After you’ve freelanced for a while, you will come to notice a pattern emerging from your workload. Once you’ve placed your bids and gotten the jobs rolling, your activity level will spike considerably. You might reach the point where the work seems like too much to handle, even, and that it’ll never end. But believe me, it will end.
Once the projects are completed and sent off, you’re faced with a sudden drop of things to do, and you might have so much time on your hands that you don’t know what to do with yourself.
This is downtime. Downtime can be your best friend or your worst enemy. Sure, it’s fine to relax for a day. James and I declare “screw-off days” once a month at least, and those breaks are important to us.
Don’t get complacent, though. It’s best to keep a running downtime list. When I’m in the middle of a crunch, I often come up with so many other projects or tasks that I can’t get to right away. While the tasks may be as important as what I’m working on, these projects also don’t have the pressing deadlines that a “paying” project would. Develop your own downtime list of things to do.
Once the crunch is over, I can take a look at my list and work on these projects with a clear head. I can also take my time doing them, as I don’t have other pressing work to complete. Downtime projects might include updating your website, composing an ebook, learning a new program, or brushing up on your skills.
The trick is to use your downtime effectively. Downtime can be relaxing and fun; you can take your time to do what you want and let your mind have a break with simple projects. Even if the project isn’t simple, you still have the freedom to work out the problems without a deadline looming over your head.
When work starts to come in again, you can put downtime projects aside and pick up where you left off later on. If you get into this habit, you’ll never waste time again.
