence and try to travel and work simultaneously we had to plan around slightly more boring life things.
Step One: Quitting our jobs
We did have to line up our respective notice periods with leaving our rented house in July 2021.
The original plan was for us to finish working and begin location-independent life in line with moving out. However, I accidentally left my job around 5 months earlier than planned!
How do you accidentally leave your job I hear you ask? So I decided to tell my employer about our plans. I told them that I would be leaving in July…yes, that’ll do it!
I was due to have a review at work, in which my future progression at the firm would be discussed. Honestly, I didn’t want to go through the motions and waste people’s time in going through my career progression. Particularly when I knew at the time, I’d be handing my notice in 6-8 weeks from that date.
However, honesty is not always the best policy! Perhaps unsurprisingly, I was given my notice and put on gardening leave for a month.
My initial reaction was total worry! How the hell will I pay my rent, given we still had 5 months before we were due to move out. But then I began to see it as an opportunity. The fact that I didn’t have to get up on Monday and give legal advice also helped me feel a little better!
I spoke with Aaron and we basically agreed that I would try and find remote work to get us started. The gardening leave gave me an opportunity to figure out how it all worked. I would try to pick up some clients so we could hit the ground running in Cyprus.
How Did You Find Your First Location Independent Job?
This leads nicely to step two of beginning location independent life!
Step Two: Find work!
Less than 3 weeks after leaving my job in law, I began working freelance for a UK start-up. At the time, I felt embarrassed that I couldn’t hack solicitor life. Hats off to all the solicitors out there, because a large portion of that job is putting up with endless bullsh*t from all angles – clients, courts, colleagues! I felt like I’d failed because I couldn’t deal with it, and then found myself out of a job.
However, in hindsight, my employer did me a massive favour. The result was that when we arrived in Cyprus with a stream of income behind us. Essential for Cyprus, as it is SO expensive! I was also suddenly in the position of NEEDING to find work. But needing to find work meant I had to put my worries about whether I had the right skills for remote working aside.
Getting Started on Upwork
I began my freelance work search on UpWork. My cousin was self-employed, predominantly finding work through this platform and earning good money from it.
For those that aren’t familiar with UpWork, it’s essentially an online work platform. Businesses or entrepreneurs list available positions or projects they need assistance with. You create a profile, which lists your skills and qualifications.
Sometimes, potential clients will approach you and invite you to interview for their position. But mostly, you will view job listings and send over a proposal which will be reviewed by the potential client. Especially at the start when you don’t have any reviews or Upwork experience.
Your proposal essentially sets out why you think you would be a good fit. You detail what you can offer to benefit that potential client along with your hourly rate. The potential client will then either invite you to interview or archive your proposal.
If you are invited to interview and are successful, an offer will be made via the platform. If you accept, a contract will automatically be produced by UpWork which governs the relationship between you and the client. In return, UpWork takes a commission from anything you earn on the platform.
I found a few jobs that I applied for, but mostly were admin/virtual assistant jobs. These generally fit well with location-independent life. I was finally offered a position with a lovely lady who was starting up a pottery business in the UK. It has been so much fun and I’ve learnt so much. It has really opened my eyes to the world outside of law.
Alternatives to UpWork
Aaron has also found projects on Fiverr. This is another platform which has a great offering of work for a location-independent lifestyle.
Fiverr works slightly differently from UpWork. On Fiverr, you create your offering, or gig, advertising your skills. Then you have to wait for clients to come to you. There are no job adverts for you to browse through.
Aaron mainly works as a legal/business consultant but has found some good clients through this platform too.
I will do a full blog on Upwork and Fiverr and how they work at a later date!
How Did You Prepare For Becoming Location Independent?
First, we had to tell our friends and fam about our plans!
Step Three: Tell our friends and family
I think they were a bit surprised when I revealed I was unemployed!! Other than that, they were really excited for us. Both of our families are supportive of everything we do. Their view is that we’re adults and we’ll have thought it through. As long as we’re happy, they’re happy.
I was nervous about telling my friends and family I wasn’t going to do law anymore. Again, I felt like I’d failed. I was quitting right at the time when my other friends were working their way up. I felt like I was heading right to the bottom again.
In some ways, it is a shame that society sees some professions as successful, and others as not so much. It’s even more of a shame that we worry about how people might perceive us because of this. But, I think that’s a post for another day!
Of course, our friends and family were only ever excited for us. They were supportive of our decision to begin a location independent lifestyle. They love hearing what we’re up to and always ask about our plans. That made making the transition so much easier.
Once notice was given/I ‘moved on’ from the law, the time came to think about selling our stuff and moving out of our home.
Step Four: Move out of our home
We didn’t own our own home. So we didn’t have the stress of putting the house on the market to start our location independent life.
However, we had bought all of the furniture in our house, and obviously wouldn’t be taking that with us. We had the mammoth task of selling everything we owned. Storage was just going to be far too expensive for a long period of time.
Whilst it was super exciting to think of starting our location independent adventure, the reality was far more stressful. Listing our stuff on Facebook and having people collect all of the things we’d bought together to create our cosy, home was actually quite upsetting.
When we were packing up our things, I remember crying so much! I was sobbing taking down a clock from the wall lol. Not because I’d changed my mind, but it goes against everything humans crave – security, shelter and comfort. We loved our little home, the town where we lived and we had lots of family and friends close by. It was going to be sad and strange to leave that all behind.
Selling our stuff was like whipping out the comfort blanket from beneath us. I think we both really felt so unsure whether we were doing the right thing. We are very lucky that we had each other though. There were many times that we’d look to each other for reassurance that what we were doing wasn’t crazy!
How Did You Find Your First Location Independent Destination?
FINALLY, the final stage and the most exciting was to plan where we were off to!
Step Five: Plan our first destination
Between the stress of turning our lives upside down, we were thinking of all the places we could go! This was obviously the most exciting part of transitioning to location independent life.
Of course, we had the small complication of Covid to deal with. We booked our first Airbnb / destination in April 2022. At this time we were still in a partial lockdown in the UK. The Government was advising against booking holidays and the borders were still closed. So, we booked it anyway!
We settled on Cyprus as our first location independent destination. This was because we had spent a week there with our friends Chris and Lex the previous September. We absolutely loved it there and had repeatedly said we could both live there. Well, it was time to put that statement to the test.
It was also a good place to ease ourselves into this massive lifestyle change. It would be relatively familiar, and we’d have people there to help us and socialize with.
Since then, we have picked our destinations based on what other people have told us. Generally, we have only met other digital nomads or people living a location independent lifestyle. So if they recommend somewhere, we’ll often go as we know it will be perfect for our lifestyle.
In general, we look for places that have cheap rent (£600 or less), great Wi-Fi, and a good co-working space.
What Do You Think?
So, there is a little summary of my own experience of how I traded the 9-5 for a location independent lifestyle. It’s not necessarily how I’d recommend others do it. You know, probably don’t accidentally get fired, 5 months earlier than planned! Generally, though, these are the steps we took and this is how we did it.
Do you have any other questions about how I did it?
Please let me know in the comments. I’d love to hear from you and am happy to answer any questions you might have. It’s been an emotional rollercoaster but I’m so glad we made the change!
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