You know that feeling when you have everything that looks perfect on paper – the house, the stable job, the “should be happy” life – but something deep inside you is restless? Something that whispers “this isn’t it” even when everyone around you thinks you’ve got it made?
That was exactly where Ioana Wilkinson found herself at 21 years old in Texas. She’d just bought her first house, achieved what most people would call success, and immediately felt what she calls “this ick.” Not just disappointment – actual physical revulsion at the idea of living in the suburbs, staying in Texas, following the prescribed path that everyone expected from her.
Most people ignore that voice. They push it down, tell themselves to be grateful, try to make the “sensible” choice work. But Ioana did something different. She listened. And that decision to listen to her inner knowing instead of external expectations completely transformed not just her life, but eventually her daughter’s life too.
In these two episodes I spoke with Ioana Wilkinson, a Freelance Content Writer and SEO Strategist about her career journey from teacher to digital nomad mom.
So yes we actually spoke so long that I shared this in two episodes:
✨ How to trust that inner voice when it’s telling you to make a major life change – even when it seems crazy to everyone else
✨ Why the traditional “safe” path might actually be the riskiest choice for your soul
✨ How one mom replaced her teaching income within months through freelance writing – starting with zero experience
✨ The power of win probability and why responding to existing opportunities beats cold pitching every time
✨ How to build a business that travels with you – real strategies from someone living it
✨ Why LinkedIn’s “easily apply” filter is your secret weapon for landing clients fast
✨ The truth about AI and freelance writing – spoiler: it’s actually creating more opportunities, not fewer
When Your Soul Knows Before Your Mind Does
“I don’t want this. I don’t want to live in Texas. I don’t want to live in the suburbs. I’ve got to get out of here.” Those were the words running through Ioana’s mind as she stood in her brand new house. The logical part of her brain couldn’t make sense of it – she’d worked hard for this, saved for this, done everything “right.” But her soul was already three steps ahead, already calling her toward something completely different.
For the next five years, she and her husband dreamed and planned. Not the kind of vague “maybe someday” dreaming that most of us do, but actual strategic planning. They decided they wanted to teach English abroad. They started preparing, saving, getting ready to make a move that would seem absolutely crazy to most people.
Because here’s the thing about following your inner voice – it rarely makes sense to anyone else. It’s not logical. It’s not safe. It requires you to trust something deeper than spreadsheets and five-year plans.
At 26, they did it. They sold their house, packed one suitcase each, grabbed their little dog, and moved to Barcelona, Spain. Just like that. From suburban Texas to the Mediterranean coast, because something inside Ioana knew that’s where she belonged.
The Spanish Love Affair That Changed Everything
Why Spain? What is it about this place that calls to people so deeply? As Ioana describes it, “It’s the nature, the culture. Everything’s slow paced. They have such a good work-life balance. You know, a whole month off in August, three day weekends, siestas. People take their nap, they go have lunch with mom, they go and pick up their kid and bring them home for lunch. It’s just a totally different, flexible, freedom-focused lifestyle.”
This isn’t just about vacation vibes or pretty beaches. This is about a fundamental difference in how life is structured, how priorities are ordered, how human beings are supposed to live. In Spain, Ioana found something she didn’t even know she was missing – a place where life comes before work, where community matters more than productivity, where taking time to actually live your life isn’t seen as lazy or selfish.
For five years, they taught English and lived this dream. And then COVID hit.
When Everything Falls Apart (And Creates Space for Something Better)
Sometimes the universe has to take away what’s comfortable to make room for what’s calling you. For Ioana, that moment came when the pandemic started shutting down the English academies where she taught. Classes were dropping left and right – after all, when people are worried about survival, English lessons become a luxury they can’t afford.
And right in the middle of this crisis, Ioana discovered she was pregnant.
Picture this: you’re living abroad, your income is disappearing, you’re about to become responsible for another human being, and you have no idea how you’re going to provide. Most people would panic, maybe even consider moving back to the “safety” of home country and traditional employment.
But Ioana had learned to trust that inner voice. And that voice was telling her there was another way.
She started hearing about freelance writing from friends in Barcelona groups. At first, her logical mind dismissed it: “That’s probably just something you do for a little extra money. It can’t be anything too serious.”
How wrong she was.
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The Intuitive Leap That Changed Everything: Building an Intuitive Business
What Ioana discovered was this huge world of content writing and SEO that she’d never known existed. Companies needed writers, badly. And with her background in teaching, marketing, and running a photography business, she actually had more relevant skills than she realized.
But here’s the beautiful part – instead of spending months researching, taking course after course, trying to build the “perfect” strategy, she followed her intuition. She remembers sitting on her terrace in Spain with her big pregnant belly, writing her portfolio “completely intuitively like I did not plan it out like I teach my students to now, so just completely intuitively wrote it out.”
No perfect plan. No elaborate business strategy. Just a pregnant woman in Spain trusting her instincts and taking action.
And it worked. Within two weeks of publishing her portfolio and starting to apply for jobs, she was getting gigs. Within a few months, she’d replaced her teaching income. A couple of months after that, she was able to “retire” her husband from teaching too.
This is what happens when you stop overthinking and start trusting. When you let your intuition guide you instead of waiting until you have all the answers.
The Freedom to Live Life on Your Terms
But the story doesn’t end there. Because Ioana and her family didn’t just build a business – they built a lifestyle. Their daughter Rosie’s first year was in Spain, her second year in Mexico, her third year in Oklahoma, and her fourth year back in Spain. This little girl is growing up speaking Catalan, Castellano, Romanian, and English. She’s learning that the world is big and beautiful and full of possibilities.
Think about that for a minute. While most kids are growing up in one town, going to one school, thinking that their little corner of the world is all there is, Rosie is becoming a citizen of the world. She’s learning that there are different ways to live, different foods to try, different languages to speak, different cultures to celebrate.
And this is possible because her mom chose to listen to that voice inside that said “there’s more than this.” Because she chose courage over comfort, trust over fear.
The Spiritual Foundation of Success – When you make God Your Business Partner
But there’s something deeper happening in Ioana’s story that most business advice misses completely. This isn’t just about strategy and tactics and finding clients on LinkedIn (though she’s brilliant at that too). This is about learning to co-create with something bigger than yourself.
When Ioana was trying to decide whether to move back to Spain through the digital nomad visa process, she didn’t just make pros and cons lists. She prayed. She asked for guidance. And she heard a voice saying “I will make a way for you.”
The logical part of her mind was terrified. The visa process was complicated, expensive, uncertain. She would have to physically move her entire family to Spain and hope they’d be allowed to stay. The risk was enormous.
But that voice kept saying “I will make a way for you. I will make a way for you.”
So she trusted. She showed up, step by step, and found the right lawyer, navigated the bureaucracy, trusted the process. And when the approval finally came through, she realized: “You were right. You made a way. You made a way for me.”
This is what happens when you learn to partner with the divine in your business and life decisions. When you stop trying to figure everything out with your mind and start listening to the wisdom that’s available to you if you’re willing to receive it.
The Mother Identity Crisis (And How to Navigate It)
Let’s talk about something that doesn’t get discussed enough in business circles – what happens to your identity when you become a mom. Ioana is refreshingly honest about this: “I was someone that was in shock for a long time after becoming a mom. It’s hard to say that out loud because I know a lot of women want… I shouldn’t say that, but I’m sure many women feel… it’s taken me years to realize that I’m a mom, which is so weird to say out loud.”
This is so important to hear. We live in a culture that expects women to instantly transform into blissful, instinctual mothers the moment a baby arrives. But the truth is, becoming a mother is a relationship that develops over time. You have to get to know each other. You have to build that connection.
And for women who are used to independence, used to freedom, used to following their own desires and dreams, this adjustment can be profound. The fear of losing yourself, losing your freedom, losing your ability to travel and explore and build the life you want – these are real fears, and they deserve to be acknowledged.
But here’s what Ioana discovered: becoming a mother doesn’t have to mean giving up your dreams. It can actually be the fuel that helps you achieve them.
“It lit a fire under me to really make sure that this business can scale and is successful because I want to give her everything. I want her to have everything she could want and more. And I want her to see what it’s like to build a business and what it’s like for her to build her dream life.”
This is about more than providing financially. This is about modeling for your children what it looks like to follow your calling, to trust your instincts, to build a life that’s aligned with who you really are.
The Community You Create vs. The Community You’re Given
One thing that really stands out about Ioana’s story is how intentional she’s been about creating community wherever she goes. In their daughter’s school in Spain, there are 30 parents in their WhatsApp group. And every single week, there are multiple invitations: “Y’all want to go to the park right now? Y’all want to go get gelato right now? You want to go to the beach right now? Who wants to come over to our house to eat barbecue?”
This is the kind of community that people in places like the US are desperately craving. The spontaneous connections, the assumption that of course you’d want to spend time together, the integration of children and adults and daily life.
But it doesn’t just happen automatically. It happens because you choose it. Because you prioritize it. Because you’re willing to sometimes run into Martha when you don’t have your makeup on, or say no to an invitation because you’re running late, but you show up anyway because community matters more than convenience.
The Fear Marketing vs. Desire Marketing Dilemma
As someone who writes marketing content for businesses, Ioana faces an interesting dilemma that many of us in the online space wrestle with. How do you grab people’s attention and make sales without using fear tactics? How do you market with integrity?
“One of the top things that we learn, especially when you’re writing introductions or hooks, is to use the pain point agitation solution framework. And it works very well… But it is in a sense a fear tactic. And it’s hard because it’s like, man, you’re almost using manipulation to grab someone’s attention.”
This is such an important conversation to have. Yes, pain point marketing works. It grabs attention, it drives clicks, it makes sales. But what does it do to us as human beings when we’re constantly being reminded of our problems, our fears, our inadequacies?
The alternative is desire marketing – speaking to people’s aspirations, their dreams, the transformation they want to experience. Instead of poking at wounds, you’re painting a picture of possibility.
As Daniel Priestley says, “People buy what they want, not what they need.” This is why someone will spend money on something that seems completely impractical while ignoring things that would clearly benefit them. Because decision-making isn’t rational – it’s emotional, it’s intuitive, it’s about desire.
AI, Fear-Mongering, and the Real Future of Work
Let’s address the elephant in the room – AI and the future of freelance writing. While everyone else is running around like “little mad chickens thinking everybody is going to lose their job,” Ioana has a different perspective.
For her business, AI has actually brought in more work, not less. “Most of my clients actually have AI tools and so they need content to write about their tools. And it’s so funny because some of the AI clients I’ve written for as well have AI writing tools.”
The key insight here is that AI is artificial intelligence. It can help with patterns, lists, outlining, research, brainstorming, beating writer’s block. But it will never be you. It will never have your expertise, your years of experience, your unique perspective on the world.
“Anyone that says that is fear-mongering or they’re a client you wouldn’t want to work for anyway.”
This is what happens when you stay grounded in your own value instead of getting caught up in the panic that certain people are trying to spread. Things have always evolved. The internet was once going to ruin everything. Google was going to drown us in too much content. Social media was going to destroy human connection.
And yet here we are, more connected than ever, with more opportunities than ever, if we’re willing to see them.
The Prayer-Driven Business Strategy
Here’s where most business advice diverges completely from Ioana’s approach. She doesn’t just rely on strategy and tactics and market research. She prays about her business decisions. She asks for guidance on everything from rate increases to relocations to whether she should keep engaging on social media.
A few months ago, she was feeling like social media engagement was wasting her time. So she prayed about it: “God, I’m going to start engaging for a while. And if this is something that would help me connect with others, let it happen. Show me if this is something that is worth my time.”
She started engaging differently – not just fire emojis and “you go girl” comments, but actually sharing pieces of her real self. And within a few weeks, she started getting DMs from aligned people. Real conversations with real people who wanted to connect.
“The prayer engagement worked. And I was pleasantly surprised.”
This is what happens when you invite the divine to be your business partner. When you recognize that you don’t have to figure everything out by yourself. When you understand that there’s wisdom available to you that goes beyond what your mind can compute.
The Peace That Passes Understanding
Throughout all of this – the international moves, the career changes, the motherhood adjustments, the business building – there’s one constant in Ioana’s life: a deep sense of peace that comes from knowing she’s not alone.
“If I have God close to my heart, I’m never alone. Literally, it doesn’t matter where I am or what happens. Even if I’m in a bad situation, I’m never alone. And that steadiness just really grounds me… It’ll give me a clue. It’ll tell me what path to take next.”
This is what changes everything. When you know you’re not alone, when you trust that you’re being guided, when you understand that there’s a bigger plan unfolding that you’re part of – the fear starts to dissolve. The anxiety about making the “right” choice becomes less important because you know you’re held, you’re supported, you’re loved no matter what.
What This Means for You
So what can you take from Ioana’s story? How can you apply these insights to your own life and career?
First, start listening to that inner voice. The one that knows things your logical mind hasn’t figured out yet. The one that gets excited about possibilities that don’t make sense on paper. The one that whispers “there’s more than this” even when your current life looks perfectly fine.
Second, understand that following your calling doesn’t have to mean sacrificing security entirely. Ioana didn’t just quit everything and hope for the best. She planned, she prepared, she took strategic steps. But she did it all in service of a vision that was bigger than safety.
Third, remember that becoming a mother doesn’t mean giving up your dreams. It can actually be the catalyst that helps you achieve them. Your children are watching how you live your life, and they’re learning from your example what’s possible for them.
Fourth, consider bringing spirituality into your business decisions. Whether you call it prayer, meditation, intuition, or just quiet reflection – there’s wisdom available to you beyond what your analytical mind can provide.
And finally, trust that there’s more possibility available to you than you can currently see. We’re living in unprecedented times when it comes to remote work, location independence, and building businesses that serve your life instead of consuming it.
The question isn’t whether it’s possible. The question is whether you’re willing to listen to that voice inside that’s calling you toward something more, something different, something aligned with who you really are.
Because on the other side of that fear, on the other side of that leap, there might just be a life more beautiful than anything you could have planned with your logical mind alone.
That’s what Ioana discovered. That’s what’s available to you too, if you’re ready to trust, to leap, to co-create with something bigger than yourself.
The only question is: are you ready to listen?
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