Experimenting with myself

I’ve declared this the year of the experiment, and I am not letting anything get in my way.

Last year, I worked hard. I was like some worker hummingbird. I said goodbye to clients where the favour elastic had stretched, neatened up my hourly rate, took contracts, and did my best.

It was with an eye to devote 2024 to something I’d been neglecting for a long time - myself.

So, I figured that if I gave myself the grace to work intentionally on work, life and creativity, maybe I could get things where they need to be.

And lucky you, you get to watch me.

Please prepare for more bodgy art in 2024. You have been warned. Image: broken jetty at Windang is blocked off with a sign that reads “caution: experiment is underway”. In the water, what remains of a collapses jetty has the word “Me” and an arrow scrawled towards it.

Radical acts of transparency

Change only comes when the pain we’re experiencing now outweighs the pain of uncertainty.

That’s very true for me.

I’ve put up, shut up, shrunk down, stood up, thought better of it, and sat back down again.

Somewhere, I lost my creative bravery. I’ve looked for comfort because life outside creativity is difficult and exhausting, not realising that any comfort zone shrinks. The comfort you think you have melts in the next heated life moment, and you become shrink-wrap me beneath it.

I’m bored, in the mood to cause some creative mayhem, sick of my timidity, and curious in equal measure.

Thus, 2024 is the year of experimentation for me.

That means:

·        Writing my arse off (the reason I started freelancing in the first place - check my notes here to see that in action)

·        Making bold swings with what I do (like radical financial transparency)

·        Studying counselling

·        Entering as many creative prizes, grants, and writing awards as I can

·        Unapologetically asking for what I want

·        Experimenting creatively as much as I can  

·        Becoming a massive crowdfunding nerd

·        Carrying the flag for mental health, disability, and trauma  

Yeah, great, but what is that in real terms?

Getting messy with creativity

I started freelancing because I wanted more time for my creative work. That has never been the case. This year, I’m going back to why I started freelancing and prioritising my creative work. I’m scheduling everything else around it.

So far, so good.

But it would mean the world to me to know there are other people freelancing who are out on a creative limb (writing that book, making that film, recording that album etc) and to hear about your journey.

I’m talking about money

I’m sick of having a shambolic relationship with my finances. So, I’m spilling the tea in a month-by-month live action case study.  On the blog and via Instagram, I’ll tell you about my financial experiences. Olly from accounting software Rounded and Holly from Oceans Accounting Advisory are doing cameos and helping me improve at the thing I hate the most - dealing with money.

And it’s for you, too, as the first blog explains.

Embracing accountability

I started the Patreon because I was really sick and couldn’t manage the community, a freelance business, and my ailing health effectively. I couldn’t afford the labour the then leviathan side project was costing me, not when I was only awake four hours a day and headed for major surgery. I thought you’d give me an excuse to close it down without feeling guilty or that I’d let anyone down. Instead, over 200 of you supported me through crowdfunding. And it’s been that way since 2018.

It hasn’t been easy. I love the Patreon and what it allows me to create for you. But I feel like I have been struggling to figure out what I want from it, and what to give to you, ever since. But your continued support, working with the Deathstar pod (love you guys), and being a Patreon A Club captain (FTC, you all rock my world) has finally clicked something within me.

And I see the potential to experiment, play, and really dig in this year and see where this can take me.

It means I need you

Creativity makes you vulnerable, money is a big trigger for me, and change is scary. And I’m in trauma recovery while learning tough subjects like trauma-informed content and counselling.

Clearly, handled the right way, this could be an amazing year. I could clobber some of my own demons while helping you with what you need much more effectively.

But if I stumble, it could also get pretty hairy pretty quickly.

Knowing you exist, you enjoy what I do, that you feel safe to tell your highs, lows and meh moments in the Freelance Jungle, seeing you at classes and virtual coworking – you don’t know how much it means to me.

You make me feel included and useful. And I want to do for you, too.

Speaking of which…

Come to some events

Courtesy of the Patreon, you can:

Come along and sit in, plan, and let’s spend the day together setting 2024’s wheels in motion in the right direction using the Freelance Jungle Planner on Feb 5^th.

You can join me for an hour of creative virtual coworking at 9:30am ADST time on Feb 9^th.

There’s also a double hitter of two hours of business coworking from 12:30pm ADST on Feb 9^th.  speed.

Join Hayley and I for the first accountability informal chat of the year at 11am on Feb 13^th.

And for general members (i.e. free), you can:

Spend morning team with your Freelance Jungle friends by the watercooler at 11am ADST on Feb 9^th (all welcome)  

Talk stage three tax cuts, freelance finances, cashflow, and this year’s potential challenges with accountant Holly Shoebridge on Feb 20^th (all welcome).

See what freelancers have been up to

Entertainment

Curl up with a cup of tea and Joanne Spiers book, Second Chance of Love in Point Perry.  Meet a 100-year-old park runner from New Zealand. Check out Pieces, a film about mental illness and art therapy on Binge that Nicole Ferraro worked on. Write your way through it with Danielle Norton’s guided journal of story sparks and affirmations.   Listen to Karen Gee perform a poem about Maksym Kryvstov, an award-winning Ukrainian poet who was killed recently. Indi Go started with hand stitched hankie self-portrait for a project to celebrate the reopening of an art space and ended up making their first maker video.

Education

Find out why gratitude is a great staff retention strategy with Katrina Strathearn. If you’re in Newcastle, join Alexandra Morris as they look for common ground within the conversation. Anna Featherstone offers you a whopping 24 ways to support writers, authors and poets this year. Katrina Lobley and Catherine Marshall are diving into the art of travel writing via their newsletter. Take Ray Pastoors helpful advice to get your newsletters into other people's inboxes after Google's latest changes.  Redefine the passion economy with Anfernee Chansamooth. Sheree Chambers is offering to help you find your sleep again as a certified sleep consultant and former sleep deprived Mum.

Finally, if you’re worried about your marketing in an inflation year, I have some advice. I’ve outlined the challenges clients are facing in 2024 and how we can meet them as freelancers. And if you’re a Multipotentialite, take heart in the knowledge you’re the hottest property in 2024.

Love and other fuels that help us experiment,

Rebekah