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The Biggest Drawback of Being a Freelance Writer
Spoiler alert — it’s not as fun as writing for yourself
I’ve been writing for money for eight years. Wait, that almost sounds like I’m a beggar. Let me rephrase it — I’ve been a freelance writer for eight years, and the month of February is when I started writing back in 2017.
Time really does seem to fly by faster each year.
Freelance writing is much better than other jobs I’ve had in the past, but it’s still a job. Recently, I had to write a few blog posts for a client, and I soon remembered why writing for myself is much more enjoyable.
I don’t want to give out any details, but let’s just say that it was a boring topic. I’ve also covered my share of other boring topics over the years. Cloud computing, home insurance, asphalt paving, HVAC, roofing, and data backups are just a few examples of the many things I had to write about in my career.
I know some people have a “passion” for writing, but there is no passion in writing about how often you need to change out the air filter in your home or why you should sealcoat your parking lot every few years.
Back in 2020, I used to write in a similar style on Medium. I mostly focused on the IT niche because that’s what I had the most experience writing about. I didn’t get the memo that sharing your own personal experiences is much better than writing boring informational content that can easily be found on Google.
I eventually moved on, and I didn’t start writing again on Medium until August 2023. It still took me a few months to realize that being informal and saying whatever is on my mind works much better than trying to write like I do for clients on Medium.
In other words, writing for myself is actually fun. I’ve been writing for years, and I’ve never associated writing with being fun.
Sharing your own experiences and adding your personality to your writing is especially important in 2025 because AI can easily produce informational content in only a few seconds.
The biggest challenge of writing on your own is turning that into a career. Some people can do it, but not many. For myself and others, writing for yourself on different platforms can be an additional source of income, but freelance writing or other jobs will still need to be done if you want to keep the lights on.
Either way, it’s still fun to write for myself, and it gives me a much-needed break from writing about some less-than-interesting topics.
Why do you write?
