A Freelancing Plan of Business, Part 1

Holbein's Erasmus via Wikamedia

I want to start taking writing seriously. To this end, I read Margit Ragland's book, Get a Freelance Life. It begins by attempting to puncture the hot air out of a writer's dreams. Writers are not destined to wealth or greatness. Writers need to be able to endure solitude, sell themselves, flip over backwards for people, and operate without the encouragement of a boss. And God forbid you contemplate quiting your day job.

The thing is, I'm fine with all this. I adore being alone, love promoting my ideas, am flexible to a fault, and get motivated without rhyme or reason. And I don't want to quit my day job. It's a endless source of new experience. Besides, I like the idea of having writing as sort of a second, secret life. Reading, thinking, and writing are what I do with my free time anyway, so why not make an extra living out of it?

This decided, I'm going ahead with Ragland's next point, which is to combat writerly vapidness by applying deadlines and operating off of a Business Plan. So, here is my Freelancing Plan of Business, Week 1:

--read chapters 1-6 of Learn HTML in 24 Hours. I've decided keeping abreast of technology is crucial and there are all sorts of things I want to do with this blog that I can't because of lack of tech wizardry.
--write blog entries for an outside, paying blog.
--apply to day jobs that relate to writing
--get name cards
--get a camera (some of the paying blogs require original photos)
--write 6 blog entries
--read a lot and start tossing around ideas for longer articles
--pin-point readings and such to go to
--interview other writers

All this of course needs to be fitted into a larger scheme of things (Ragland preaches the virtues of the 5-year-plan) that I'll get to in my next post. I will however insert a very unbusinesslike deadline here. My birthday is August 9th, and what could make for a better birthday than having a fledgling freelance business started? I'm going to work at getting something published by then.

If anyone knows of blogs that are looking for authors, or other venues a start-up free-lancer should look into, let me know! :)