The “Just Say No” Thread Continues…
Mark Dugas wrote an interesting post at FreelanceSwitch.com on saying no to low-paying freelance work you don’t feel is worthy of your skill and experience. This makes me think of a post I recently raved about at WritingHermit which touches on the same notion.
I had some painful choices to make in 2007, and the agony of cutting loose dependable, but ultimately time-wasting gigs is very real. You wind up accumulating some serious time-waster projects if you aren’t careful. My dilemma was that I was earning just barely enough to justify the work, but the time investment was actually costing me money. The strange thing about freelancing–at least in my world–is that it usually pays off when you go out on a limb, treat yourself right and say no to money that isn’t worth the effort. I found much better projects to replace the ones I ditched, and fairly quickly!
You’re probably wondering what the relevance of the above photo is–it’s a still from Mark Dugas’s documentary, Ganesh. Something I’d be interested in seeing as I’ve always loved the Ganesh imagery. Being a fellow documentary filmmaker doesn’t hurt either, so in the spirit of cross promotion, please take a second to have a look at Dugas’s site. Doc films don’t get enough love at film festivals in my opinion–though it’s been several years since I submitted one, so maybe the tide has changed. But I digress…
