My name’s Emiliano, and I’ve been a digital nomad and freelance copywriter for nearly four years. To me, going where I wanted, when I wanted, with no bosses and no 9-5 grind was like winning the lottery. But being a digital nomad was far more than a transformative escape or a cool lifestyle: it literally saved my life. Today, I want to tell you that story. 

And, hey, drama aside, maybe there are some takeaways from my experience you can use to build the life you want! After all, having freedom is about far more than being a part-time beach bum; it’s about redefining work, being where you need to be, and where you’re needed. 

Here’s how I did it and why it was such a life-changing decision — for the better! 

How Did I End Up Here? 

I’ve been writing since I learned my ABCs and first picked up a pen. But it took me thirty-odd years to get it through my thick skull that writing was a monetizable skill. From then, it was a skip and a hop away to freelancing, my one true game-changer. 

Before I learned I could write for a living, I was already a remote work enthusiast. I’d tried the daily commute rat race life, and I’d found that it was mostly a soul-crushing bore. Or like a game of impersonating Hide the Pain Harold.   

After a few years—and a few failed startup attempts—I found a pretty cushy remote job as a virtual assistant for a Florida-based electronics SME. Now, I know “cushy” can mean different things for different folks, but, being an Argentinian, it meant a way-above-average income in USD. 

And hey, if that was the way the outsourcing game went, I wasn’t afraid to play it. 

For context, Argentina isn’t precisely leading the pack regarding the average salary. In 2023, you’d be lucky to break $600 as a Python developer. Suddenly, making eight bucks an hour seemed like I’d won “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?”

But I still had to clock 9 hours every day, and freedom wasn’t on the menu. And let’s face it: as a fully bilingual person from age 10 onwards, I knew I was selling myself way short. 

I had to kill the goose that laid the golden egg.

Freelancing: The Open Door 

One day, my ex-boss needed a voice recording for the company’s IVR (Interactive Voice Response) system. He asked me to look for a budget-friendly voice-over actor on the freelancing platform Bunny Studio. 

When I visited their site, a neon sign lit up in my head. 

Not only did Bunny Studio offer a catalog of freelance voice-over talents, but also in nearly every other category imaginable. I browsed everything, and the translation and copywriting verticals caught my eye. “I’ve got this,” I said to myself, and applied as a freelance writer. Not long after I completed the required test assignment, I got a welcome email. I was in!

I was ready to break out into dance. (Only, I didn’t, because I suck at dancing.) 

But it was what I finally needed: a semblance of a way out of the loop I was in. Only, it took a while for my new career to gain traction. So, for nearly a year, I kept my job and moonlit as a writer, slowly building up confidence as more assignments came my way.

Sometime during my last few months in the company, one of my best friends moved to Maui, Hawaii. He said I should visit, but I wasn’t feeling like working 9-6 while watching others surf with a despondent look on my face. I told him, “If I can make it as a freelancer, Maui is the first place I’ll visit.” 

I became dead-set on reaching my goal so, once I had saved a year’s worth of money, I quit my full-time job. So long! 

One Gig to Rule Them All

After, I went on every site imaginable: Workana, Freelancer, PeoplePerHour, and many more that have closed since. I learned how to pitch myself and started landing jobs, even if they were far below what I wanted my ideal rates to be. For a couple months, I kept my eye on the prize: a perfect tropical paradise. 

As luck would have it, opportunity struck. 

Bunny Studio was putting together a team of freelance writers for an SEO blog project. The PM had seen samples of my work, liked them, and dropped me an email offering me a spot on the team as a writer and proofreader. And not just that, but they offered a decent per-word rate — more in line with what I felt my job was worth.

I’d landed the perfect gig, the freelancing Holy Grail.

If you ever find a client who can offer a constant workflow at a fair rate, you’ve made it. And there I was, a made guy, not two months into a new career.  

I booked that flight to Maui faster than Usain Bolt can run the 100.

Maui Magic/Pandemic Blues 

Cue the movie montage with me going on a 72-hour trip to Maui and staying for two months. The island was everything I’d imagined and more. If anything, the stories fail to do it justice. 

And I experienced it on my terms: no micromanaging bosses, zero schedules, and total freedom. I’d gone from city-dweller to citizen of the world in no time.  It was one of my life’s milestones. 

And then, the COVID-19 pandemic hit like a ton of bricks. 

I don’t think I have to tell you about the consequences: panic, chaos, and a near-complete global shutdown. And there I was, 10,000 miles away from home, with only a computer, meager savings, and a suitcase to my name. 

To make things worse, Argentina had one of the world’s most restrictive COVID policies in the world, including a no-exceptions border shutdown. The official line was, “You’re on your own!”

I was, along with 15,000 other Argentines around the world, stranded. We had no idea when, or if, we could ever go back home. 

How Being a Digital Nomad Saved My Bacon

But I had an asset few people possessed: I still had plenty of income from my clients. Meaning that, while there was far less work, I wasn’t bleeding money and eating into savings like most folk. Of course, I still had to be cautious and frugal. 

I left Maui and stayed at my brother’s in San Francisco for a month. But my US visit couldn’t last forever: I was very close to exceeding the term limit on my visa. I needed an alternative, FAST. 

Thankfully, they still had open borders in Mexico, and I was able to land a good deal for a beachfront condo in Cancún. And hey, it’s not like I was Nero fiddling while Rome burnt — Cancún was where you had to be if you wanted to book a flight back to Argentina. Over time, the border restrictions were easing up and they were slowly allowing small batches of flights into Argentina.

Now, it was time to sit back and wait. 

So I waited, worked, sat on the empty beaches, swam in the ocean, occasionally cried into a Margarita, and subsisted on a diet of chicken and shrimp tacos. I also took the opportunity to help other Argentinians out, most of whom were in a far more dire spot than I was. Trickle-down economics may be BS, but it shouldn’t be. 

In June 2020, I finally boarded a flight back home. It was four months after I’d left Buenos Aires on February 7th and two months after my expected April return. If it weren’t for freelancing and being a digital nomad, I would’ve faced the same destitution my compatriots had gone through. Some, sadly, never made it back, succumbing to COVID, pre-existing diseases, or plain abandonment by our government. This “lifestyle” saved my life.

And heck, I liked Maui so much that in 2021, I visited again. The genie wasn’t going back into the bottle by any means. 

Some Takeaways For You

So, after all this drama and excitement, what does this mean for you? What wisdom, if any, do I have to offer my would-be digital nomads? Here’s some common-sense advice I learned from experience.

• Save! Living on the go is unpredictable, and it can get expensive. Always have money in the bank for an emergency. And, if you’re a freelancer, the typical unsteady, boom-or-bust workflows of the trade make this doubly important.

• Always travel with a stable job or reliable clients that offer steady work.
• When abroad, health insurance is a life-or-death necessity. Don’t rely on luck.

• It pays to have acquaintances in your destinations. It can spell the difference between booking on Airbnb and a discounted “locals only” rental. 

• “Mostly OK” WiFi is never good enough. Triple-check!

• Always keep your paperwork up-to-date. And please, don’t leave your passport unattended in your backpack at the beach! (I learned this the hard way, although that’s a story for another time.)

• If I could do it, so can you. Fortune favors the bold!

Just remember that seeing the world on your terms is its own reward. The digital nomad lifestyle can mean different things to different people, but one thing remains 100% true for everyone:

Being a digital nomad lets you move toward the life you want instead of waiting for it to come to you.

I don’t know about you, but that makes me feel truly rich.

To learn more about Emiliano’s story, follow along his Instagram profile here!