Natalia M. Sylvester

In freelancing, it’s totally possible to be swamped even when you’re not swamped with work. Allow me to explain.

We’ve all heard of the ebb and flow cycle. The way it basically works is that when things are ebbing we run around trying to make them flow, and when they finally flow they usually overflow, and we end up wishing we’d appreciated the downtime when we had it.

You know, it’s the whole “grass is greener when you have no time to lie in it and read a good book” theory.

So really, there is no downtime, even in times when work is slow, because when work is slow I pick up my marketing efforts. I go to more networking events, I schedule more meetings with potential clients and spend time researching publications and pitching them.

When I don’t have a lot of work coming in, there’s no end to how much I’ll do to bring the work back in. And since networking and sending out proposals and pitches aren’t the kinds of things that show instant results, nothing ever feels like it’s enough. My time management skills pretty much disappear and I become swamped with the non-work work.

Until that one contract gets signed. And then another, and another…and poof! Suddenly I’m busy again and I have a set schedule. I’m the type of person who’s so deadline-driven that if I forget to write something on my to-do list I’ll still write it in after I’m done, just to get the satisfaction of checking it off the list.

The only thing that doesn’t end up making it onto the list is some downtime. And really, I’m not sure that it should. Downtime outside of work is one thing, and I’m all for that. But when there’s downtime in my freelancing, I remember my internship at an ad agency my freshmen year in college. At one point, I thought I had nothing to do, until my boss saw me doing nothing and gave me the task of archiving their entire stock of digital images.

Lesson learned: There’s always something we could be doing.

When I started this blog I aimed to post at least three times a week, and in the past couple of weeks I’ve only been able to post about twice a week. Even though I’m sure I have a readership of about ten (that’s being kind, I’m sure) I still feel a responsibility to update frequently, so I apologize. I’ve just been swamped. If you were to come into my office right now it’d look a lot like this:

While I’m excited to be busy I always feel sooooo guilty about all the printing my work requires. Reading on a laptop only goes so far for me, especially when it comes to editing. Tomorrow I have to buy a new ream of paper (recycled, of course) and fresh toner for the printer, so the guilt keeps piling up. My next mission will be to make my office more eco-friendly. I’ll keep you posted on how it goes…

Just about a couple of weeks to go till September 15, which means estimated taxes are due!

Eliza does her taxes, from www.willwriteforchocolate.com

Taxes are never fun for anyone, but as freelancers we get the short end of the stick on this deal: We send payments four times a year and pay our taxes in their entirety, so it’s a bigger chunk off our paycheck. Payments are due Jan. 15, April 15, June 15 and Sept. 15. The first time I ever sent in my quarterly payments I was quite the wreck, but it’s really not as intimidating as it seems if you follow these important steps. Read the rest of this entry »

There’s an old episode of Sex and the City in which Carrie is called in for jury duty and tries getting out of it by saying something like: “See, I work for myself, and if I don’t come in to work one day, there’s no one to cover for me.”

I’m reminded of this every time I get ready for a vacation. When a freelancer leaves the office there is no alternative contact to include in your Autoreply emails; there’s no one you can leave an unfinished project with to finalize the last details. And even though I CAN take my work with me wherever I go, the point of a vacation is to unplug a bit, right? Since I’ll be skipping town for a few days over the upcoming holiday weekend, I thought I’d share how I prepare to leave my office unmanned. It’s kind of like those wedding to-do lists you’ll find in magazines.

1 to 2 months before the big day: The first step is to determine just how unplugged you’re going to be while you’re out. For the purposes of this trip, I’m okay with receiving emails on my phone, but realistically I know I won’t have time to write. So as new work comes in, I make sure to schedule all deadlines for the week before I leave or a couple of weeks after I return. Personally, I prefer to have as much done as possible before I leave, so that I can really unwind and not worry about all the unfinished business I have to take care of the second I return. Read the rest of this entry »

We’ve all heard of the must-have office supplies for a work-from-home freelancer: computer (I prefer a laptop), dedicated phone line, printer, fax machine, etc. These are the essentials, but today I thought I’d share a bit about the tools that have simply made my work easier. I figure if they’ve saved me some time and sanity, why not pass the info along to another freelancer?

One thing I notice writers always asking about is writer software. They want to know if there’s an alternative to MS Word, and if there is, is it actually helpful?

I’d say yes, depending on what you’re writing. For longer forms (like my novel, currently at about 150 pages) I’ve found Scrivener to be quite the organizational life-saver. It basically works like a digital binder, where you can flip between the text, which is separated into different chapters, and an outline and notes section. This is really helpful when you’re revising a hundred page document, cutting and pasting text from page 3 to page 57, for example. It also has a trash bin for text that you want to delete but might want to go back to later in case it turns out to be not so bad. In case I’m doing a terrible job describing all this, here’s a screenshot of a Scrivener project: Read the rest of this entry »

Lately I’ve been having a tough time separating my work life from my personal life. I can’t say I’m too surprised–when your office is just a few steps from your kitchen and your writing is sometimes shaped by experience, it’s not easy to put up that invisible wall. Problem is, if I can’t balance work with enjoying the times that I’m not working, I’m defeating one of the main reasons I started freelancing: I wanted my time to be my own, and I wanted to be responsible for the outcomes of my hard work.

What’s worse than a boss who never acknowledges your efforts? Probably one who never lets you quit, who’s never satisfied that enough is enough, even when you’ve checked off all your to-dos for the day.

So in other words: me (does that sound like you, too?). What’s an overworked freelancer who can’t catch a break from herself to do? Read the rest of this entry »

One of the things I hear most often when I tell people what I do (aside from the “who do you write for?” question) is “That’s great! You can work from anywhere!”

This is true only to a certain extent. If I move it probably won’t affect my work that much, but I’ve been guilty of going on trips and not taking my work with me as much as I should. And I don’t mean vacation trips. Last month I helped my sister move out of state and stayed at her house for about a week. I took my laptop and told myself I’d get lots of work done, but in the end all I really ended up doing was preparing my taxes for the second quarter estimates.

I guess I’m just a creature of habit. I don’t do the whole write-at-a-starbucks-coffee-shop thing. I tried working from a Panera once because they offered free wi-fi but felt guilted into buying a soup and salad. I need quiet, I need my desk, I need my piles of papers surrounding me.

But lately I feel the urge to get out the office and interact with actual humans. Read the rest of this entry »

I’m tempted to include the typewriter in the corner of my mom’s office as one of my first workspaces, but the keyword here is WORK, and I doubt a four-year-old writing limericks that rhymed with “Coke” really qualifies.

When I first started freelancing full-time, my office consisted of a shiny new Macbook and the dining room table of our one-bedroom apartment. At the end of each day, I had piles of papers, folders, notepads, envelopes and pens scattered across the table, and come dinnertime it all had to be transferred elsewhere. When we moved into a bigger one-bedroom apartment the living room had space in the corner for a small desk, so I switched headquarters. Only problem was, being in the same room as your kitchen, couch and television doesn’t make for the best work ethic.

Read the rest of this entry »