I was in downtown Atlanta a few weeks back, delivering a few seminars at a writers conference. I loooove getting out from behind my computer and mingling with the rest of humanity (and when they’re paying me, even better…). It’s part of the variety that makes me love this life I (we) have.
Well, apparently, that love and appreciation for My Pretty Cool Life came through loud and clear to one of the attendees of my morning session on self-publishing. After the talk, sitting at my book table, this gentleman approached with a lovely bit of good news: He was a freelancer who did the regular Why I Love My Job feature for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, and I sure seemed to fit that profile. Would I like to be the subject of a future half-page instalment of the series? “Is this a trick question?” I asked, smiling. Like, duh.
He came by last Thursday to do the interview and snap a few, and that’ll be coming up some Sunday in May, I’m told. Yay. Of course, it got me thinking about how good I have it. There’s a special moment I have every morning (after rising about 8, 8:30, and commuting 15 feet to my office) when I’m sitting at my computer answering email. Big windows frame trees and more trees, and let the morning sun stream in. I always stop and think about everyone out on the highway, struggling through gridlock on their way to an airless, windowless, soulless cubicle for the next 8-10 hours, and then back in the car for Round 2 and on to fight crowds at the grocery, gym, and dry cleaners, etc.
I thank my lucky stars I am not among their ranks and wish this life for them. To live life on one’s own terms. To rise or crash on your clock, not someone else’s. To take a day, week or month off when you say (as long as you can pay your bills). Yeah, I know, you folks still working for The Man don’t really want to hear all this, but hey, if it helps you get to this place quicker… I joke sometimes – but I’m more than half-serious – that while my Well-Fed Writer titles are ostensibly about writing, they’re really about lifestyle. I just happen to do that with writing.
If you’re living the freelance dream, what part of it puts that quiet, contented smile on your face or even makes you downright giddy?
I’m still at university, so it’s hard for me to actually start a life as a freelancer. Still, the idea of getting paid for doing what I love looks attractive and I know that I’ll enjoy it. I also like the idea of being almost completely in control of my success 🙂
Oh man… I love this topic! I take the “Free” in “Freelance” quite seriously.
I live a half-mile from the ocean, so if it’s a nice day, the family and I head down to the water in the morning or early afternoon and tend to have the beach to ourselves as most other people are working.
I love that if it snows, I don’t have to call in to the office to ask the boss if I can come in late or stay home. I can go out and play with the kids guilt-free.
I love working on weekends from time to time (as I am this moment) when it’s quiet and taking time off during the week to go to places that are less crowded Monday through Friday.
I love never having to work with a client again if I find I don’t enjoy it. (Knock on wood, though… I really like all my clients and haven’t had to fire any.)
I love being able to take my kids to any activity and not worry about it conflicting with typical work hours.
I love getting up when I’m ready and rarely needing to set an alarm.
I love that I can expand (or contract) my business as I see fit without having to clear it with anyone.
I love avoiding traffic. (I still look at the traffic cameras where I used to live and work and think, “Ugh.. thank goodness I’m no longer stuck in that mess day after day.”)
I love feeling like I can waste some time and surf the ‘Net without wondering if a boss is spying on my activities.
I love not having to fill out annual performance reviews.
I love taking time off when it suits me best without having to get clearance from a boss.
I could go on and on. This life is sooo great. That’s not to say I don’t work my tail off for my clients and that there aren’t times when the deadlines are so tight it seems like I’ll never get away from the computer. But the benefits so outweigh any negatives.
GREAT stuff, Mike! What HE said…except I don’t live by the ocean and don’t have kids…;) But folks, he’s hitting it on the head. C’mon, who else?
PB
Lately, my mom has been going through a lot of stress at work. She has coworkers that she can’t stand because they don’t do anything and basically get away with murder. She’s been hating her job for some time.
It makes me appreciate what I have. I remember working in retail and experiencing the same thing. I was the only one who ever worked. On the manager’s day off, everyone would just slack, and that bothered me.
Now my only coworker is the computer, and it does its work just fine. Yay for freelancing!
Love this question! I just moved into a new loft that borders on a major expressway in Chicago. Each morning I watch the traffic and the commuter trains go by, and smile as I walk back to my office.
What else do I love? That I can organize my day with freedom. That my cat can be my work partner (even if she does have to announce her presence when a client calls by meowing like she’s dying). That I can wear comfy clothes. That I am in control of who I work for, what kind of work I do, and how i earn my money.
Most of all, I love the fulfillment that building an independent writing business gives. I never thought I would have this career and this lifestyle, and I am so thankful for it each day. Even when I’m stressed, or worried about the famine part of the feast/famine pattern, or pissed about taxes (urgh!), this career still rocks.
I live in a duplex with my oldest daughter and her family living downstairs. I love being able to take a break to play “Go Fish” with my grandkids whenever they pop upstairs for a visit!
Oh, Peter, this is so up my alley! I love my job, but I especially love the fact that I don’t have to go anywhere but my own office to work. I can get up, throw a few clothes in the laundry, sit back down, work, get up, walk the dogs, go back to my office and do more work…the best thing about this is that I am on my own time. I can be sick and still go to work, lol. I love it, absolutely love it.
I am not yet self-employed, but I get a lovely taste of it every summer. As a public school teacher, I get summers off, but I must work at something to feed my family.
I make and sell handmade soap and other natural body products. When I am selling these things at the farmer’s markets, I feel free. I can set things up how I want. If I’m out of a soap–oh, well! I don’t have anyone to answer to but myself. My weeks are my own, and I get to spend tons of time with my daughter.
So I know what you are talking about. I do want that for myself, full-time. I’ve been working on it. I’m on the edge of a new project, which only needs a little bit of money to get going…
I’ve been saying that for a while.
Thanks Trish, Amy, Theresa, Dorothy, and the other Amy for all your comments. (FYI, check out Amy #2’s soap site. I bought some myself recently – really nice stuff! https://soapcrone.com/soaps.php.
As I wrote to Mike Klassen, who commented above with his great list of what makes the freelance life so fab, this is one of those topics that might seem a bit lightweight, but those of us who are indeed living the dream KNOW that it isn’t. AT ALL.
PB
Best thing about the freelance life is the control. I just moved to a great new house. More room in my office than I ever had. My massive window looks out onto woodland and it’s so quiet you could hear a pin drop. I never liked the rigid structure of a 9-5 job demanded. It always seemed to me to be silly to cart my body to a building for a certain time and remain there for a set period before I could go home. It did take me several years to pluck up the courage to dive into self-employment, but it was the best decision I ever made. I know we all develop a routine when we’re homeworking, but its’s a routine that I’ve devised and works for me.
My freelance experience was interrupted by about three years of employment for a nonprofit organization that I wanted to be a part of. Although that was a wonderful experience and I learned a lot, I found it difficult to work through the creative process in office setting. Now that I’m back working from my home office, I truly appreciate the ability to ponder an idea while I’m out walking my dog or to write from a picnic table at one of our local parks.
In my senior year of college (1975), I took a freelance writing class, because I enjoyed writing and decided it’s what I wanted to do. After taking that class, I was inspired to choose a career as a freelance writer. Shortly after graduating college, I started writing. I had to do other freelance jobs for awhile, but they were usually related (market research interviewing, typesetting, etc.). By 1980, I as making a living as a freelance writer, having developed a niche that was quite lucrative at the time.
During that time, I’ve had some lean years and some fat years. Freelance writing has given me the freedom to pursue other interests, such as acting, film producing, and other film-related work.
For the last few years, though, freelancing has been tough for me. There was a time when all my worked came by word-of-mouth. I didn’t have to promote myself. At times I was so busy I contracted to other writers.
Now, my old niche market has changed dramatically. There’s more competition (I as only one of a handful of writers in this area in the 1980s). I’m not up on the latest publishing technologies (internet, html, search engine optimization, etc.) It seems like clients now want their writers to know a half-dozen programs, in addition to knowing how to write, research, edit, interview, and take photos. I can handle Word, but many seem to want people who know MS-Office, Excel, HTML, Dreamweaver, Power Point, etc. In addition, I find some of my old clients are no longer in the business — or those that are don’t want to pay. They want me to give them content for free and my compensation would be to drive people to my web site. The problem is: what’s the use of driving people to my web site — even if I had one — if no one who goes to the web site is willing to pay me to write. In the past, no one would dream of asking me to provide them with free content for their publications. Sometimes I would allow them to reprint stuff I’d published elsewhere, but even then, they would often pay me for it. Today, though, everybody I’m familiar with thinks writers should provide content for free.
It’s a little overwhelming. I’d like to get back into a freelancing groove where I’m actually getting paid enough to make a decent living, but I’m not sure where to begin.
Peter, this is close to being my favorite subject of all time!! The only good thing about being unemployed was having the ability to control my time instead of being dictated to all day, every day, by business rules that fit some high mukkety-muck’s kingdom. Yee! Haw! for the day when the freelance work makes it possible to control my time and pay all the bills! I haven’t given up hope of working from my home office every day, if I choose, or 3 days a week if I don’t. For those of you who are “there” – Way to Go!!!
I appreciate being able to call my time my own. We have 5 kids, and it is important to me to be able to go on field trips with them, volunteer at their school and be on hand if one is ill and needs to be fetched from school.
Last year we took the big step of having my husband quit his job and work from home as well. So now there are two freelancers in the house! Risky in that we have no ‘guaranteed income’, but wow – we are loving the time we can spend together. We are generating more income together than we did separately. Before he began working from home my time was limited to the hours the kids were at school and if I needed to do something in the late afternoon I would have to hire a sitter. I didn’t want to work in the evenings as that was my time with my husband. I appreciate now that we can both pitch in with the kids. There are times when my husband is in a time crunch with a client and I will take the slack and vice versa.
I appreciate that this summer we can take mini-vacations and not ask a boss for the time off; I appreciate that I can take my laptop to the pool and spend time with my kids and STILL be productive; I appreciate that my husband and I can spend time together during the day; and although we are still ‘slaves’ to the alarm clock so we can get the kids to school, I appreciate that there are mornings one of us can sleep in and the other one get the kids up.
Most of all I appreciate that someone else has not decided what our income is – we decide that. There is no limit to what we can achieve. I also appreciate that almost everything we do can be billed, not like in a company where you might be called on to do extra things and never see a penny from it.
What do I love about this life? Well, I love that fact that it’s 12:19 a.m. (EST) and I can stay up late, catch up on emails, browse the Web, and even getting a head start on my newest copywriting project, and not have to worry about waking up early tomorrow to get to a 9-5 job on time.
I love the fact that I can read blogs like this during the day and not have to worry about someone looking over my shoulder, wondering why I’m not working.
And yeah, I love the fact that I already equaled my full-time salary from last year.
I used to have to get 3 kids and myself up, ready, and out of the house for work/daycare by 7:30 AM. Then when it was time to come home, the kids would be all stressed out, tired, screaming. Me too, given that I still had a house to manage, kids to care for, countless errands to run. Now that stress is gone! The kids have MUCH shorter days because I’m home when they come home from school and the baby can just stay home all day.
What else is so great about freelancing?
* I plan my day around my fun, not my meetings and work. If I want to take my 2 youngest kids to the park, I do. I can write later. If I know I’m going somewhere (fun) on a particular day, I just don’t schedule any conference calls that day.
* I don’t sit in a grey, drab cubicle anymore. Now, I sit wherever I want with my laptop!
* No more gossip, politics, office “crap.” Occassionally I’ll hear my clients mention something about their office squabbles and I can’t help but be thrilled that it’s their issue, not mine.
* I’ve only been at this business for 9 months. Yet I work AT MOST 20 hours a week (usually more like 10) and at the rate I’m going, if I add in all the daycare and after-school care costs I am no longer having to spend, I’ll be making about 80% of what I used to make when I worked full time and spent 1 1/2 hours a day commuting. Considering I also don’t pay for $4/gallon gas to commute, I’d say I’m doing pretty darn well!
Freelancing is the way to go!
Thanks Dave, Shari, MHK, Shirley, Cori, Daniel, and Wendy, for weighing in!
This is turning out to be a good (and fun!) topic, and not surprisingly: successful working freelancers get quite passionate about their lifestyle. I remember reading a letter to the editor in some magazine a few years back. An American ex-pat living in Australia was commenting on the difference in mindset in Australia (AND Europe and much of the rest of the world for that matter) about work there vs. in the U.S. He said something to the effect that, in the States, people judge their success almost solely in monetary terms, and what a pathetic standard that was, and a reflection of a culture that didn’t know how to truly live. I couldn’t agree more (sure, we could debate the slow decline of productivity and rising costs of the European “welfare” states as the price of a higher quality of life till the cows come home, but that’s another discussion for another day…).
How many of us have friends who make a lot more money than we do, but with whom we wouldn’t trade places if it were the last job on earth? What’s the point of money if you sacrifice health, personal time and peace of mind to get it? Sure, I’m not naive. We all have to make a living, and those with families have to be more concerned about money than those without. And I like money as much as the next person, but for me, it’s about giving me freedom and options, not “Stuff.”
One final comment for MHK (comment #12 above). I don’t know what arena of writing you’re in, but it doesn’t sound like the commercial writing field I know. I’ve been in it for 15 years, and I’ve never had clients expecting me to know Excel, HTML, Dreamweaver, or Power Point. Sure, if I did master all of them, I could be more marketable, but it hasn’t been necessary. I’ve only ever been called on to be a writer, and overwhelmingly, that’s been the experience of my colleagues as well. And my clients absolutely, positively have NOT started expecting me to deliver content for free. The very idea is laughable – seriously. Sounds like you might want to check out the REAL commercial writing field, because it doesn’t appear that that’s where you’re operating now. With your experience, I’m guessing it would be a happy shift on a LOT of levels. And of course, check out my books at https://wellfedwriter.com/books.shtml (that concludes the marketing portion of this broadcast… 😉
PB
Here’s my short LOVE list:
* Planning my work schedule around my family, horseback riding, etc. instead of the other way around.
* Loving my work so much that it doesn’t really feel like work, and still getting paid for it.
* The awesome feeeling of making a client so very happy without having to sacrifice myself, family time, etc.
* Only having to attend meetings that absolutely require my presence, and the fact that I’m usually “on the clock” keeps them brief and on-topic. At my previous employment, practically my whole day would be booked with useless meetings!
* The pride that comes with teaching/demonstrating independence, self-reliance, discipline and creativity to my children.
Four years and counting….man, I don’t know if I even COULD go back to a “real” job.
Fabulous, Kara,
Thanks! And I say it all the time: At this point in my life, I am truly UNemployable… 😉
PB
When I read or hear about yet another daycare horror story, it isn’t one of my children.
My secondary love is the same as Peter’s above. I am, at this point, unemployable. Too much of a free thinker for the corporate world. I’d say it was sad, but it most certainly is not.
I get to be me 24/7.
Hey Peter –
Quote >>How many of us have friends who make a lot more money than we do, but with whom we wouldn’t trade places if it were the last job on earth? We all have to make a living, and those with families have to be more concerned about money than those without. >>end quote
We have to keep some of those people working at the corporate jobs so that WE all have jobs! If it weren’t for all the corporate/small business folks out there slogging away and sending work to us, we would have to do something else. Yeah for them!
Carol
The best thing about freelancing? Sleeping by your own body clock. I think that last time I’d done that (pre-freelancing years, that is) was when I was still in Pampers.
Peter –
When do I get a big grin? Every time I catch five minutes of the hilarious TV show The Office. They say it’s fiction, but I’m sure I’ve worked there – twice. Thanks to your eye-opening and life-changing books, I’ll never work there again! I’ve already replaced my income, my hope, and my soul! Thank you for taking the mystery out of the dream and making it a reality for so many of us! And thanks for this great blog!
I love being able to be home with my dogs. I know it’s silly, but it’s 100% true. They are so cool and so fun, and if I didn’t work from home, I wouldn’t be able to have them. They complete me. 🙂
Kristen
I am a new transplant to Atlanta. I started doing freelance articles for glossies, saved up my money from my day job in Michigan, then quit and packed up the Honda and hit the road! I also am trying to break into public relations. In the few weeks I’ve been here, just on my daily jaunts, I’m found businesses who need my services. I don’t have any financial agreements laid out, and I plan to pitch local mags, but I still think I might want to work for a PR agency so I can really see what being in the field is about. Anyway, I love these comments, because I am so free to enjoy the lovely Atlant spring and avoid the notorious Atlanta traffic and not be stuck in a building all day. I am on the fence as to whether I should really do this full time, for real. Gotta pick up Peter’s books again from the library to help…
I agree with all of the above. Okay, I confess, I like to get up early, even though I don’t “have to.” Well, I guess you do have to get up early if you still have kids at home.
But anyway, the bit about the dogs. Yeah, I wouldn’t leave a dog home alone all day for any amount of money. And my cats wouldn’t mind so much, but only those of us who work at home can have a cat in our lap while we sit at our computer. A petless workplace? No thanks….
Hello Peter:
I just finished reading your book, “The Well-Fed Writer,” a couple of months ago and have just started implementing the techniques you suggest to drum up business. As a former SAHM (stay-at-home mom) transitioning to a WAHM It’s TOTALLY scary for me to be doing this. But after reading everybody’s comments–I’m even more encouraged than ever to start living the dream! So far, the flexibility is awesome. And if I could actually make a living doing what I love, working the hours I want to work, well, that would just be…WOW!
Thanks Holly, Lisa, Toni, Kristen, Brigette, Tiffany, Carol, Jenny and Kara! Good stuff – all of you!
And Holly, good luck in making it happen. It’s quite doable, as all these folks would no doubt attest. Not necessarily easy, but worth it like you can’t even imagine…. 😉
PB
I don’t really think you have the space for all reasons I love what I do. I’ve wanted to be a writer since I was in second or third grade. After paying my dues in the publishing industry the freedom of being able to make my own hours, write what I want, work from my back deck and be there for my kid is indescribable. To top it off, I’m earning more as a professional blogger than I did as an editorial assistant. My schedule is so flexible I can work full time and still play taxi, bake cupcakes and ok…hang out at Starbucks once a week with a few other kindergarten moms.
I think the big plus is how I’m finally at the point in my career where I can pick and choose the jobs I want – I don’t have to take work just to get a foot in the door.
By the way, when I left the day job to freelance full time, yours was the first book I bought and it’s still the one I recommend to those just starting out. It continues to inspire me to do my best – so thanks.
– Deb Ng
Oh and PS Don’t tell my family but sometimes after sending husband off to work and putting my son on the schoolbus, I go inside and nap!
I love being able to go skiing in the middle of the week, when the slopes are not crowded. And I love not having to deal with office politics.
Cathy in Colorado