Going freelance: the honest guide

This is the episode we wish someone had handed us before we each went out on our own. Not the inspirational version, and not the scary one — the practical, slightly boring, genuinely useful version that actually prepares you.

Money, clients, and your own worst boss

Freelancing isn't a job. It's a small business where you are every department, and the sooner you internalize that, the better your life gets.

We cover the fundamentals: how to set rates that don't quietly bankrupt you, where your first clients actually come from (spoiler: rarely where you expect), and how to build a runway before you need it. We get into contracts, scope creep, and the specific sentences you can use to push back without burning a relationship.

Then we talk about the harder stuff — the identity shift of no longer having a job title, the feast-or-famine anxiety, and the systems that turn freelancing from a stressful scramble into something you can actually sustain.