Going From Freelancer to Employee

There are so many blog posts out there about switching from being a full-time employee to a freelancer. I should know—I wrote some myself.

But back in December when I made the decision to accept a job (a full-time job as an employee!), I started Googling (because that’s who I am). Here are a few of my searches:

• “advice for going from freelance to employee”

• “what to know going back to being an employee”

This shouldn’t come as a surprise, I suppose, but there isn’t a lot being written out there about people who go from freelance to being an employee. A lot of this is because the SEO for these search terms is dominated by people selling courses (big surprise) and a lot of this content is about switching to being a freelancer (and hey, why don’t you buy this course to help you learn how to get clients??).

People who are quitting freelance to go back to being an employee aren’t a money-making opportunity. And that’s just fine.

For me, being a freelancer was really challenging, it was outside of my comfort zone, and it helped me grow a lot as a person and in my career. Was it my forever plan? Absolutely not. I went into it absolutely knowing that. ⁠It was simply something I had to do to make money for the time being, because I found finding a job really challenging—I had really strict guidelines I wanted when it came to being both a parent and an employee.

Freelancing can be really hard. Working for yourself is not the way the Instagram gurus like to portray. Have you ever seen those ads where those same gurus brag about selling 6-figures worth of services in a month? Well, someone has to do 6-figures worth of work if they sell it--so that means they work a lot... and that’s if they’re being honest about how much they sell their services. (The truth is probably that they aren’t making that much money. There is a huge controversy right now with coaches being exposed for not making the big bucks they said they did—which basically renders their services null and void. Shockingly people who work a lot and make a ton of money at their jobs typically don’t spend time bragging about it constantly.)

This is all to say: lots of people go from being freelancers to employees and thrive because of it. If you like me are doing Google searches to see if anyone has lived that, I hope you find this and know you're not alone. ⁠

I did want to share a little bit more about what I’ve been mulling over when it comes to this big change in my life. Let’s dive in!

1. Working for yourself isn’t for everyone (and we have to stop pretending that it is).

Here’s the thing: it’s totally ok to be “just an employee.”

I feel like the mood on the internet is often that working for someone else is useless and your career is only valuable if you start your own business. I just simply don’t believe that’s true. We all find ways of feeling valuable. If owning your own business or freelancing is something that calls to you, by all means, go for it! But if it doesn’t call to you, there isn’t anything wrong with that.

As well, you might really think you’ll thrive freelancing, but then find that you don’t like it—and that’s ok too! It takes a certain personality type, to be quite honest, and some people are just better at it.

Freelancing isn’t better than being an employee. Different things work for different people and encouraging everyone to freelance or own their own business to the detriment of their personality or stress level is… bad.

2. Being a freelancer uses more energy on a wider variety of things.

Not only was I managing client’s social media and writing a ton of copy week-to-week, I was also acting as an account manager, a bookkeeper, and a project manager. It was way more mental energy every single week and for 75% of those tasks (like organizing my time sheet, invoicing, keeping track of my books, and more) I wasn’t being paid because it wasn’t client work.

Plus, at least 50% of my mental capacity went towards worrying about my taxes.

It was a lot. It was super stressful and I felt like I didn’t know how to handle it. A lot of the information on how to handle these things is, surprise, behind a paywall these days; there is no one giving clear cut, good advice on how to manage that level of stress. It’s understandable, but it makes freelancing as a profession a lot harder for people who might thrive in it. And it makes people like me, who are high stress anyway, more likely to leave freelancing.

3. I actually have more time now.

So it turns out, not working weekends hugely improves my mental health? Not having to wake up at 4am every weekday to get massive amounts of scheduling and invoicing done is a huge stress relief?

And being able to set my hours and say, “I’m gone at 5pm!” is another huge relief?

This is to say: I actually have more free time now than I ever did in the past year of freelancing and that’s really, really exciting.

3 Things I've Learned in One Year of Freelancing

When I started writing this blog post, I tried to find the previous one I thought I remembered writing around July of last year. As it turns out, I didn’t write very many blog posts last July—I wrote a few of my last beauty reviews and that was it. It wasn’t until August that I wrote a blog post about going freelance—and even then, I didn’t really talk about what had happened, just that I had been laid off and it sucked and I had one of two options. (You can read my first blog post about going freelance here.)

I found the blog post I thought I had written in July and it turns out, I wrote it in November. And again, in that blog post… it was in this blog post that I talked about being laid off and what they meant for me and how I didn’t want it to be the overwhelming focus of my life. (You can read that blog post, about resiliency, here.)

As it turns out, my desire to have the lay off and folding of a company I’d worked at for the majority of my career be the focus of my life wasn’t entirely possible. I’ve still spent time talking about it privately for months; at least once a month, something or other comes up about this company and I have to talk about it or interact with it. I still get calls about this company from the Oregon Department of Employment (fun!) and I still have to wonder: who, exactly, was I looking for?

I haven’t known how to write about what happened to me or this company (agency) that I worked for. It’s not my goal in life to make people miserable or to out people. I love gossiping privately, but this is one of those situations where the gossip isn’t that fun. Maybe because so many people’s lives were at stake. At first, I didn’t feel like it was my story to tell; I wanted my previous employers to be ahead of their own story and reputation and to control the narrative, without feeling like they were pressured by their former employees.

In an ideal world, that is what would have happened. It isn’t what happened unfortunately.

Here’s the truth about my being laid off: I got really, really screwed. My former employers still owe me money—over $5,000 to be precise—and it’s money that, over the last year, I have thought about repeatedly in an “I could really use that as capitol for my own business, to be honest” way. However, I’ve had to deal with the fact, internally, that I will never receive that money.

I will also never receive an apology. I know that now too. And they will never try to get ahead of the gossip or story or rumors about what happened. A lot of explanation is left to employees, which makes it hard for us to talk honestly about our experience without feeling like liars or poor sports, or as if we’re vindictive and out for revenge. None of those things are true.

But how can we talk about what happened when no one is being honest? It’s still not my place to talk about why my former workplace closed. But my decision to go freelance was impacted by one, large fact: I didn’t ever want to be screwed over for money like I was. I wanted to control my money and my product.

I lost all my work for 5 years. I have no portfolio, despite running social media for multiple businesses over 5 years, rewriting websites, writing blog content… it’s gone. All the proof of what I did is gone. And besides, as an agency employee to an agency that no longer exists, I can’t even say, “Well, I did X work for X client while at X”—because that place doesn’t even exist anymore, the bridge with the client has been burned so badly that our work was effectively wiped, and I don’t even have emails to back me up.

At the time I wrote my freelance announcement, I did so with the thought that I didn’t want to spill any “tea” so to speak. I just wanted to make people aware of what I was doing and how it was changing my life. But a big part of my motivation, at that point, was total independence. If a business can go under at any moment, then why not be in control of that business at least? I lost thousands of dollars to a business I had no stake in and nothing to show for. If I’m going to be at risk like that again, it might as well all be on my own shoulders.

This is all to say one thing: going freelance was still an incredibly hard decision. Some days are definitely easier than others. I’ve learned a lot over the last year and I hope that by sharing my story in my career it helps other people make better decisions for themselves and their families.

1. Networking isn’t as terrifying as I thought it would be.

Networking was the big scary idea of freelance that I always dreaded and hated. I didn’t know how to do it and what I did know about it, I didn’t particularly like. It stressed me out in ways that I didn’t really know how to identify.

The truth is, though, that networking is just… being friends with other people.

Networking gets a really bad reputation as being shallow and entirely favor-focused. And, of course, there are some people who use networking very shallowly. That being said, there are lots of people using it in very positive ways that aren’t so bad. I’m one of them!

I genuinely want to be friends with everyone I interact with in a networking way. I want to help them grow. I don’t ever approach anything with the “what can I get out of this?!” mentality. It’s just about building a relationship and seeing what happens. There will be lots of business relationships where I don’t see any “return”—and that’s fine! That’s just life!

So, networking isn’t so bad. And so much of my business comes from networking. I’d be really lost without it.

2. Project management is hard.

If you’re a project manager and you’re reading this, please know that your job is so vital and important.

Because it’s really, really, really hard to manage multiple projects and stay organized. Especially if you’re the one doing the work!

So much of my time goes to admin tasks: keeping Asana organized, making sure my calendars are up to date, invoicing, emails, everything. It all takes so much time. Then, when I start a new project, creating it in Asana, updating tasks, creating due dates… it’s so much work.

Alongside that, managing client expectations is part of project management and, oh my goodness, that is hard too. Staying up to date with multiple clients, keeping them updated, using their various task management and communication systems, scheduling meetings… it takes a lot of work!

This is the hardest part of freelance for me. I thought networking would be my bugbear, but it turns out to be actually managing and organizing projects.

3. Using cycle tracking helps plan my month.

Is this a big disparate to the first two items? Yeah, a little bit.

It was last year that I started noticing something that happened to me month-to-month: I realized that about a week before my cycle started, I had absolutely no energy or motivation. I often let this get me down: why can’t I get anything done?! But then, like clockwork, I would get a huge burst of creative energy usually a week before I ovulated—and I would stay in that energetic phase for about 2 weeks.

As it turns out, my experience is not unique. I randomly googled, “Why am I so creative when I’m ovulating?!” and it turns out, there is a whole system to this. Here are a few great resources I’ve found:

• How to Sync Your Business With Your Menstrual Cycle

• A Menstrual Cycle Based Business Calendar

For me, my monthly calendar is broken down week-by-week:

• The week of my period, I avoid meetings or large events. I simply won’t have the energy and honoring my body’s needs are more important. I usually do a lot of admin tasks during this time, as well as invoicing and planning my month financially.

• The week before ovulation, I work on calendars for the next month (so in June, I start my July calendars for clients). I’m ramping up my energy and feeling more creative, so this usually works out.

• The week I ovulate, I schedule meetings, launches, new client consults, and more. This is my most productive week always. I do most of my copywriting and graphic design this week for the next month.

• The week after I ovulate, I usually schedule in more time to rest after a busy and productive time, focus on admin tasks, analytics, reporting, and client relationships.

A lot of this organization has to do with how my exact cycle lands during the month (which will be different from roughly 75% of the population!)

It has definitely helped me to avoid getting in the habit of thinking, “I’ve lost my mojo, I don’t feel creative or energized by my work!” that then effects the rest of my month. This helps me so much with meeting deadlines. I’m so glad I discovered it and started organizing my calendar effectively.

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What a year it has been, huh? I can’t believe we are getting so close. A year ago this week, I was moving into my new house with absolutely no idea what was on the horizon. It’s always good to look back and think about how we’ve changed and what we’ve learned over the last year.

5 Things I've Learned About Being Resilient

Originally, I had this post in my editorial calendar as “things I’ve learned since I was laid off". But as I started to write, I found myself thinking over and over and that again, this puts the focus of my life at this moment on being laid off.

Was it terrible? Yes. Sometimes, it’s hard not to just be filled with a blazing, all-encompassing anger that controls my life day-to-day.

My therapist keeps reminding me, though, that I’ve gone through terrible things before and I’ve always made it out ok. I survived being fired, struggling to find a job, graduating from college amidst my grandfather’s illness, and much more… and I survived all of it, even on the days when I thought I wouldn’t be able to. The only difference now is that I have Forrest.

Before, when things were bad, I had some responsibility, but not much. Now, I have an entire little person to stay functional for and that makes the pressure that much greater. Also, after becoming a mother, I felt overwhelmed by motherhood; I found it at times isolating. It took me a long time to learn that you can love being a mother (I do!) and also recognize that it is a thankless, difficult, and often unpleasant job. It’s not all bad, but sometimes, it’s pretty bad. It can leave you drained.

So when I went back to work, it helped me have a second part to my identity again. I have never wanted to be all mom, all the time. I think if I did, it would leave me exhausted and depressed. It might work for some people, but it doesn’t work for me; I needed more and my job, in so many ways, was the more that I needed.

I’m removing the emphasis from being laid off. I get to tell my story exactly how I want to and part of that means rewiring in my head what that looks like and sounds like to myself. I got laid off—that’s bad. But I think what that actually feels like to me is losing a part of my identity that was helping me to offload the stress of being a mother.

As I started writing, I realized I was talking more about resiliency and inner confidence—not necessarily that I was laid off. Part of the last few months has been rebuilding my identity, figuring out who I am as a professional without an “official” job title (or job, period!), and wrestling with everything that comes with it. This isn’t really fun work (trust me), but it’s been important. And while I would never pretend everything is fixed and perfect right now, I do feel better in many ways than I have in a long time.

All this is to say: when I was laid off in July, I realized I needed to work on being more resilient in my current life. I’ve been resilient in the past in a hundred different ways, but I have really struggled with it the last few months. I wanted to write about resiliency, about what I’ve learned not just this year, but in the years past, and how we can all work on being more resilient.

1. Resiliency is only a little about choice.

“Would you judge me if I canceled X today?” I text my husband at least once a day. It’s usually something small, like an oil change or a work out class. He always sends back: “you can use your energy however you feel fit today.” This is his nice way of saying: if you don’t have the energy to do whatever it is you’re asking about, don’t do it.

We all use our energy for different things, prioritized in different ways. One thing I do every single day, even if I don’t feel capable of doing anything else, is make my bed. It makes me feel good; it makes my bedroom feel cleaner; it’s how I will use a tiny smidgen of energy because it’s important to me. Things I won’t use my energy on if I’m feeling low are: working out; emptying the dishwasher; or vacuuming.

When I went to a therapy appointment recently, I was dressed nice because I had a meeting right afterward. The week before, I’d been barely functional; just really wallowing and feeling bad. My therapist’s first words were: “you’re choosing to be resilient. I see that and I admire that about you.” That day, I had the energy to get dressed (even though I did not feel like it at all) and make myself presentable, because I had an obligation. That’s a form of resiliency.

But sometimes being resilient isn’t really about choosing to do those things. It’s about choosing not to do those things. Sometimes, resiliency might be this: making the choice between showering & getting dressed, and actually finishing a client project you’re on a deadline for. If you have enough energy for either one, you’ll probably do the one that makes you money—but doesn’t necessarily look externally like resiliency.

2. Being resilient isn’t always a badge of honor.

Let’s return back to that time my therapist told me I was resilient and that she admired that about me; right afterwards, she said, “you know, you don’t always have to be so resilient.”

Sometimes, our ability to pick ourselves up and get on with this is something to be lauded. We should feel proud that we got dressed enough to take our kids to school, to make a client meeting. We should feel proud that we used our energy to meet a deadline. But sometimes, it’s not something to wear proudly; forcing ourselves to continue going along with our day (going to work, pretending to be happy or fine) is just hurting us in the long run. It’s ok to take time, to focus your energy on healing and getting better. Sometimes, resiliency is something we use to avoid focusing on what’s hurting us.

3. Like a muscle, resiliency is something you strengthen over time.

We all know someone who has never really had anything very bad happen to them. No traumatic family deaths, no big career shifts. At once, it’s very easy to be jealous of that life; what would it be like to never have something go absolutely topsy turvy one day? To wake up and just be… fine?

But everyone, eventually, has an event in their life that will throw them for a loop and require them to become a little more resilient. Mine, right now, is being laid off; I’d gotten complacent in many ways and now, I have to learn to build an identity that isn’t just about being a working mom. Even the people you look at and think, “they’ve never had anything bad happen” will eventually have something bad happen, unfortunately; and they’ll need to learn to be resilient too. The brilliant thing is: the more you practice resiliency, and healing yourself when bad things happen, the better you get at it because you have the mechanisms and knowledge in place to know what to do.

4. Resiliency is an experience, not an identity.

In the words of my therapist: “you’re entire personality cannot be that you work hard even when you are extremely unwell.” Basically, there is more to life than showing everyone you are extremely resilient and hardworking. No one is going to think you’re any less of a hard worker just because you take personal days, or make time for your self-soothing and self-care activities. Resiliency is something we do, an experience we have throughout our day… but it’s not who we are.

5. Some people are just more resilient than others.

This is slightly related to point 3: some people just go through more in their life and develop stronger skills at resiliency.

Some people are just naturally better at “springing back”, if you will.

And some people just aren’t.

I don’t like change, so I think my biggest struggle with resiliency is moving on and adapting myself to something new, and finding tools to help me make it happen. I don’t think I’m naturally resilient, but resiliency is something I’ve adapted to help me over time. The first time around when I was unemployed, I think I was mentally in a better place, but I was also significantly less resilient in many ways.

Being more capable of resiliency, again, isn’t necessarily a personalty trait. It’s just a fact of life.Some people are better at being organized; some people are just naturally better cooks; and some people are just very resilient.

Life Lately: 5 Things I Learned Last Week

I have found myself waffling back and forth between two plans lately.

Sometimes, I’m fully committed to being freelance: I post on LinkedIn, I network, I make meetings, everything.

And other times, I just wish I had a job again: a job that I turned off, that I could clean out my office for, that I could drive to everyday and have coffee provided.

If you don’t follow me on Instagram, then you don’t know the big, bad, and also very weird thing that happened to me last week. I’ll get to it!

But it’s definitely thrown me for a loop. I’ve recommitted to going freelance, even though it is hard, and makes me tired, and fills me with anxiety in ways that are both good and bad. The last few weeks have been a series of lessons, over and over. I wanted to share a few things as I know that many are on this journey with me. If you’re thinking of going freelance or becoming self-employed (or starting your own business), you’ve probably felt a few of these things. And if you, like me, have had moments of self-doubt and tried to reconnect to a different path, well, you might feel some of these too.

1. Sometimes, anxiety is self-protection.

As I wrote in my newsletter two weeks ago, my therapist often talks to me about how my anxiety and self-doubt is often me trying to protect myself. I hold myself back in ways I don’t truly understand because I’m afraid of being rejected—and then when I step outside my comfort zone and experience rejection, it just reinforces the “you should have anxiety about this,” or “you are an imposter and you aren’t good at your job” feelings. (If you aren’t subscribed to my newsletter, then, baby, please do.)

The past two weeks have been anxiety central for me. Which is crazy because I had one week where everything went fantastic: I had meetings scheduled every single day, I was networking, I was sending emails, I felt amazing. But then, the next week, it’s like it all came crashing down and I didn’t know how to cope.

Anxiety is often what I describe as a combination of my gut feeling (which is instinctual) and this buzzing in my brain that seems to resonate with “wrong, wrong, wrong, something is wrong.” It’s hard to have the two happening at the same time and wonder if one is correct and the other isn’t. It’s hard to trust myself when what I inherently think (go the easy route, don’t make waves) is often a way of protecting myself from experiencing rejection or anxiety.

Anyway, this is all to say: I’ve been working on how I react to things and how I make decisions. I sometimes jokingly say that I am a classic Libra because I can’t make decisions. But the truth is, I struggle with making big decisions because I tend to make life decisions focused on what other people would want, rather than what I would want myself.

2. My gut feeling is usually correct.

It’s time for me to write the big, bad, weird story here & talk a little bit more about what it made me learn.

This might feel a little contradictory to my last point, but I sometimes just get a gut feeling about things. This won’t go well or This doesn’t seem right. It’s not anxiety, exactly, but sometimes a part of it. Sometimes, it’s just a feeling I have that I can’t totally explain.

Anyway, let’s talk about the big bad: I was offered a job.

Let’s rewind: two weeks ago, I went to an interview where they loved me. I met with an executive, who thought I would be great in the role, but wouldn’t be happy. She then offered to accelerate starting their marketing department so that I would be added to it. She would get back to me in a few days. A few days later, we scheduled a phone call. I clarified my schedule (I want to be able to pick up my son in the afternoon, but I could work from home as much they wanted). They had never done a remote position before, but were willing to try. She said they would be sending a job offer by the next day.

The next day, Tuesday of last week, I woke up from a nap to see an email from her, telling me they would not be sending me a job offer specifically because I wanted to be able to pick up my son in the afternoon.

I know this is not the worst example of anti-mom bias in the workplace. I know that. I also know I’m in a really privileged position to be able to ask for that, but I don’t think it should be a privilege. I think it should be assumed that parents need to be able to leave to get their kids when school is over, but if they work a job that is 100% online the way marketing is, then why can’t they just finish up the last two hours of work from home?! I just don’t get it.

I cried a lot.

But, I had been nervous about getting the job offer. I’d debated back and forth with Danny about accepting it. And a small part of me on Tuesday thought: this isn’t right. This isn’t going to happen the way I think it will.

Even as I got excited to accept the job. Even when I thought about the salary and how it would have changed our lives. (We could afford a vacation, for once.)

I was still devastated when I got the email, but I found myself thinking: that gut feeling was right. That feeling I got that they wouldn’t be understanding of my role as a caretaker and mother was right. I was right. It still royally sucked, but I was right. It just sucks.

3. Sometimes, a bad thing leads to a good thing.

The day after I got that awful, no good email, I got a text message about a potential freelance gig. I was groggy, with that “hungover from crying” feeling. I was in a bad mood all day, mostly lying on the couch and sometimes texting Danny, “I had already planned a celebratory Disneyland trip in my mind.” (Yes, I know that is full-blown emo, but what can I say?)

But I scheduled another meeting for a freelance gig. Because why not? Because why stop myself just because I’ve had a rough week?

4. It’s ok to get in your feelings about it—but sometimes your primary feeling isn’t the right one.

As I said, I cried a lot last Tuesday. (And unfortunately, a lot of this blog post is about that email on Tuesday. God, it sucked!) I cried a lot and even though I’d had this gut feeling that it wasn’t the right job for me even though it paid so well and I wouldn’t have to worry about money and it seemed perfect… I still had the feeling that it wasn’t quite right.

But I also had that feeling of: I’m a failure, I fucked up, I’m stupid, I shouldn’t even apply to jobs because no one wants to hire a mother, everyone thinks I’m an idiot.

But then I talked to my former boss and she told me that there was no reason blaming myself. What kind of company offers someone a job, then yanks it away because they decide they don’t like the already agreed upon schedule? Especially in marketing, where a flexible schedule is sort of… the point of working in marketing? “Be angry,” she said.

The right thing is not: “I fucked up.” The right thing is: “they fucked up and I’m so angry.”

The worst part is that companies here in Eugene so often complain about being unable to hire good talent. They can’t find people to hire or the people who apply don’t have enough experience. I have 5 years experience; I am a high level marketer; I’m very good at what I do! I am the good talent! But because businesses see “work” as being 40-60+ hours a week in an office, no exceptions, they aren’t willing to accept people who might need other schedules: mothers, or people with disabilities, or anyone else who just doesn’t want to be chained to a desk. Millennials have a much different view about what it means to work “full time” and it’s time for everyone else to catch up.

I sat up on Tuesday night until nearly 3 am writing a blisteringly angry article for LinkedIn. I probably won’t post it, but God, it felt good.

5. It’s ok to be content.

“I should be making more money,” I thought. But is that right? Do I need to be making more money?

If you can’t tell, a big part of why the loss of that job offer sucked is because the salary was good. Full disclosure, I’ve never been motivated by money when it comes to my jobs; I just want to work and to be quite honest, I have a really hard time understanding salary comparisons. I have known, at least somewhat, that as a marketer I should have been making more money ages ago, but it didn’t really matter to me. We got by.

It’s only been the last probably year where things felt really tight, but that was for reasons sort of beyond our control. We had a year of bad financial set backs and then, in 2019, my workplace was becoming more and more financially unstable as well. (Again, no one’s fault! Just the way the cookie crumbles.)

So the idea of a lot more money was huge. We haven’t been on a real vacation since we went to Disneyland in June 2017 and friends, I am exhausted. I think about getting in my car and just driving away at least once every single day. I have worked, for at least 5 hours, every single day since June 2017 on either this blog, or work, or some other professional capacity.

As much as I wish we could be saving more money, I have also realized it’s ok to just get by for a little while, especially if it means improving my mental health. Money is nice and I wish we could afford a trip to take a break (we both need, Forrest needs it), but I’m ok with waiting if it means I’m not continually being punched in the gut by companies!

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Whew, I know that was a lot but it felt good to write out. I’m trying to look at the next few weeks with positivity. I have time to make Forrest a birthday cake, to take him to school most days, to pick him up from school and love him. It has been a rough few weeks for me, but I’m lucky to be doing as well as I am, considering everything.

With that said: how have you been doing? Share with me!