Time or Money: You can’t have both as a freelancer
A man with money doesn’t have time to hang out and a man who has time to hang out doesn’t have money. If you really want to be rich, there’s some things you’re going to have to cut out of your life. Sacrifices you’re going to have to make in order to achieve your goals. The current way of doing things isn’t working, so what should you do?
Do you want to have more time?
If your ultimate goal is to get more time to do things you love, you’re going to have to change up your approach a bit when freelancing and focus on things that’ll help you achieve this goal.
First, you’re going to want to cut back your expenses a bit. Do you pay for Netflix or other subscription based items? If so, they’ve got to go. Are you eating fast food on a regular basis? Yeah, that’ll have to stop too. Do you buy a ton of music on iTunes? Spend some time listening to songs on Youtube instead, but don’t watch the videos, just listen to them – you don’t want to waste all the extra time you’re finding by watching videos all day.
Next, you’ll need to raise your rates so you can earn more money while doing less work. Start by increasing price quotes by 20-30% and see how the responses go. If new clients are still buying your services at the same speed as before, increase the pricing even more.
It’s not a bad thing to want more time to spend with friends and family, so if this is what you want to do, you’re going to have to accept the fact that most freelance businesses will need to either stay the same or increase rates while decreasing spending in order to make it work.
Do you want to have more money?
If your ultimate goal is to get more money, there’s some things you’re going to have to give up too, so don’t think you’re getting off that easy. When you’re looking at the worlds most successful people (I’m talking about multi-millionaires and billionaires), you’ll notice that they’re constantly working and moving their businesses forward, so if you’re wanting to get more money, be prepared to hustle your ass off and working 8 days a week.
First, you’ll need to stop going out to bars, the movies and brunch with friends. Actually, you’ll notice that in order to really hit strides in your monetary growth, you’re going to disappear for a while. If your friends aren’t calling your phone and asking you if everything’s o.k., you haven’t been hitting the ground running hard enough.
Next, you’ll need to cut back on your spending as well. Just like the people who want more time, Netflix and other subscription based services should be cut. The trick here though is to cut subscription services which don’t further your business (ie: Netflix, magazines, music, etc) while keeping memberships that will benefit your freelance business.
But can there be balance?
I know there’s someone reading this right now who thinks that this article is bullshit and that there’s definitely ways to balance both time and money. Hell, maybe it’s you who’s thinking that right now.
And you’re right.
Yes, you can balance both time and money but you’ll never reach the full potential on either side of the spectrum.
If deep down inside you just want to spend time with friends and family, travel, read more and see the world, you’ll find it hard to do while working 40+ hours a week on average to maintain a normal work life.
If you’re looking to put a couple extra commas in your bank account, you’ll find it hard to do when you’re constantly distracted by friends and family who want to hang out, talk, go see a movie, go to bed at a reasonable time, etc.
Staying in the middle ground is death to your spirit. It’s what we call average and I know you’re anything but average. So quit trying to be average, figure out what you really want most out of your life and hit the ground running.
You’ll love your live much more that way.
