Real talk. If you’re a sensitive snowflake this entry isn’t for you…
When you start making rates that make you want to always be working, one thing you should always remember is to keep hiring yourself.
No, I don’t mean literally hire yourself through Upwork, but I do mean make time for the important things in life.
Family
Self
Business
Family:
Now that I have a child and a girl that I love very much, it’s important that you make time for them. Just like all of the other clients that you find, if they aren’t happy, or feeling like the project called “life” is being constantly worked on, things can happen that will take the knees out from all your other work.
When this happens, it will be damn near impossible to focus on your paying clients and ensure that they are being served properly.
And like I always mention, if they aren’t served properly, it’s only a matter of time before your reputation suffers and it becomes more and more difficult to find new work.
And you need NEW work. New clients are the lifeline to your consulting and freelance business. No clients will ever last forever, and you should never bank on one or two clients or you will eventually be burned. And if you’re burned, and don’t have income coming in, it will be detrimental to your freelance career, and you’ll be working for the man again.
I failed at this one time, OK maybe a couple times, and each time it wound up really sucking for me.
One time, in particular, I was working with one of the top marketers in the world, and I made it my entire world to make sure that I was doing everything right for them. But, I disregarded important family obligations and it wound up biting me in the ass. The next thing I knew, I was spending 10 times the amount of time trying to fix my family issues, which completely knocked me out of my game for this big time client.
He wound up being not too pleased with me and found someone that was more focused and not dropping the ball like I was admittedly doing.
Shit happens. Luckily we had a good relationship, so he didn’t want to fuck me over on Upwork, but it was a lesson learned.
*Side Note, you should have a relationship that goes beyond the gig with ALL YOUR CLIENTS*
Like my man, Ben Franklin said: “…an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure”. This is so true when it comes to family operations.
Make them your number one client, and make sure they are happy first and foremost.
Self:
It’s really F’n easy to stay in front of the computer all day long and make money, but if you’re like me, you’re going to get fat. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to reach peak cardio by tapping keys and clicking mouses. Or is it Mice? I never know that one…
It’s also really easy to just order takeout while tapping away and eat like garbage.
Anyway, the fatter you get, the more your body will start to hate you. People will also find you less attractive, which isn’t good for your social life. This will hinder your mental and physical health in ways beyond comprehension.
When you work out hard and do physically demanding exercises, your body will feel better, you’ll look better, and you’ll do better work.
My best work comes when I’m not squeezing my love handles and wondering when the last time I worked out was. The best work comes when I’m feeling like a million bucks and dialed in.
For me, I like Muay Thai, Krav Maga, surfing, yoga, running, and sometimes the gym. Whenever I do any one of these things, especially during normal work hours, I feel like I’m winning, my head feels more clear, I look better, and I do better work.
Not many people around the world can have the freedom to do that so take advantage of it.
I know this is some pretty harsh language, but as a fluctuating fat person, I feel like I can speak from experience. I’m not trying to fat shame or anything, but there’s typically a reason why you’re not reaching peak performance, and it’s not because of proper nutrition and heavy exercise.
Make sure you hire yourself for 1 to 2 hours a day to work on yourself, or your freelance career and mental health will not be sustainable.
Business:
There needs to be an end goal in mind when it comes to freelancing.
Think about ways you can work on your own business while you are working in between clients.
This can be your own web pages, affiliate marketing, eCommerce, or anything else that can earn you passive income during the gaps of clients.
Though there are many bullshit artists who will make you believe otherwise, these businesses aren’t usually something you can get going in 5 minutes. It’s also not something you want to invest so much time into that it takes away from your bread and butter, which should be your lucrative and guaranteed freelance payments through Upwork.
I’m still working on these types of businesses and have a long way to go. This blog is one of those activities. I also have automatescale.com which is my consulting webpage. I also have many different partnerships with the platforms I work with and other online businesses.
At the moment, these tertiary businesses don’t hold a candle to the income I make on Upwork, but shit, it’s nice to get some extra scratch on monthly reoccurring businesses and not have to do anything extra!
Make sure you hire yourself for a couple of hours to maybe 5 hours a week to work on businesses that will work for you while you’re not working for clients.
Hopefully this was helpful in thinking about ways you should be applying your time.
Be sure to wake up early and get proper rest so you can fit everything into a single day.
Good luck everybody, and as always, please let me know if you have any comments or questions 🙂
