So better make sure you enjoy your work! Otherwise doing more of it is going to make you feel miserable. Just like there are employees that are unhappy in their jobs because of the nature of the job so it happens that in freelancing if you don't like your job you're going to feel bad. Especially if you are doing more of it...
> The hunter lives in a hard world
Yes, but when you are kicked out, laid off, fired then work divorces you. Employment is paper-thin security, you are basically living at the whim of someone else. As a freelancer if you are not 'pipelining' your work you are doing it wrong. You need to set up your rates so you can afford some slack (you are that good are you?), and then you need to push a little bit too much work in to the pipeline working prospects and turning them in to customers. Over time you will find yourself with a portfolio of customers. Periodically you review them and you raise your rate in those cases that you'd rather be doing something else. As a freelancer that is good, work finds you.
> weekly paychecks are a luxury
Yep. So a freelancer saves. If you don't have the attitude that will let you save half of your income on the spot for taxes and rainy days freelancing is not for you. Suggest you get a dayjob in stead until you close the hole in your hand and you can plan ahead a couple of months to a year.
> Also a luxury: heartburn meds and that spleen transplant you really need
I have been self employed for as long as I care to remember and have on occasion paid cash for an operation I needed, but now have state required mandatory health insurance. Things actually got cheaper for me. This will vary country to country, and in some places it's really hard to find decent health coverage as a freelancer. But there are ways around that. Incorporate a company, hire yourself and your spouse as employees and sign up for a package with some health insurance provider.
> Hey good luck with that mortgage
Freelancing requires you to be in control of your own funds to a much larger extent than a day job will give you, and banks have learned the hard way that lots of freelancers can't do that. So don't look at a bank to provide you with a mortgage until you have a solid track record. Meanwhile, nothing will stop you from working a bit harder, saving a bit more and buying that house cash in 3 to 5 years time, staying in as cheap a place as you can get away with for the intermediate period.
> oh, and nobody else will get it either
So what. Who are you doing this for? Some audience? What do you care what other people think about you not having a 'job'?
> You might as well paint a face on a volleyball
Freelancing is the opposite of a lonely life for me! I've met more people than I would ever meet in a regular job. Freelancing has taken me all over the planet, caused me to meet some of the most interesting people. It's maybe time that you 'don't make money', but I've set my rates to compensate for that and am in enough demand that that still works out well. A bit of passive income doesn't hurt either, which is how a smart and savvy freelancers spends his 'idle time'. That way that time will still make you money in the future. $20 per day in passive income is definitely doable on a very low budget in terms of time invested. Much more than that will require you to work hard at a project for well over a year but that's something you will not be able to do in the beginning. Freelancing is a stepping stone to being independent completely, I think of it as a way to make money that has more freedom than a job will ever give you.
> So why do it? Because it's awesome
Then why bitch about it? I think the author should go back to a day job for a couple of weeks. Because if you really think it is awesome then any and all of the above is either 'speedbump' variety or lack of success.
Oh, btw, I did get that mortagage. Maybe find a better bank? The tax break made it worthwhile, otherwise I would have saved just a bit longer.
I dont think the author needs your advice, the post was half written as advice and half I expect a cathartic "bitch", at least thats how it came off for me.
people can enjoy something immensely and still feel the need to bitch about it once in a while, I think thats fairly healthy.
If he meant what he wrote he should get a job, seriously.
I love the freedom that being a freelancer gives me and I could write about the hard times but I'd still do it without a bitter aftertaste like this.
Of course everything has its good and its bad sides but this sounds like someone that is very frustrated but that has found nothing better than what he's doing.
Also I notice he's a writer, now writing code and writing books are completely different for the 'average' level. An average coder can bring in quite a bit of money if they play their cards smart (look at me ;)), but an average writer would have a very hard time to make ends meet.
Writing books is more like making music than it is to writing code. And music can be tough too, as long as you don't make it in the 'big league'.
Freelance writing is tough from a financial point of view, and that's something that you presumably know before you pick that particular poison.
I find this piece much more negative than just the facts presented, the undertone is such that I hope people do not take this as the 'average' outlook of freelancers on their work and their work environment as well as their financial situation. It is not representative as far as my experience and the free-lancers that I work with are concerned.
You can't negate the tone of that article with a single line of 'because it's awesome, duh' at the end.
the first few paragraphs are all about how much he loves his work, It sounds exactly like someone who loves what they are doing but wants to point out that it isnt all sunshine and roses for people thinking about doing the same thing.
he is obviously a very good creative writer, you probably need to read it a little less literally.
when I first seen the title I remembers pg's quote straight away "doing a startup is like being punched in the face repeatedly, but a 9-5 job is like being waterboarded"
Doing a startup is much more like running a marathon than it is like being punched in the face.
It's for people with stamina, and the will to fight back.
I've been doing this for many years now and the times that I got 'punched in the face' are relatively small, and most of the times they were simply setbacks that if I had thought a bit longer and had been a bit smarter I could have avoided. Being punched in the face repeatedly suggests that third parties are actively trying to hurt you as an individual, and I can only find two instances of that over the last 15 years, and in both those cases the counter-punch was a k.o., so I don't expect to see repeat performances from that corner.
Entrepreneurs as a rule are not from the soft side of life, they know the value of standing up for themselves.
Going out for funding and being turned down for instance is not being punched in the face, it is a learning experience that tells you that something about you, your product or your presentation needs work, or that the investors you've been talking to are simply wrong.
So you improve and you try again, such is the nature of entrepreneurship and the nature of life in general.
If you can't handle disappointment well then entrepreneurship may not be for you. Think of it as character building.
edit: the disagree by downmod crowd has it today it seems.
I feel compelled to mention that similarly to the OP, I am not having an existential crisis.
Its probably a cultural issue, At least personally I think if you cant have a proper bitch about something, you probably dont love it enough. Same as the british idiom that says you arent friends with someone until you can call them a [Insert crude insult]
So better make sure you enjoy your work! Otherwise doing more of it is going to make you feel miserable. Just like there are employees that are unhappy in their jobs because of the nature of the job so it happens that in freelancing if you don't like your job you're going to feel bad. Especially if you are doing more of it...
> The hunter lives in a hard world
Yes, but when you are kicked out, laid off, fired then work divorces you. Employment is paper-thin security, you are basically living at the whim of someone else. As a freelancer if you are not 'pipelining' your work you are doing it wrong. You need to set up your rates so you can afford some slack (you are that good are you?), and then you need to push a little bit too much work in to the pipeline working prospects and turning them in to customers. Over time you will find yourself with a portfolio of customers. Periodically you review them and you raise your rate in those cases that you'd rather be doing something else. As a freelancer that is good, work finds you.
> weekly paychecks are a luxury
Yep. So a freelancer saves. If you don't have the attitude that will let you save half of your income on the spot for taxes and rainy days freelancing is not for you. Suggest you get a dayjob in stead until you close the hole in your hand and you can plan ahead a couple of months to a year.
> Also a luxury: heartburn meds and that spleen transplant you really need
I have been self employed for as long as I care to remember and have on occasion paid cash for an operation I needed, but now have state required mandatory health insurance. Things actually got cheaper for me. This will vary country to country, and in some places it's really hard to find decent health coverage as a freelancer. But there are ways around that. Incorporate a company, hire yourself and your spouse as employees and sign up for a package with some health insurance provider.
> Hey good luck with that mortgage
Freelancing requires you to be in control of your own funds to a much larger extent than a day job will give you, and banks have learned the hard way that lots of freelancers can't do that. So don't look at a bank to provide you with a mortgage until you have a solid track record. Meanwhile, nothing will stop you from working a bit harder, saving a bit more and buying that house cash in 3 to 5 years time, staying in as cheap a place as you can get away with for the intermediate period.
> oh, and nobody else will get it either
So what. Who are you doing this for? Some audience? What do you care what other people think about you not having a 'job'?
> You might as well paint a face on a volleyball
Freelancing is the opposite of a lonely life for me! I've met more people than I would ever meet in a regular job. Freelancing has taken me all over the planet, caused me to meet some of the most interesting people. It's maybe time that you 'don't make money', but I've set my rates to compensate for that and am in enough demand that that still works out well. A bit of passive income doesn't hurt either, which is how a smart and savvy freelancers spends his 'idle time'. That way that time will still make you money in the future. $20 per day in passive income is definitely doable on a very low budget in terms of time invested. Much more than that will require you to work hard at a project for well over a year but that's something you will not be able to do in the beginning. Freelancing is a stepping stone to being independent completely, I think of it as a way to make money that has more freedom than a job will ever give you.
> So why do it? Because it's awesome
Then why bitch about it? I think the author should go back to a day job for a couple of weeks. Because if you really think it is awesome then any and all of the above is either 'speedbump' variety or lack of success.
Oh, btw, I did get that mortagage. Maybe find a better bank? The tax break made it worthwhile, otherwise I would have saved just a bit longer.