So I stumbled upon this article earlier this week: I Want To Travel For The Rest of My Life – featuring travel bloggers who’ve managed to successfully accomplish a life of full time travelling.
The benefits of a life of travel are pretty obvious (duh), as Sab from justonewayticket.com writes:
Every day was a new adventure. I paid attention to details. I got lost. And addicted. Addicted to this kind of lifestyle. I never wanted to go back to a daily routine.
When I was in college, I used to dream about being a travel blogger (or I think the trendy term these days is “lifestyle designer”) – individuals who manage to pull in enough money to feed themselves and still fund their travels. I followed, and still follow, world-famous digital nomads like Chris Guillebeau, Maneesh Sethi and Tim Ferriss.
(Fun fact: Chris Guillebeau recently completed a quest to travel to every country in the world)
But of course, it’s never as straightforward and rosy as it seems. Most people think of bloggers as simply typing on a laptop on a beach, but it really isn’t. After 2 years of blogging on cheerfulegg, I’ve come to realize that blogging is friggin’ hard work. And it really isn’t as simple as publishing posts and watching the money come in.
While it’s super inspiring to read about bloggers who’ve managed to successfully ditch the cubicle, I’m wondering what it’s like for the majority of travel bloggers who still have to hustle for jobs to make ends meet.
Even some of the supposedly “successful” bloggers from the article have had to struggle a couple of times:
Caroline Makepeace:
Is your travel blog making enough money to fund your travels?
After three years of hard work it finally is. But, we aren’t earning oodles of money, so we have to be very smart with our budget and expenses. We have 15 years’ experience of travelling on a budget, so are pretty good at finding cheap or free travel experiences.
Turner Barr:
How do you fund your travels? Are you working abroad?
To find jobs I do what any respectable member of society does, harass people until they hire me. I have had jobs from copy-editing to stock trading to jobs that pay slightly less (see: nothing) like rice farming and tequila harvesting.
Is your travel blog making enough money to fund your travels?
Yes. But I do eat questionable street food most of the time.
Alexandra Baackes:
How do you fund your travels? Are you working abroad?
But I also took any opportunity to make a few baht… I worked as a bartender, I handed out flyers, I even babysat for the equivalent of $2 an hour.
So my question is: Do you think it’s worth it?
On one hand, it’s something that most people can only dream about: the whole carpe-diem-life-is-an-adventure-don’t-waste-it thing. Plus, you could definitely cut down on expenses and live like a king in places with a lower cost of living. You could have crazy and rich experiences, spend more time with your spouse and kids, and in general, live a truly rich life (defined by experiences and excitement).
On the other hand, would you trade security for freedom? Let’s be realistic here: Only a fraction of a percentage of people have managed to successfully build a consistent stream of passive income. If having a lifetime of travel means giving up the security of a regular paycheck, would you still do it?
I want to know what you think.
By the way, I’m looking for real debate, not some generic, clichéd, self-help advice like “Just go out and live your dreams and everything will be fine!”
If you didn’t have to worry about obligations (a mortgage, elderly parents, etc), would you uproot and go?
Would you do it even if you have to wash dishes and wait on tables to support yourself?
What would the future be like if you wanted to stop travelling eventually and settle down?
I think it just depends on what kind of travel you’re doing – if you travel slowly, staying in each location for a couple of months, it’s really no different than working from home in an internet based job – and there are plenty of people out there making a living online. (maybe not from blogging though! Personally I think freelancing is the way to go.)
If it were me, i would rather accumulate enough money before venturing out, knowing that on the other side of the world you would be sort of working to meet ends meat. It would help if your spouse shares the same dream as you. The worse that could happen is probably you run out of money and will have to go back to where you belong.
But experience wise its all worth it.
Thanks for featuring me here 🙂