Spoiler alert: Nothing is easy about freelancing, and your pitches will get rejected, but the process gets easier as time goes on.
Freelancing full-time is like rejection therapy, and the trick to getting it right is to learn how to support your ideas down to every sentence, and to not take pitch rejections personally.
There are a million things I wish I knew before leaping into freelancing full-time. Like how to write the perfect pitch, or what a reasonable day rate is, or when to follow up. Along the way, I found the most important tip to be: learning how to build your self-esteem as a writer. If you’re new to it or are a bit unsure, here are a few tips to get you started:
Time is your best friend
“I was rejected from Genius a bunch of times before I finally broke through,” says Jaelani Turner-Williams, a late zillennial and established music and culture writer from Ohio. She is best known for her bylines in Teen Vogue and Rolling Stone.
“My first piece for [Genius] was probably five years ago now, so it took me a while to land something with them,” she adds.
One of the most crucial lessons you’ll learn in your writing career is that time is your best friend. Which feels counterproductive, as you’re often working towards tight deadlines. In reality, there is no rush in making your big-hit story or debuting in your favourite magazine. Working in this space, you’ll find it’s a lot to do with luck and patience.
Comparison is the thief of joy
The internet often warps our perspectives on success. Sam Vijay puts it best in his article ‘The Illusion of Success on Social Media: Unveiling the Hidden Realities.’ He writes, “Social media turns everyday life into a highlight reel. Creators pick the best moments and skip the rest.”
We consume so much media day-to-day, which, as a result, creates the illusion that the content we see is a direct reflection of reality, which is hardly ever the case. It’s easy to see success on-screen and not consider the steps it took for people to get there.
As cliché as it goes, comparison is the thief of joy. It’s important to remind yourself that we’re all on separate journeys. It might take one writer a year to freelance for a major publication, and another just a few months. That doesn’t directly reflect the success of either journalist.
