Riding the Freelance Wave: Learning to Accept the Highs and Lows

Riding the Freelance Wave: Learning to Accept the Highs and Lows

I’m starting to learn that freelancing definitely has a bit of a pattern to it… even if it doesn’t feel like it at the time.

For me, February always seems very full-on. Loads of fun projects but also the kind of chaotically busy where I’m secretly counting the hours until I can pause for breath! Then March hits and it goes eerily quiet. It seems to happen every year around the end of the financial year, but it still feels a bit unnerving when everything goes quiet. And then April comes along and things start gradually picking up again – Existing clients get back in touch, new enquiries land, and there’s a bit of momentum back.

The pattern has been similar for the last three years. But what’s finally started to change this year is how it affects me.

In the early days, it really stressed me out. The quiet months especially—I’d start questioning everything and wondering if I’d done something wrong or needed to fix something quickly. This meant that I didn’t actually enjoy the downtime because I was so stressed about getting work back in that I didn’t relax during the lull.

But now, almost three years in, I’m starting to feel a lot more at peace with it.

Although it still naturally feels a little uneasy, I don’t panic as much when things go quiet because I’ve seen the pattern now. I know it picks back up again. And when things are busy, it feels a bit easier to handle because I know it won’t stay that intense forever.

Freelancing isn’t consistent, and I don’t think it ever will be. But it does balance out over time, and that’s something I trust a lot more now.

This year I didn’t panic all March. I just made the most of the bit of extra time I had to catch up on some case studies and focus on my physio and strengthening ahead of knee surgery. And sure enough, April has come around and things have started to trickle back in, and for the first time I feel refreshed rather than stressed going into the next financial year.

Still figuring it out, but definitely less stressful than it used to be.