The Fear and Paradoxes of Focusing on Personal Work

I have had a catastrophic series of anchor clients reducing their contracts all at once recently. There are no two ways about it— I’m in trouble.

I have some hourly work trickling in, and I’m in a position where I won’t be out on the street right away if I miss rent, but times, as they say, are hard.

On the other hand, I have more time that I can spend working on the shop, which is long overdue for a makeover.

I never have the kind of time I wish I had to work on it because I’ve been scrambling to keep up with the bills by taking on as much work as I can (and probably undercharging for it). I have been thinking of the work on Sharptooth Snail as “non-billable time,” which is a distinction freelancers make between the labor to get a project done, and the admin required to secure and communicate about the project. But the truth is, if I were my own client, that time would be billable, and that work should result in an increase in revenue. The problem, of course, is that I don’t get my hourly rate at the end of the month if the work here doesn’t result in sales right away, and I haven’t been able to afford carrying that risk.

But right now I can’t afford to do anything, and as my paying client base for marketing strategy and web development is drying up, so is my pool of prospects. So every non-billable effort starts to look the same. And if I never do the work for the shop, how is it ever going to start generating the revenue, right?

I suppose I could take my mom’s advice and try to “get a real job,” and I guess I have no choice but to be open to that. I’m told I have a rare skill set, as a person with a combination of technical know-how, design skills, and marketing savvy. So it’s all resumes and inquiries and maybe applying some of that rare combination of skills to my own work. I’ll edit this post in a minute with my updated resume, so if you know anyone who needs a unicorn, let me know. And collectors of my art can expect a drop of original work very, very soon.

We’ll see what happens!