Tips and Strategies for Staying Motivated as a Freelancer

When starting as a freelancer, burnout became something familiar to me.

When I first graduated from college with business and marketing degrees, I knew immediately that I didn’t want to go into the industries that I had gotten my degrees with in. With an editorial background, finding freelance work was something that was always mentioned, but never had actually been discussed. I hear that with a lot of journalism and digital media majors nowadays; in a lot of universities, where professors tend to skewer older, they don’t really teach you about freelancing as a legitimate career. It’s always expected that you will get a job at a media company and stay there, which, unfortunately, isn’t the reality anymore.

I started freelancing in the summer of 2021, when the pandemic was still going and a lot of media companies were laying their workers off. I had done it before in a non-official or full-time manner, casually doing this blog and pitching, but it’s a completely different game to do it full-time. I was struggling in the beginning because I wasn’t used to the schedule I was going to need in order to do this as a professional. And along the way, I’ve collected some tips and tricks in order for you to keep your sanity and work-life balance together.

Using Google Calendar, Notion, and GoodNotes as a Freelancer

Because you’re not restricted to the hours of a 9-5, you’re going to learn how to use your time efficiently. As a writer or creative, deadlines are going to be your new best friend. If you can’t meet deadlines at all, you’re going to need to learn how to quite quickly. Your income is going to depend on those deadlines and companies also talk. If you build a reputation that isn’t good, no one is going to want to hire you. Now that I’ve scared you enough, let’s dive into Google Calendar, Notion, and GoodNotes as your biggest assets. I don’t recommend using any more than three project management systems because then you’re going to get tied into too many things all at once.

Google Calendar

Google Calendar is useful for me when I’m not specific about what I’m intending to do during the time blocked. I know my personality and how I do work, so when I want to block off time to work, I don’t put basic tasks on the Google Calendar. I use a broader category like “work” because I know if I do this, I can set it aside for any work. I’m the kind of person that will not do something specific if I write that I’m doing something specific during that time. However, always recommend scheduling meetings in if you’re forgetful like me, and including all the information in the email sent with it (e.g. agendas).

By blocking off time in which you actually sit and do something, you’re training yourself to follow a specific regimen, especially if you do everything at the same time every day. I’m absolutely horrible at habits, so by switching it up I’ve been able to keep my creative levels going, but I also recommend scheduling in breaks. Breaks are a necessity. You are human, so pause your work and allow yourself ten to thirty minutes of rest whenever you find yourself shutting down.

Notion

I like to build my editorial calendar on Notion, but only my deadlines. I use one of the calendar templates and I like using Notion because if you click on a deadline, a larger page will pop-up and you can program in all the information that is needed for the project. That way everything is condensed into one place and you don’t have to hunt through emails in order to find the right details in the piece you’re submitting to the client. I also use Notion along with my professional Squarespace website (this cutie you’re looking at right here) in order to track my full publications list.

GoodNotes

This is very specific to if you own an iPad (I’m not too sure if GoodNotes is a thing for non-Apple products). I ended up buying an iPad on a whim and it’s completely increased my productivity levels because I’m not constantly beating myself up for not doing anything in a day. I do three very specific things in regards to freelancing on my GoodNotes. The first is that I downloaded a landscape calendar off of a YouTuber (A-Hong, she gives free stickers and templates out for free) and made it into a pseudo editorial calendar. But it doesn’t have deadlines on it—that’s Notion’s job. Instead I use this calendar to track how much I’m writing and producing, just to appease that little voice in my head that tells me I’m not good enough. It also has been very helpful to write down when I send things out, so if I know I haven’t gotten a response by XYZ date, I probably need to follow up with that individual.

I don’t believe in buying to-do templates. I just open a dotted plain page and make daily to-do lists on there. This helps me run through all the tasks I need to get through in a single day, since

Keep a running list of publications that you admire.

Even if you’re not sitting down and writing because you feel burned out, start a bookmarks folder on your computer or tablet. Whenever you come across a publication that you like, bookmark it and pay attention to their content. Constantly be reading it (more on that in the next section) and the newest content, or scour the archives. I found out my local library gives free access to sites like The New York Times, so when I found that out, I started an article list on my Notion account. I then broke it down by category and genre, which would help me sort out what was what when I went back in and wanted some inspiration for research I’m doing or wanted to study a particular writer’s style.

I also keep tabs on writers that I love and admire. Twitter has been a great tool for finding new writers, whether they’re small, emerging, or big fish in the editorial or literary world, and one of my favorite thing to do is look as websites and how people convey their personalities via the aesthetic. Like keeping a list of publications, I’ll keep a list of websites to look at bylines and ways they went about their career in order to see how I can plot my own trajectory during my downtime, even if I’m not actually creating right now.

Constantly be reading and writing, even if you don’t think it’ll go anywhere.

This ties into the previous point. Whenever I’m completely burned out from writing, I don’t force myself to write things professionally. I take a couple of days off in order to watch movies, read books, and find the publications I enjoyed reading. In a way, it’s still scoping out the market. Like recently when I was burned out from writing, I picked up the book Business of Being a Writer and immersed myself in the business side of this world. I then also picked up a bunch of novels and short story collections, and so when I was reading them, I was writing down the things that inspire me. So when I was ready to write again a week later, I had an entire list of ideas I felt passionately about was able to create some really good pieces off of my relaxation time ideas. It’s not work if you’re enjoying it!

Just be very aware of the division between inspiration and plagiarism during this time period—we don’t stan plagiarism in this household.

Start a blog and experiment—it doesn’t have to be under your name!

This is something I know very well! I was honestly burned out of the kind of content that I was writing at the time, and I was starting to shift focus on writing about film, television, and books, which was previously untouched territory for me. And so I started a blog. It wasn’t to make a new kind of business, and it was something I had never done before. But then my blog started gaining traction, and I was writing content that I and other people apparently wanted to read. The traffic was coming in, so I started viewing it as a sort of side hustle.

If I had never made this blog, I never would’ve generated as much traffic to this site as I did in a short amount of time. My first year, as I was a freelancer and writer in the void, I only got four hundred hits in a year. In 2021, by October, I had over 2,000 hits, most of which came from advanced social media strategy as well as learning about the mechanics of SEO.

By starting a blog, you’re able to have fun with your content, have full creative license, gain more attention on yourself, build skills in digital marketing and SEO that are desirable, and you can even have a portfolio to refer people back to. I think it’s a win-win situation.

Be confident and don’t lose hope.

Being a freelancer is hard. There’s a lot of rejection involved, as well as stress. Some of us don’t have the privilege of a stable home and are unable to rely on support from others. As the rejections start to pile up, you may begin to lose hope, but don’t worry. This is a career of perseverance and a hell of a lot of rejection, but your persistence will pay off in the long-run. Remember that mental health should always be a priority and if you feel that something is off, say no. There are instances where you might have to demand money or might get stiffed, so if you’re getting dodgy vibes do some research and see if your intuition is right.

Also be confident in your work! I started believing in my work more this year and got bolder with where I was submitting it to. I genuinely believed in the work I was writing and submitting, and I think my confidence paid off because I had some of my dream publications lined up by the end of the year. Your story is important and needs to be heard, so give it the confidence boost it needs.

You don’t have to have a niche.

A lot of freelancers will tell you that you need to have a niche to make it in this world. I genuinely don’t believe in that myself because humans are complex creatures that aren’t meant to be pigeonholed into a single genre. Some people will also not be authentic to themselves and will chase a field or genre that they’re not actually into for the money, which, I can assure you, leads to a specific kind of misery. Follow what you’re passionate about. If you’re into robotics and dance, pitch to both. Have some of the confidence in yourself and your work that I mentioned in the last point.

People also evolve and move on from their past selves. If you think that you’re not into a certain genre anymore, slowly try to move away from it. Pitch to publications in a different field that you find yourself growing into. If you’re not passionate about the work you’re writing, I think it’s really going to show. And if it doesn’t show, you’re going to burn out pretty quickly.

And those are my tips! I hope they help someone out there, as they have helped me. Connect with me more on this blog or on my social media accounts, which are linked below.