The Power Of Mirco-Loans With Wanderers Helps

“Wanderers Help project is neither mine nor my co-founder’s main business activity. We just really want to be able to give back to inject some money back into the community and to keep them a helping hand.”

Creating impact with Kathy aka digital nomad tax expert Wanderes Wealth

Kathleen is a location-independent international tax consultant and the founder of Wanderers Wealth. She’s been nomadding for four years, combining her love of travel with her entrepreneurial spirit.

She used to work in a corporate job as a tax lawyer. Yet, she realized that she wasn’t made for the corporate world. So, she booked a one-way ticket to Bali and started networking, and found out that people needed her help with regard to businesses, logistics, taxes, visas, residences, second citizenship, and bank accounts. She is solving a huge problem in our community and serving many digital nomads. She is also named in The 2022 Remote Influencer Report by Remote.com.

Kathy’s goal at Wanderers Wealth is to help independent entrepreneurs, digital nomads, freelancers, expats, and remote workers improve their tax situation and corporate structure. Consequently, she aims to empower them. Kathy also offers services of global diversification strategies for digital nomads.

The microfinancing project in Uganda: Wanderers Help

Recently, Kathy launched a microfinancing project, Wanderers Help, in Uganda. Her strong education and successful background are behind this project. She went to Uganda ten years ago for volunteering purposes for a social organization. Even though she studied financial system economics, Kathy ended up in financial/international business law. Moreover, she wrote her final thesis on “Micro-financing in Uganda.” Through this project, they will be able to give out more micro-loans to small business owners in Uganda.

She thought that maybe this project would happen later in her life, maybe in 50 years. But this year, she decided to launch and go entirely into it. Because she was obsessed with the topic and also surprised by the big distribution of wealth among countries. When she saw this inequality, it became inevitable for Kathy to support underprivileged people.
She is driven by the idea that while the western world has the privilege of citizenship, travel, and lifestyle, people born in less fortunate countries do not have that privilege. Thus, it is important to help these people by asking questions like, “How can we help? How can we have a lasting effect and help them in their world as well?”. Giving back comes naturally for Kathy because of her religious background, and we appreciate it!

How does this micro-loan work?

There are many ways to give back, and a popular method is via donations. However, Kathy explains why she’s not a big fan of donations: “you make people dependent on simply receiving more money. Receiving more money and not necessarily stepping up and being responsible for their own livelihood.”
“A lot of studies have shown that it has a great impact on the local communities that wouldn’t necessarily have other ways to get an extra income flow.”

Instead, they create a higher impact through microloans. In Kathy’s words,

‘‘micro-loans are basically handing out small loans to those individuals that are in a less fortunate situation. A lot of them already run their own businesses to survive. Those microloans are meant to help them out so that they can grow their businesses and make them think more about money so that they can implement a business plan and be stricter and have a bit of feeling around what to do with that money that they get.’’

The microloans can have a much bigger impact because the money is given directly to recipients with the condition that they will repay only a small amount over time. It also sounds better than taking loans from the bank due to the interest rates. While banks’ interest rate is up to 20%, Wanderers Help’s rate is 10%, which is minimal. So, it gives an opportunity to a community to enable them to build a business and sustain their life.
The 10% interest is reinvested in the project. For example to compensate petrol expenses to visit all the recipients and hand over the money. Apparently, it’s not about getting a profit from it, but it’s truly about giving back. It’s about making sure that people can go on with their dream business because they wouldn’t be able to do it otherwise. And this is exactly what makes Kathy’s story inspiring.

She also told us that it’s not just her running this project. She has a lot of support around her. Kathy surrounds herself with the right people who know how to help, like her co-founder, who’s been an international development consultant for 15 years, a local person from Uganda who can speak the language, and different consultants and lawyers.

How can digital nomads contribute?

The funds that enable them to give out microloans are collected in various ways. Organizations and individuals can donate, which will be used to fund the microloans. Keep in mind that you won’t get your interest back as a contributor. Instead, the money will be cycled and go towards another group of entrepreneurs or local staff in Uganda. That’s how the biggest impact will be achieved.
So what about you? It’s time to give back! If you would like to help Wanderers Help, you can make a contribution via this link: https://wandererswealth.mykajabi.com/wanderers-help

Quick takeaways

🌟 give at least 10% of your income back or put it into charity
🌟 you don’t have to be so old to achieve a lot of great things in your life
🌟 give a hand those who needs and unprivileged ones

Connect with our Nienke Nina and our guests

Your host Nienke Nina

More digital nomad tips and life advice via instagram @digitalnomadsdaily

Connect with Nienke Nina on LinkedIn @Nienke Nina Keizer

Find Nienke Nina on Instagram @nienkeninatravels

Meet digital nomad Kathy

Find her on Instagram @wanderers.wealth

Kathleen’s personal Instagram @kathymcpaul

Wanderers Help to make contribution: https://wandererswealth.mykajabi.com/wanderers-help

Wanderers Wealth website: https://wandererswealth.com/

Other episodes you might like:

🎧  Episode #08: Leaving the corporate world behind and reinventing yourself with nomad Tarek

🎧  Episode #43: Remote Work Isn’t Just For Digital Nomads With Lorraine

🎧  Episode #46: The 5 Best Ways To Find Friends For Digital Nomads With Marina

How Digital Nomad Families Can Live A Boundless Life With Marcos

“Being able to adapt, being able to relate to others and feel comfortable with the unknown, with the discomfort, being comfortable in discomfort, it’s important, even if it’s not easy.”

The vision of world citizen and serial entrepreneur Marcos Carvalho

World citizen and entrepreneur Marcos Carvalho shares his story and the mission of one of the many companies he has co-founded, Boundless Life. It’s a purpose-driven initiative helping digital nomad families to overcome the practical obstacles of the digital nomad lifestyle. Boundless Life organizes cohorts across the globe and offers a combination of traveling, co-working and transformative education. If you are a digital nomad family and want to live a well-balanced lifestyle and connect with like-minded families, or think about your future family life, this is your episode!

Marcos Carvalho is one of the co-founders of Boundless Life and a world citizen. Growing up, he moved about five times and between Brazil, France, Canada and the United States. He is a successful serial entrepreneur who has founded several companies mostly in tech. Marcos is passionate about the future of humanity and you can clearly see this in the companies he has founded.

Marcos was introduced to different cultures and perspectives growing up and he shares this experience with the other co-founders of Boundless Life. Together they share the vision of transformative education and developing the entrepreneurial spirit in children. He has a purpose-driven personality and believes that combining traveling with future-ready education is the best way to raise the people who will develop the empathy, compassion, and kindness necessary to make the world a better place.

You can see his personality triads clearly back in his lifestyle and work and there is a lot to learn from Marcos’s journey.

What is Boundless Life

Boundless Life is an initiative helping families live fulfilling lives where travel, education, remote work, culture and meaningful connections are the stepping stones to a memorable experience.

Families from all walks of life bring their kids and work to one of the Boundless Life locations. The team takes care of all digital nomad families’ basic needs such as housing, a co-working space, cultural experiences and community events. Boundless Life is also known for its future-ready transformative education approach. It’s a unique education program developed to deepen a child’s core competencies based the world’s best educational practices. A couple of highlights of their education program:
🌟 Experiential learning
🌟 Personalized learning
🌟 Purposeful learning
🌟 Project-based learning
🌟 Future-ready
🌟 Holistic mindful well-being

‘‘It’s about building a structure to raise children so that these children will be well-prepared for the future and will be able to make a difference’’

Boundless Life develops an education system that enables the child to live the way they want and makes the nomadic life easier for families. One of the co-founders, Rekha Magon, creates a curriculum with her team, but not from scratch. As Marcos points out in this episode, “We are taking the best of the best and then putting together and then adapting it to that nomadic lifestyle.”

Of course, it attracts open-minded families who love to travel and enjoy unique experiences. Remote work expert Rowena Hennigan joined The Digital Nomads Daily Podcast and talked from the Boundless Life co-working space in Sintra, Portugal.

Marcos shares that different profiles are joining the experience. Some are entrepreneurs like himself and others are consultants, investors or people that have been working remotely. It also attracts a group of people who already have their children in alternative education systems but are looking for a more culture-based experience. These digital nomad families are looking for something that offers them independence and doesn’t tie them down.

What everyone has in common are the kids. It also helps the parents even make stronger connections. Nevertheless, some parents wonder if they are doing the right thing for their kids and this is a common topic within the Boundless Life Community. However, Marcos shares that the kids often ask their parents if they can join the next cohort and he beautifully shares:

‘‘We don’t know what’s coming next. Being able to adapt, being able to relate to others and feel comfortable with the unknown, with the discomfort, being comfortable in discomfort, it’s important even if it’s not easy. It’s not always as charming as it seems. There are a lot of challenges… But change requires time.’’

Connect with our Nienke Nina and our guests

Your host Nienke Nina

More digital nomad tips and life advice via instagram @digitalnomadsdaily

Connect with Nienke Nina on LinkedIn @Nienke Nina Keizer

Find Nienke Nina on Instagram @nienkeninatravels

Meet digital nomad Marcos

Follow his journey on LinkedIn @Marcosfacarvalho

Visit the website of Boundless Life  @www.boundless.life

Other episodes you might like:

🎧  Episode #16: The Future Of The Digital Nomads With Pat

🎧  Episode #19: 5 Benefits Of Joining A Digital Nomad Travel Group With Craig

🎧 Episode # 23: The Power Of Open-Mindedness In The Digital Nomad Lifestyle With Elle

How To Become A Travel Blogger And Make Money Online With Isabel

“There are so many ideas, but the thing is to put them down on paper and to implement them rather than just absorbing all the ideas and not taking action.”

How Isabel started her travel blogging journey

She’s been on the road for two years and she’s tuned in from Bulgaria, where she joined the Bansko Nomad Fest! Her roots go back to Singapore. At the age of 21, Isabel made her first solo trip and wanted to document her journey; this is how she started her travel blogging journey. She currently lives the dream life of many people, traveling the world and documenting her experiences on her blog.

Isabel didn’t have the skills initially and shares that she had to learn everything from scratch. Like many self-made digital nomads, she learned everything she needed to know to build a successful travel blog. Once she started getting more traffic and feeling more confident, Isabel realized that it was not impossible with the traffic and success she gained over time.

Her ultimate transition of how to become a travel blogger and make money online

Nevertheless, she had no such skills and didn’t know things like how to grow sizable traffic, how to get enough page views to have passive income, and how to collaborate with brands through advertising. So through self-learning and watching many YouTube videos, Isabel gained the wisdom needed to make her travel blog successful. She also looked at what other successful bloggers were doing which is a great way to discover what is possible.

While she was building her blog, Isabel was working full-time in Singapore. Over time, as her blog became more successful, she thought about managing time freedom and travel simultaneously. So the idea of ​​a full-time travel blog entered her mind. Once she got into an advertising network and saw that money rolling in passively, she decided to walk away from the full-time job and only focus on her travel blog. And it looks like one of her best decisions. This is how she fully transitioned and mastered becoming a travel blogger and making money online to support her lifestyle.

How does a travel blogger’s day look like?

‘‘Not one day is the same. Never gets dull.’’

Traveling and exploring the beautiful corners of the world sounds fun but of course, Isabel also needs to work. So how does her typical day looks like? Well, that totally depends on what’s on her plate that day.

Generally, she starts her day by having breakfast and heading off to a co-working space. She creates content for her blog and does a freelance service for her clients. This means that she is writing, editing pictures, researching keywords, and many more different tasks.

So believe it or not, Isabel is working full-time while traveling and this makes her lifestyle fun but exhausting too. She prefers to do her priority tasks in the morning because that’s when is has the best focus. She leaves the afternoons open for low-level tasks as they require less focus. So what makes her successful? Here is what she says:

‘‘Success depends on how disciplined you are, how much work you can get done while balancing work and play together.’’

Success brought by cooperation

Creating digital content takes a lot of time and a tremendous amount of work. Aside from her blog and travels she also does client work and creates digital products to share her knowledge and experience with others. She has an SEO course for example which you can view via this link.

So how does she do all this work and travel? The key to success is collaborating with others. Isabel shares that she’ll not be able to do so much on her own and enjoys working with others. For example, she has a VA (read here about what a VA is) for her admin tasks. Isabel also works with a digital content specialist like graphic designers and video editors. So the key is finding the right balance and being smart about how to get work done. Are you ready to become a travel blogger and make money online?

Key takeaways:

🌟 Find your best productive moment in the day and create a schedule around this
🌟 Organize your work and create a to-do list for yourself. This also helps release that overwhelming feeling
🌟 Want to start a travel blog? Learn everything you need to know about getting significant traffic so you can start working with brands
🌟 Hesitate less and do more. Don’t be afraid to fail because you’ll learn by doing and that means sometimes failing

Connect with our Nienke Nina and our guests

Your host Nienke Nina

More digital nomad tips and life advice via instagram @digitalnomadsdaily

Connect with Nienke Nina on LinkedIn @Nienke Nina Keizer

Find Nienke Nina on Instagram @nienkeninatravels

Meet digital nomad Isabel

Check out her website: https://www.belaroundtheworld.com/

Take a look at her Pinterest: https://www.belaroundtheworld.com/

Find her on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/belaroundtheworld/

Find her on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bel.aroundtheworld/

Check out Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/Belaroundtheworld

Other episodes you might like:

🎧  Episode #15: The Life Of A Remote Social Media Manager 

🎧  Episode #21: 10 Years Of Traveling The World With Daisy

🎧  Episode #49: 8 Freelancer Mindset Challenges to Overcome For Success With Steve 

Behind The Scenes Of A Content Creator Couple With Julia & Gidi

“Slowmadding gives you the opportunity to get the know the place better and experience more.”

Digital nomad couple Julia & Gidi have been nomadding for three years. Unlike many other digital nomads, they started their journey in their home country Israel. The couple sold most of their belongings and continued their European journey. The next stop was in South America and they are talking from the Cozumel island in Mexico. It’s not a big digital nomad hub but it offers beautiful scenery and plenty to explore. Not far from the island, you can immerse yourself in a bigger community in Playa Del Carmen.

How they make money online

They started their journey at the start of the pandemic and worked remotely. Julia is a website designer and Gigi makes a living as a developer. Aside from their job, they also turned their passion into a new career path and income stream.

During their travels in Israel, they got invited to participate in a couples shoot to promote a hotel. They both really enjoyed it and this was when they started thinking about continuing this type of work. To make this happen, they have to learn how to take photos, find their niche and reach out to hotels. At the start ,it was often an exchange from a free luxurious and of course, romantic break up to a free stay. As their portfolio grows and they gain more experience slowly, they are getting better at getting more promising deals.

While they still remain in their day jobs, building their businesses is something that drives them. Doing this while traveling requires a lot of work and as a couple, they need to pay attention to their relationship. We also talked about this in the very first episode with Anat & Orr.

Julia & Gidi share the following takeaways for other digital nomad couples to stay productive, relax and find me-time:

✅ During the day they work and try to finish around 6 pm to watch the sunset
✅ On Fridays and Saturdays they basically don’t touch their computer and have fun outdoors
✅ Working in separate spots is what they often do like a different room, location, or table.
✅ Community is important for everyone and also for nomad couples. Julia and Gidi try to join meetups together or alone to keep expanding their social circle.
✅ As a couple they spend a lot of time together and they like it, although they make a conscious effort to do things individually

Listen to the full conversation to learn more about digital nomad couples and tips to prepare yourself better for the digital nomad lifestyle.

Connect with our Nienke Nina and our guests

Your host Nienke Nina

More digital nomad tips and life advice via instagram @digitalnomadsdaily

Connect with Nienke Nina on LinkedIn @Nienke Nina Keizer

Find Nienke Nina on Instagram @nienkeninatravels

Meet digital nomads Juli & Gidi

Find them on Instagram @nomadsjuliagidi

Check out their website and special offer www.slowtravellerss.com

Other episodes you might like:

🎧  Episode #17: The life of a Digital Nomad Copywriter with Jamie

🎧  Episode #32: How To Become A Travel Blogger And Make Money Online With Isabel 

🎧  Episode #50: Creating Your Career Around The Lifestyle You Want To Live With Natasha

Find Your Focus Mate For Distraction-Free Productivity For Digital Nomads With Taylor

“We are social creatures and we almost service of those pats on the back and it’s really hard to get enough of that when you’re too isolated.”

Digital nomad Taylor started working remotely because he had a horrible commute. It seemed that this was the ideal solution for his problem but it opened up another unexpected challenge – focus.

After he started working from home, his productivity went down because he had difficulty staying focused. This resulted in a lot of procrastination and eventually became unsuccessful at this job. Unfortunately, he experienced the truth in a harsh lesson as he got laid off. We can learn from Taylor’s story that working remotely isn’t an ingredient for the success of a happier life. It requires hard work and a lot of self-awareness.

After he got laid off, he also lost his motivation to find another job. He started learning more about the mind and self-development and continued his career in executive coaching. Focus on productivity where an active topic of interest and he began to look at these things from the nervous system. Taylor was not the only one that struggled with focus and procrastination, and he helped a friend who Taylor identified as a high-performance. He pitched his idea to start a community to help others focus and this is how Focusmate was born. It’s been a success and Focusmate has thousands of members from 193 countries.

Becoming a productive digital nomad with Focusmate

Community is an important part of the digital nomad lifestyle and Taylor created a community around focus and stopping procrastinating. It’s for individuals as well as teams and is pretty easy to get started. On the platform, you select your accountability partner and if you enjoyed the session, you could favorite your focus buddy. Next, you set up a 30-60 min call and share with each other what you are going to work on. During the work, you will keep your sound on mute so you don’t distract each other but you can communicate in the chat.

At the end of the session, you get back on the video and can talk about how your session went. If you both like it, you can book another session and in this way, you can focus on getting your work done together with someone.

What we love about Taylor’s story is that he started his business because he was facing this challenge to the point that he lost his job. It was hard for him to concentrate and he could not calm down enough to be intentional with his time. We see in the community that many remote workers find it hard to focus and it gets even harder with an adventurous distractions like travel and sunny weather.

Taylor shares that the cultural foundation of Focusmate is safety. He overcame the shame he felt and his depression. When he got the idea to start Focusmate, his friend supported him and it’s incredibly to see what Taylor has accomplished so far.

If you would like to get a taste of Focusmate go to www.focusmate.com and use the code NOMAD22 to get a free month of Focusmate Turbo.

Connect with our Nienke Nina and our guests

Your host Nienke Nina

More digital nomad tips and life advice via instagram @digitalnomadsdaily

Connect with Nienke Nina on LinkedIn @Nienke Nina Keizer

Find Nienke Nina on Instagram @nienkeninatravels

Meet digital nomad Taylor

Find him on Instagram @TaylorJacobson

Check out his website www.focusmate.com 

Other episodes you might like:

🎧  Episode #25: How To Optimize Your Brain To Increase Performance With Angela

🎧  Episode #41: The 5 Key Ingredients To Work Remotely Effectively with Anna Maria

🎧  Episode #51: How To Live A Balanced And Joyful Remote Life With Ali 

A Digital Nomad Family Enjoying It Part-Time with Rowena

“Remote work is a way of living and it’s a lifestyle. I chose remote work because it gave me the flexibility to live a certain style which means that I don’t work all the time.”

The definition of digital nomads

Rowena’s digital nomad life goes way back even before having a family. Today, about fifteen years later, she is still enjoying the digital nomad lifestyle and created her own unique way of living it. Her first digital nomad moments were in 2008 during a backpacking trip in South East Asia. While some things always stay the same, her digital nomad lifestyle looks very different these days. One of the reasons is that she is not alone anymore. She is a part-time digital nomad with her family and enjoys this lifestyle during long school breaks.

How we define digital nomadism is very different for every person. This episode shows you can successfully live the digital nomad lifestyle with your family. Rowena and her family only do it around 4-5 months a year and in this way, no one is missing out on the important things like school. That is a very different picture compared to what we see on Instagram. She shares that there needs to be more open-mindedness about the definition of a modern nomad.

As one of the world’s experts on remote work and a professional educator, Rowena knows how to build a sustainable and successful remote career or business. She explains remote work as a way of living. She helps her clients succeed and provides various remote work training services.

But even for an expert, this lifestyle itself doesn’t bring happiness and success. It’s a common conversation with our podcast guests that this lifestyle requires constant self-awareness, self-care, and reflection. Rowena shares helpful tips to achieve a successful remote lifestyle and maintain a healthy work-life balance.

🌟 Know your core values in life and connect keywords to them like travel and self-care.

🌟 Model these values throughout your life so you can live by them daily.

🌟 Find different ways to commit to your values and make them part of your everyday routines. For example, going to the gym, a morning walk, or watching the sunset.

🌟 Set intentions for different moments in the day to help you get into the right mindset.

A final tip Nienke Nina adds to the conversation is to create a recurring task or calendar reminder to capture your wins of the day. Wins are not just about work but can also be related to self-care or your surroundings. Ending the day with a couple of wins helps you maintain a positive mindset and boost your self-love.

Boundless life the travel community for digital nomad families

Travel groups for digital nomads are getting more popular. We talked with Craig, the co-founder of Noma-Collective about this in episode #19: 5 Benefits Of Joining A Digital Nomad Travel Group With Craig.

Rowena and her family joined Boundless Life in Portugal. It’s a travel community for digital nomad families with a special education program and high-quality services to coordinate accommodations, child care, activities, and engagements, keeping her daughter occupied with impactful activities and so much more.

If you want to learn more about Boundless Life, stay tuned because we have a beautiful episode with the co-founder Marcos Carvalho.

Connect with our Nienke Nina and our guests

Your host Nienke Nina

More digital nomad tips and life advice via instagram @digitalnomadsdaily

Connect with Nienke Nina on LinkedIn @Nienke Nina Keizer

Find Nienke Nina on Instagram @nienkeninatravels

Meet digital nomad Rowena

Find her on LinkedIn Rowena Hennigan

Follow her on Twitter @Ro_Remote

Other episodes you might like:

🎧  Episode #24: Traveling The World For 25 Years With 3 Kids And A Dog With Andrew

🎧  Episode #33: How Digital Nomad Families Can Live A Boundless Life With Marcos

🎧  Episode #43: Remote Work Isn’t Just For Digital Nomads With Lorraine