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Freelance writers don’t plan to fail.

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Planning to become a blogger or freelance writer? Plan well.

While some people do strike gold quickly and make a ton of money, it’s best to assume that these folks are outliers. Entrepreneurship is chancy at best and sometimes downright frustrating.

For part of my own freelancing career, two words too often applied: feast, famine.

Too much work, not enough work. A fair amount of work but knowing that in a week’s time I’d be finishing up my final assignments – and no editors seemed interested in my current pitches. More rarely (and usually at the beginning of this journey) I’d have no work at all for weeks at a time, and be mighty glad that I had some side hustles.

Then again, I started freelancing full-time way back in 2002, when blogging wasn’t a big thing and when companies didn’t have to have major online presence. I’d get some magazine or newspaper gigs, and then a whole bunch of rejection slips. Again, thank goodness for alternate income streams (and a super-frugal nature).

“To break in you need to be willing to be broke,” notes Lamine Zarrad in the Freelancers Union blog.

Zarrad suggests that would-be entrepreneurs (including freelance writers) become “scrappy and creative.” He also offers some pretty useful tips for doing so. I’m listing some of them here, along with a few of my own.

 

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‘Self-care is part of your work.’

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Paula Pant, who writes the Afford Anything blog, has been a freelance writer since 2010. Recently she posted some excellent advice on Instagram:

The time that you spend going to the gym, practicing yoga, writing in your journal or connecting with a close friend on the phone is not time that you are spending away from work.

Self-care is part of your work.

Even laptops need to recharge.

Paula is a very wise woman. Freelancers would do well to listen to her advice about self-care – especially at this time of year.

 

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The flexibility of the freelance life.

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Sometimes the freelance life is frustrating: isolation, long hours, dry spells between assignments, no paid time off.

Sometimes, though, the freedom to order your own days makes it all worthwhile.

A few days ago I was just about to tackle a current deadline when my teen-aged nephew, M, called from the school counselor’s office. He’d just learned that a friend had committed suicide, and was too shaken to finish out the day.

His mom had okayed his leaving but could not break away from work (she’s a teacher) to come get him. Was there any way that I could?

You bet there was.

 

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A writing retreat for women.

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thBack in the early 1980s a writer I know earned a residency at the Hedgebrook writing retreat for women writers. The experience crystallized writing as a concept. Specifically, it defined it as a vocation.

That happened when the writer tried to help clear the table after dinner and the residency director told her to knock it off – she’d already done her work for the day. It was the first time anybody had said writing “was a real job,” she said later.

The writer was Dana Stabenow, and she went on to hit the New York Times best-seller list. Since then she’s published nearly three dozen books and shows no signs of slowing down. And now Stabenow is creating her own writing retreat for women.

 

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Freelancers: Prepare to get sick.

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Two days ago I had cataract surgery on my left eye. Although the outpatient process is fairly simple, it has affected my ability to work.

This reminded me, once again, that freelancers should always be ready to deal with illness or injury.

Independent contractors don’t get sick days. If we don’t work, we don’t get paid. That’s just one more thing to think about if you’re planning to go freelance.

As someone who hasn’t had a square job since 2002, I have a year-round readiness plan in place. If you, too, are your own boss then you need a plan of your own.

 

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Don’t let Facebook run your life.

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The November election certainly stirred things up. Even if your preferred candidates won you’ve likely felt some upheaval thanks to relentless Internet uproar, which in some cases led to un-friending – and even un-familying – over political differences.

And if your candidates didn’t prevail? The temptation might be to dig a hole, crawl in and pull it in after you – after you get done un-friending your Facebook buds and cutting yourself off from relatives.

Don’t do that. Instead, take some advice from online course expert David Siteman Garland.

“Your social media is your social media. If you want to talk politics on there all day, that’s your right,” he said in an e-newsletter.

“However…there are better ways to spend your time.”

 

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Freelance survival skill: Napping.

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thIn my late 40s I went back to school to earn the degree that was interrupted by single motherhood and the need to make a living.

At the same time I was undergoing a drawn-out divorce (after a long-term abusive marriage), managing an apartment building, babysitting and writing three times a week for MSN Money. Tired? Always.

Without naps I probably wouldn’t have made it through, let alone graduated magna cum laude. Kept snoozing even after graduation because I was traveling regularly and taking on freelance gigs in addition to the MSN job.

Turns out I was in good company. According to an article by productivity author and coach Michael Hyatt, the list of famous nappers includes Leonardo da Vinci, Albert Einstein, Eleanor Roosevelt, John D. Rockefeller and Thomas Edison.

Naps feel luxurious, even when you’re taking them because you know you’ll be pulling an all-nighter. Especially when you know you’ll be pulling an all-nighter.

 

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Wil Wheaton hits ‘reset.’

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th-1The actor/writer/geekster recently wrote about seven things he did to reboot his life. The second and third items on the list were the ones that caught my eye:

Read more.

Write more.

In my opinion you can’t have one without the other. Apparently Wheaton feels the same way:

“I need to read so that my imagination is inspired. I need to read so I get an artistic and creative hunger that can only be fed by writing. I need to read so that I feel challenged to scrape ideas out of my skull and turn them into words and images.

“I became a writer 10 years ago because I not only loved it, but because it was a way for me to express myself creatively in a way that ultimately gave me control over my own destiny and my own life.”

Control over destiny and life. Easy for him to say, right? He can make a living as a writer because he’s got a huge audience (including 2.92 million Twitter followers) who will read/listen to whatever he writes/says. But you know what else he’s got?

 

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Why you need a stroke file.

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thDuring my newspaper years I kept a file folder of letters that extolled my virtues as a reporter. Some came directly to me, and others were copies of letters to the editor.

Back in the days of print journalism relatively few people let you know that you did something right. But oh, if you did something wrong – or simply not to the reader’s personal satisfaction – boy, would your phone ring!)

The idea for keeping the good letters came from a colleague, who called it her “stroke file.” Thus I labeled my folder “Ego Strokes” and kept it handy for dim days.

 

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Why writers shouldn’t give up.

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thWriting can be one of the most isolating and thankless jobs around. Unless you have a contract for that article, essay or book, you’re working on blind faith that somebody, somewhere might want it.

And then the rejection letter (or e-mail) arrives. Whether it’s your first or only the most recent in a long line of “thanks, but no thanks” missives, you wonder whether there’s a point. Will anyone ever want to read your words?

As someone who’s made a living writing for 31 years, I have one piece of advice: Don’t give up.

Easy for me to say, right? But I didn’t succeed right from the get-go.

 

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