One of the things that I promised myself when I left the world of full-time employment was that I would never again punch a clock. Being a freelancer, or “gainfully unemployed,” is a blessing to me. And I choose to focus on the “free” part.
I have plenty of client work, but I don’t have office hours. I write and work when there’s work to be done. And when I don’t have anything that needs to be done, I leave my office and do something else.
It’s strange to be out and about in the middle of the day. I used to wonder who those people were, who could be found roaming around, shopping, doing stuff, when the rest of us were busy working. Now I know. I’m one of them.
And if I want to take a full afternoon, go have a leisurely lunch with someone like my friend and editor Penny, I can do it without a worry.
There are plenty of times, days and weeks, when the crush of work is heavy. But I’m an old farm hand. When it’s time to work, you work. Sixteen hour days? Sure, bring it on. But when the work is done, stop working.
Shouldn’t I be back at my office? Hell no. I’m a freelance writer. Sitting at a desk eight hours a day is doing it wrong.
Winning At Freelancing: The Guilt Free Three Hour Lunch by Randy Murray, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.