The idea of working as a freelancer sounds great. In theory, you will earn as much money as the amount of time you dedicate yourself to work, you have the freedom of working your own schedule, you can choose your clients and most of all you have the freedom to do what you love.

So, if it is this great, why are not more people doing it?

Truth is, working as a freelancer means way more than doing what you love. You need to do all the marketing stuff, get yourself out there, pursue new clients (or just clients, as a matter of fact), you need to negotiate prices. You also need to understand your finances. You don’t have a fixed salary by the end of the month, so you need to plan and learn how to do it. As a self-employed person you need to understand taxes. And how tricky those can be in Portugal?

You need to be disciplined. One of the biggest challenges for most of the freelancers I know is to be disciplined. Keep doing your stuff to showcase potential clients, getting out there to get new clients, doing your own schedule as you are supposed to.

Working from home is great. Until it isn’t.

When I started working as a freelancer, I loved the fact that I was less than a minute away from my so-called office, another room by the end of a corridor. I love the fact that I could remain cosy and warm in my pyjamas. Having the dog by my feet. Doing pauses whenever I feel to and working at my own rhythm (and expense). So, what is the downside of this?

To start, although it can be comfortable, wearing pyjamas all day every day does not make wonders to your self-esteem. Having that kind of routine to get outside is also a way of taking care of yourself the same way that getting out of the house, breathe some fresh air, seeing people is one of the best ways to spark your creativity.

When you know that no one is watching you tend to procrastinate more. You do more pauses. Even when you’re doing what you love, you still get distracted. There are so many interesting things around the house. Your dog who wants to play, the TV you turn on only for 5 minutes that easily turns to 5 hours, and social media buzzing on your phone.

For some reason, when people around you know you work from home, they tend to think you are much more available. You get way more calls and texts.

Finally, there’s the discipline of getting out of bed. When your office is just next to it, it’s way harder to get out of it. Who doesn’t love sleeping? No commute, no clock in. It’s way too easy to stay just for 5 more minutes. That turn easily into an hour.

Since I started working as a freelancer, I have tried many things. From apps to manage my time, to coffee shops to force me to go outside. For 6 months, I worked in a coworking space. It was great, I have to say. I was seeing people, getting out of the house and keeping still at my desk as much as I needed. But there were also a few disadvantages. The place forced me to sign a contract for a certain amount of time. This means that I ended up paying for 2 months without using it, as I got a project where I needed to stay at the client’s office most of the time. Then, once that project was done, my freelance work did not allow me to have the financial obligation of having a full-time place for an extended period. Also, it was not allowing me the flexibility of a coffee shop, as it was a fixed location and I wanted to be able to move according to my client’s locations. Or even just for personal reasons. Finally, it was breaking my heart to leave my dog alone for so many hours.

That’s when I found out about Croissant. Croissant is an app that allows you to choose where you work, when you work.

Any member of Croissant can choose their subscription, depending on the number of hours needed per month. No obligations regarding how much you really use. If you don’t work all hours subscribed those will roll over to the next month. No obligations regarding location. In Lisbon, through Croissant, you have available 18 different co-working spaces.

This is the best of two worlds.

This means you can work two hours in the morning in one place, three hours in the afternoon in a different one. You can choose your spot by location or any other features. This allows me to meet other people, who are likeminded, who have the same struggles, who give me advice. It also allows me to meet in other places, drink loads of free coffee, and to have a knock out WiFi every time I have a deadline, or I just need to meet a client. And the best part is that there are so many dog friendly coworking spaces in this platform, so I can even bring my dog.

I am so delighted how this works for my productivity and creativity that I got us a discount. All members of CreativeMornings Lisbon get a 7-day free trial and a 15 euro discount off your first month by using CreativeMornings link. Give it a try and let us know how it goes.

Text by Elisa Baltazar (CreativeMornings Host)

Photo by Leone Venter on Unsplash