Something I wrote on Linkedin but am sharing here too
I renewed my Zoom membership today. The price has gone up over last year, but I do all my podcasts through it and I find it extremely useful. It has liberated me from the need to have a production set up while interviewing people.
My phone and laptop are a couple of things I don’t mind mind spending on now, unlike earlier when I had left my salaried job and set off on a freelance career. I am an Apple user and I go for higher memory and screen resolutions in my iPhone. I do all my social media work and video editing through it. I use my Mac for my long copy writing. As I am using it now.
The ‘guilt’ went once I realised that these are business investments for me. Not an expression of personal vanity. I do feel good about being an Apple user, but that’s another story.
The realisation about ‘business expenses’ first happened when I changed the CA who did our taxes sometime back. I had just moved to being a freelancer from being a salaried person. Our existing CA was out of his depth, did not give clear advice on sales tax etc and I had to pay a penalty despite paying my taxes! The new CA, recommended by a Parsi pickle seller friend, was 4 times more expensive that my previous one. Once he came on board, I did not have to bother about things which are not what my life as a writer should be about. As good a business expense as it gets!
The parallel I drew to this was with the finance department in the agencies I had worked in, which was a staff cost and not a profit centre, and which took care of all the financial work while we focused on market research.
What 8 years of being a freelancer has taught me is that it is paramount to have a clear vision (what are you in this for) and perspective (don’t compare it with the world you have left behind). Especially for those who have been in service before.
A recent example of this was was when I was unwell due to post Covid complication and had to rest for more that two months. I was not happy about the state of things till one day it struck me that rest, in this case, was ‘action.’ The only way I could get back to action was by resting and well, here I am doing what makes me happy. Writing at my desk with my cat snoozing in front of me.
I would love to know from fellow freelancers who moved out from corporate world about how the ride has been for you. How do you keep yourself motivated?
My phone and laptop are a couple of things I don’t mind mind spending on now, unlike earlier when I had left my salaried job and set off on a freelance career. I am an Apple user and I go for higher memory and screen resolutions in my iPhone. I do all my social media work and video editing through it. I use my Mac for my long copy writing. As I am using it now.
The ‘guilt’ went once I realised that these are business investments for me. Not an expression of personal vanity. I do feel good about being an Apple user, but that’s another story.
The realisation about ‘business expenses’ first happened when I changed the CA who did our taxes sometime back. I had just moved to being a freelancer from being a salaried person. Our existing CA was out of his depth, did not give clear advice on sales tax etc and I had to pay a penalty despite paying my taxes! The new CA, recommended by a Parsi pickle seller friend, was 4 times more expensive that my previous one. Once he came on board, I did not have to bother about things which are not what my life as a writer should be about. As good a business expense as it gets!
The parallel I drew to this was with the finance department in the agencies I had worked in, which was a staff cost and not a profit centre, and which took care of all the financial work while we focused on market research.
What 8 years of being a freelancer has taught me is that it is paramount to have a clear vision (what are you in this for) and perspective (don’t compare it with the world you have left behind). Especially for those who have been in service before.
A recent example of this was was when I was unwell due to post Covid complication and had to rest for more that two months. I was not happy about the state of things till one day it struck me that rest, in this case, was ‘action.’ The only way I could get back to action was by resting and well, here I am doing what makes me happy. Writing at my desk with my cat snoozing in front of me.
I would love to know from fellow freelancers who moved out from corporate world about how the ride has been for you. How do you keep yourself motivated?