How I Turned a 3-Month Sabbatical Into 7 Years of Traveling the World

By the age of 26, Alexandra Jimenez had a demanding and successful career in the corporate fashion world. She made good money, lived alone in Los Angeles, and enjoyed the spoils of young independence — dinners out, designer clothes, and a luxury car. When she was first demoted and then quit her dream job, she was crushed. She decided to spend three months traveling to recuperate and refocus.

Seven years later, Jimenez runs a popular travel website, Travel Fashion Girl, that was inspired by her excursions. Her possessions can fit into a suitcase, and she doesn't have a home address. Jimenez explains why she decided to live a permanent nomadic lifestyle.

I started my career while I was still in school at the Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising in Los Angeles. At 20, I landed a big corporate fashion job with [a company that] produces the biggest fashion events in the world. The job paid great and had awesome perks. I was the events and sponsorship coordinator, which means I helped produce our trade shows and special events, and I also sold sponsorships to big clients like American Apparel, eBay, and American Express.

I worked hard, played hard, and didn't deprive myself of anything. I had my own apartment. I bought myself a BMW. I had Marc Jacobs shoes lined up in my closet alongside designer clothing. But I was a workaholic. Because I loved my job so much, it was my identity.

In 2008, the economy tanked, and the company I dedicated my life to for the past six years decided to squeeze me out. They demoted me instead of hiring me for a management position that became available. Ironically, I'm the one who had to train the new manager and then became her assistant. So I quit. I was so sad and hurt. My job was the only relationship I was in. Now that it was gone, it terrified me.

I had always promised myself that if I ever left the company, I would take three months off to travel. The realization hit me that this was my chance. The longest time I'd ever been away from work in six years was a long weekend. But I needed to shock my senses and experience things that would take me out of my comfort zone. I had savings. So I decided to do it.

I spent a few weeks in Central America with friends. Then I went on a group trip to Europe, which isn't where I wanted to go because I had already been there. But I didn't know [how to] solo travel yet. So I had to wait for friends to travel with me and compromise on the destination.

I was coming up to the end of my planned three-month sabbatical when I realized I needed to do what I had intended to do: travel alone. I Googled "tour groups departing next week" and came across a Canadian tour group going to India. I signed up, booked a flight two days later, and was off to India. That trip changed my life. The people there were so happy. I could just see the pure joy in their eyes that made me think I was doing something wrong in my life and that my priorities were not right. At home, everybody is miserable and unhappy that they don't have the latest iPhone.

A lot of the women in my travel group were seasoned solo travelers. They were telling me stories about going on safaris in Africa, visiting Egypt, and seeing Machu Picchu. I wanted to see the world wonders and have the stories these women had. I made the decision to keep traveling. I was 26, I didn't have kids or a mortgage, and I wasn't in a serious relationship. I didn't have anything holding me back.

While I was still in India, I wrote a list of everything I needed to do: break the lease on my apartment, sell my car, sell whatever I could, and find storage for everything else. I had a job lined up to start after my trip to India. A few days before the end of my trip, I let them know I would no longer be available to work for them since I decided to continue traveling.

I went home to my parents' house in L.A. to get everything in order. I got the deposit back on my apartment and rented my car. I canceled my cell phone. I didn't have any debt, and I got rid of all my bills. Thirty days later, I was catching a flight to Africa.

My first stop was 11 days on safari through Africa — from Zimbabwe to South Africa. From there, I flew to Egypt and did a seven-day trip through the Middle East. I stayed in hostels, learned what it meant to backpack, and became more comfortable. I traveled on my savings and borrowed some money from my mom. On a trip to Mexico at the end of that first year, I had an epiphany on a bus. I decided to do an around-the-world trip on my own.

I moved home and spent [most of] 2009 working as a promotional tour manager for Verizon Wireless. Most of the time I was driving a truck up and down the West Coast. It paid well, and because I was traveling the whole time [or staying with my parents], I didn't have any expenses. I was getting paid to stay at hotels, which also helped me build up a lot of travel rewards points. That job is how I funded my trip around the world.

My parents thought I had lost my mind and that I was having a nervous breakdown. I went from being a workaholic completely focused on my career to having no attachments. They kept asking, "What are you running away from?" Nobody understood that there wasn't anything wrong with me.

In 2011, I came home again to work as a tour manager for a video game company driving a 30-foot box truck around the USA twice. It funded my travel for the next year and a half. All these gigs I took back home were temporary. I worked just as long as I needed to save up enough to leave again.

I made money while traveling by picking up odd jobs. I was a snorkel guide in Thailand. I managed a lodge in the jungles of Guatemala for five weeks. It was in the middle of nowhere. You needed to kayak to get to the grocery store. I didn't make money, but I didn't spend any money either. My food and accommodation was covered, and I walked away with $50 in tips after five weeks. I loved it so much I did something similar in Borneo and Thailand, working in exchange for room and board. It's common to find work anywhere in the world in exchange for housing and food anywhere from one week to one year.

I had been planning to start a website for about a year and a half. I had become very frustrated with my own packing. I was tired of picking up my heavy backpack. The biggest mistake was packing too much of the wrong things, including technical travel clothing that was only functional and utterly unfashionable. I was tired of not being able to find resources online or information that was helpful specifically for women travelers my age. There was strictly practical packing advice available that seemed directed toward male backpackers. I wanted to introduce realistic tips that were not only functional but fashionable too. So I began researching. I was interviewing travelers with small bags. I milked secrets from everyone I would encounter. Then I started implementing the different techniques in my own packing and started writing articles about it that I just kept on my laptop.

I signed up for a work exchange in Thailand that was very serendipitous. It was run by an expat who was living on the islands. He hired different groups of travelers to help him with projects for his clients, such as writing articles and doing SEO stuff, which I didn't know anything about at the time. I met a web developer and a social media manger who helped me get my website up and running.

Travel Fashion Girl launched in 2012, and I didn't see it as a business until a year later. It was my hobby. But the website became profitable within the first six months. The way I've monetized my site has evolved throughout the years and includes various resources — digital products such as ebooks, banner sales, advertorials, brand partnerships, reviews, giveaways, and affiliate sales. Now I'm focusing on expanding my brand with the creation of my own line of travel accessories.

As I invested my energy into the website as a full-time job, the site continued to grow. Because I travel in places such as Southeast Asia or Central America, the cost of living is low, which means I can sustain myself with a minimal amount of money. A small bungalow a five-minute walk from the beach in Thailand or Mexico can range from $200 to $350 a month, and food can average a $1 to $3 per local meal.

Even as my website's earnings grow, I still maintain the same lifestyle. You don't really need as much to be happy as you think you do. The knowledge that you have the freedom to design your own life is incredibly freeing. We're not programmed to think like this.

My website gets an average of 300,000 visitors and 1 million page views every month. I have three permanent team members — one full-time, two part-time — including a blog manager, blog assistant, and social media assistant. I also have about 10 freelance writers keeping things flowing when I'm not in the "office." When I'm traveling actively, I like to travel for five days and work for two days. When I stay in one place for a month or more, I tend to work more of a regular work schedule.

I could never go back to a "regular" life because I know what it's like to live outside of the bubble. I'm 32, and I've pretty much marked off all the major items on my travel bucket list. I still have at least another 32 years to do whatever I want. If I feel like eating Mexican food, I'll head off to Mexico for some time. If I want to learn a new language, I'll go to Korea. If I want to do some yoga, I'll head over to India.

The hardest thing about this lifestyle is not having a community. The first couple of years meeting new people all the time was fun and exciting, but I do miss having those friendships. My job is also isolating since I work on my own. Next year, I'm planning to semi-settle down, travel to fewer places, and stay in one destination for six months at a time. I'm not as interested in chasing passport stamps anymore. I've been to 40 countries.

My travels have evolved as I have grown and developed as a person. I started off as a curious workaholic, which led to being an excited backpacker filled with wanderlust, who then got hooked by the travel bug and became a long-term traveler who later morphed into a successful digital entrepreneur.

I see the world much more openly now. I've experienced and learned about history firsthand more than I could have ever learned in a textbook. My priorities are also much different. I know I don't need much stuff to be happy and that life experience is the most valuable thing you can spend your money on.

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