You know what I think is one of the smartest things that you can do for yourself emotionally? Learn to find support when you need it. We all need people to support our choices and decisions and actions so that we can feel confident in what we’re doing. Finding the right people to support each different aspect of our lives can be hard but learning to do it can make the difference between a tough life and a much easier one.

One of the areas of life that we need support in is our work. Another, for many of us, is our creativity. And for those of us who do freelance work such as freelance writing, those two things often go hand-in-hand. Our creative selves and our money-making selves are all tied up in one and there can be a lot of conflict around that. To be strong enough to resolve that conflict, we need support.

The smart freelance writer will figure out where to get that support. They will realize that it can come in many different forms and from many different people from the support of people who read what we write to the support of people who pay us for our work. Making sure that we know where it’s coming from and that we get enough of it can be one of the smartest things we do for our careers!

Tags: employment, freelance, freelance writing, people, Relationships, support, work, writing

I believe that it’s important for every single person who does freelance work to be intelligent. Specifically, it is important for freelancers to develop their knowledge in all areas of business and marketing. Those people who are good at a creative craft like (writing or graphic design) but who don’t develop their smarts in business aren’t going to make it long in their freelance careers. But those who do develop both their creativity and their business sense can have long-lasting creative careers that are fulfilling both emotionally and financially.

One of the things that freelancers have to figure out in terms of their business is how to set the rates for their work. Some of this is depended by the market but a lot of it really depends upon your own ability as a freelancer to do some research, set some goals and work towards making the kind of income that you want to make while doing what you love. You can learn more about my recent thoughts on this from my post on Figuring Out Your Writing Rates which includes links to some other smart blogs on the same topic.

Tags: business, freelance, freelance rates, freelance writing, kathryn vercillo, money, Personal Finance, real words, self-employment

It’s tax season and for freelancers that can mean that it’s not a very fun time at all. Of course, some freelancers are terrific about keeping organized records of their sporadic income and their ever-changing work expenses. They submit their self-employment quarterly taxes regularly and they don’t struggle to figure out all that they’re supposed to figure out before April 15th each year.

And then there are the rest of us.

Doing freelance taxes isn’t difficult, exactly, but it’s not easy either. (For some helpful online tax filing solutions check out NextAdvisor.com.) It requires a strong sense of organization. It requires us to be smart about understanding our businesses. And it requires extensive knowledge of the do’s and don’ts as far as deductions and write-offs. Hopefully my Freelancer’s Guide to Important Tax Deductions will help a lot of the people who will get the chance to see it now that it was included in the Don’t Mess With Taxes blog carnival.

For people who want to learn more about taxes, this is a great place to start. There are tons of great tax articles included in the tax carnival including tips on giving to charity, doing taxes on time, filing as a medical student, learning from the past, using your refund and hiring a tax preparer. There was also some really smart information about the hidden costs of paying taxes with a credit card and use e-file. Plus there are tons of links there to information on the economic stimulus bill.

Taxes are definitely something that a SmartChick (or SmartGuy) wants to be concerned about learning so checking out the blog carnival comes highly recommended by me!

Tags: blog carnival, bukisa, freelance, freelance taxes, income tax, kathryn vercillo, tax carnival, taxes, writing