News And Updates
So apparently, just about everyone in my Twitter feed was at South by Southwest (SXSW) this past week, a conference (and seemingly non-stop party) that somehow brings together “music, independent films, and emerging technologies.” It’s that last that is of greatest interest to me and, as the web developers, bloggers, content producers, and new media entrepreneurs in my feed live-tweeted talks and workshops, party-hopped, and networked, I started to feel that I was totally missing out.
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Back in January, Betsy Lerner — brilliant author of The Forest for the Trees – wrote up a quick post in which she remembered two of her early mentors. And then, a week ago, Holly Hoffman brought up the topic again. All this mentor-talk got me thinking back on my own favorites, and how important they’ve been to my career success.
I myself have never had one single, larger-than-life figure playing the part of mentor (talk about pressure). Rather, I’ve approached mentorship in much the same way career expert Marci Alboher does: as an ever-shifting collection of people I surround myself with…people I feel I can learn from, no matter what stage they’re at in their career. I highly recommend this approach.
Why do you need a mentor? Because you shouldn’t be working in a vacuum, stumbling along your career path without outside inspiration or guidance. Why do you need multiple mentors? Because it’s silly to rely on a single person, when an entire community can provide much better support, and a greater diversity of insight and advice.
So where can you find this army of advisers?
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Work has been pretty damn good lately (aside from the occasional seasonal slump). And — conceited as it may sound — I credit myself for a lot of that. After all, I’m the one who got me here. When I was unhappy at my 9-to-5, and daydreaming about freelancedom, I figured out the steps I’d need to take in order to make it work, and then took them. I self-educated myself with a shit-ton of how-to books. I took writing and pitching classes through MediaBistro and at the New School. I attended a ton of MediaBistro networking events, and formed a writing group. I secured a freelance gig before jumping ship and, during the transitional period, was working two jobs at once. And when I’d left my 9-to-5 behind, I took on another unpaid, post-college internship in order to gain more experience, contacts, and clips.
I’ve been lonely lately.
I mean, freelancing has always been lonely. I sit in my condo, hunched over my keyboard, getting more and more used to not going out. I have full-on conversations with my three cats. I tweet, and retweet, and @reply, pretending that virtual conversations are just as good as actual human contact. I feel lonely.
Quite some time ago, I signed up for Brazen Careerist, a network for young professionals that allowed me to share my blog feed and connect with other awesome people like myself. (You may have noticed the little bookmarklet at the bottom righthand corner of my blog.)
Today, Brazen Careerist has launched itself in a whole new way.
I did not make life easy for my parents.
During my toddler years, they worried over my introversion. During my junior high/high school years, they worried over my fiery temper. During my college years, they worried throughout the course of an abusive relationship I couldn’t bring myself to leave, and then worried some more when I fell into a deep depression and dropped out of college. (I eventually went back to [a different] school and earned my degree.) Post-college, they passed me onto a possibly masochistic husband with a sigh of relief, but still couldn’t help but worry over all my ups, downs, and interminable plateaus.
Throughout the duration, they’ve (for some wild reason) continued to support me in everything I do.
Back when I was working in book publishing full-time, trying desperately to establish myself within the NYC media world, I felt stuck: tied to the area in which I was living, unable to move even the slightest bit west, due to the extent to which my daily commute already exhausted me.
Now, with my office a mere few feet from my bed, a world of possibilities has opened up to me, and I daydream about walking amongst the streets of Boston as a native…driving to the supermarket in Bucks County, PA…pushing a Bugaboo through the family-heavy streets of western NJ.
Last weekend, my husband and I even took a drive to Warren County, NJ to check out some open houses, and I fell in love with a four-bedroom house with muted purple shutters and a sunny front office: the type of house you could grow with.
What do I, as a freelancer, look for in a future home? (aside from expansive kitchen counter space, walk-in closets, and a decent school district…) Read the rest of this entry »
I’m a bit obsessed with the Twittersphere. I’m logged on 24/7 and use the site to promote my work, seek out sources, and network with other freelance writers. Plus, it helps me to maintain my sanity when I’m desperate for some small bit of human contact.
Why not use the site as a virtual business card as well?
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This past weekend, I traveled to Boston to see my father-in-law run in the marathon. It was my first marathon ever, and I wasn’t quite sure what it would be like watching a group of people run by.
My husband, my mother-in-law, and I set up shop about 100 yards from the finish line, right outside the Prudential Center and a block or two away from the library. We were lucky enough to get a spot right at the barrier, where I stood poised with my camera, waiting for our runner.
Next to us was a woman with…um…a loud mouth. I wasn’t sure if she was there to see anyone in particular, but she cheered on just about every runner who went past us, referring to the names on the fronts of their shirts.
“Yeah Jan! Whooo! Almost there! Yeah Pam and Steve! Whooo! Doing great!” Nonstop. It was a wonder she still had a voice.
Some of the people around us gave her dirty looks, but I just loved the way she broke through to those runners on the last leg of their journey, giving them the strength to make it those last 100 yards. I was alost overcome by emotion every time one of them broke out of their running reverie and smiled, or gave her a thumbs up. It seemed to me that she was doing those marathoners a great service.
Sometimes, my work day feels like a marathon — one filled with endless blog posts, pitches, interviews, rewrites, edits, and the like — and I wish I had someone to drag me those last few yards to the end. This is where my own personal freelance support group comes in handy.
I can’t believe I haven’t posted about Twitter before. After all, I’ve been using it to promote my writing and connect with other freelancers for quite some time now, and even did a guest post over at TwiTip on taking your Twitter networking from online to in-the-flesh.
I think it warrants a mention here at Freelancedom, no?
After the jump, 4 ways to use Twitter as a means of building your personal business: