I hope that those of you with a desire to write for a living or to supplement your income, studied the three tips I offered a couple of days ago. They may seem simplistic, but if you want to be a writer and it is not happening for you, perhaps you need to pay serious attention to those three tips. And here are three more:
4: Use your time wisely. Becoming a successful freelance writer takes discipline and realistic scheduling. Failure comes to those who procrastinate, who have trouble prioritizing tasks and who are easily distracted. Those who succeed in this business have found a way to organize their lives and discipline themselves.
5: Just start. It isn’t easy to transition from full-time office worker to full-time writer. Most of us don’t have the funds to support us while we build a new business. I didn’t always have 12 or even 8 hours each day to spend working my freelance writing business. I built it over time. For any of you who are interested, here is my story:
I started writing articles for magazines from a corner of my bedroom using a manual typewriter in 1973. Thirteen years later, however, it became necessary for me to take a full-time job. I’d just spent 5 years researching and writing a comprehensive local history book and self-publishing it. So funds were low and my lifestyle was in transition.
How I missed writing. While I had a good job with lovely people around me, I hated working for someone else—on someone else’s agenda. And it looked as if this would be my future. I became despondent. That’s when I realized that I had to find a way to write no matter what else was going on in my life.
I started getting up at 4 every morning and writing before I went to work. Then I would write on weekends. I completed an entire book in 8 months on that schedule. I can’t even begin to describe how happy and fulfilled I felt. But I wanted more. I wanted to come home and establish a writing business that supported me spiritually as well as financially. So I began using that time in the wee hours of the morning to submit articles to magazines—remember, this was before the ease of the Internet. Within a year, I was able to quit my job and come home to write. And I’ve never looked back.
6: Write what they want. You have to go where the paying work is and accept the jobs that are available. While I never compromised my values in order to get paying work, I have certainly had to take some challenging and sometimes not very interesting jobs in order to keep the flow of money coming my way.
I’ve seen too many writers so bent on making their own personal statement or doing things their way that they get nowhere in this business. If you want to make a living or even earn some part-time money as a writer, you have to go where the work is and write what is needed/wanted. Write about things that are current, popular or even a bit provocative or controversial.
It takes more to become a full-time writer than just dreaming about it. If writing full-time is your dream, read and reread the six points I’ve offered and use them to finally fulfill your passion.
Read my book, A Writer’s Guide to Magazine Articles. Available here for $6.50
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