Emergency Freelancing: Dealing With the Unexpected (S1E3)
What would happen to your freelance business if you had to stop working tomorrow? Not for a week — but for two months, with no certain end date?
Most freelancers don't have an answer to that question until the moment it becomes urgent. Anna Burgess Yang is a B2B FinTech writer and solopreneur systems expert who has spent years helping fellow freelancers build automated, efficient businesses. Last year, all of those systems were put to the ultimate test when she was diagnosed with a brain tumor and had five weeks to prepare her business for open-ended brain surgery and recovery.
In this episode, Anna and Liam get into what those five weeks actually looked like — notifying clients, leaning on community in ways she didn't expect, keeping content moving without being there, and coming back to a business that looked different than the one she'd left. They also pull back to the bigger picture: what every freelancer can do now, before an emergency arrives, to build a business that can survive the unexpected. Liam shares his own experience navigating a sudden family crisis early in his freelancing career, and together they map out the practical and emotional side of freelancing through the unthinkable.
Whether you're in the middle of something hard or just want to be better prepared, this conversation has something for you.
Be sure to check out Anna’s website, connect with her on LinkedIn, and check out her free resources (she’s got lots on there, including the resources mentioned in this episode).
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Episode Transcript
Liam: Ah do you hear that? The sound of the ocean? That's because I'm recording this podcast by the beach while I'm on vacation in Costa Rica with my family. I'm just kidding. I'm not recording this on the beach or while on vacation because vacation is supposed to be time off.
I didn't take a vacation for the first year and a half or so of my freelancing. I just didn't have time. I had too many clients.
I didn't have a system set up to watch the shop while I was away. I just didn't know how to do it. Then in September of 2020, I got a phone call that changed everything. It was from my sister telling me that both of our parents had been involved in a horrible car accident.
From that moment forward, my entire life changed. I had to put my business on hold as I went up to be with my parents ,
and for weeks after the accident, I was still dealing with quite a lot of trauma and grief that made it very hard to work. I had to figure out how to put my system on life support in the moment, and it was something that I hoped to never have to do again. But looking back,
it helped me set up systems and contingency plans for when I really need to take time off. Whether that's involuntarily like it was then or voluntarily like it is now when I'm going on vacation with my family. I want to talk more about those systems and that's why I am invited today's guest, Anna Burgess Yang, on to talk with us.
Anna has experience with these kinds of life altering changes that make you put your business on hold. And in this episode she's very candid with me about what happened when she received a life-changing diagnosis and had to quickly come up with some very creative ways to keep her freelance business going during that time. Here's that conversation.
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Anna, hi. Welcome to the Freelance Success Podcast. Thank you for joining.
Anna: Yeah, thank you so much for having me.
Liam: I wanted to have you on actually, when I was thinking about who I wanted to have on season one, I first thought of you because we have like a little bit of a final destination moment where we were supposed to meet up.
You were supposed to come talk to the Freelance Success community back in June of this year. And obviously that didn't happen, so I've been like waiting to get you in to talk to the community. And originally we were going to have you talk about automating and processes for solopreneurs and for freelancers, which obviously we might still get into today.
I have a feeling, but in the meantime, a lot has changed. A lot has happened. So I thought I'd start out by just asking you first, let you say who for the record, who are you, what do you do? And yeah, maybe tell me your side of that same story.
Anna: Sure. So I am a freelance writer and I mostly write for B2B FinTech companies.
So that's kind of my, my day job or the thing that brings in money in my solopreneur business. But I also create resources for fellow solopreneurs. And as you mentioned, a lot of the focus is on automation operations, kind of that behind the scenes stuff that I think a lot of people don't talk about to kind of keep a solo business running.
And that's was the topic that I was going to speak to the community about. But then I messaged you and I said, well, guess what? I was just diagnosed with a brain tumor and I need to have surgery in a couple of weeks. And so at the time, not quite knowing what path that was going to take.
I said, you know what, we're just going to need to table this and come back to it later. So I did end up having surgery in July and had to take a complete step back from my business for about two months where I hardly did anything because brain surgery's kind of involved and has a a significant recovery and a lot of unknowns, which was hard because neurosurgery they can't quite predict what you're going to be like when you wake up.
And so I was kind of planning for the unknown and also planning for an unknown recovery time.
Liam: Wow, that sounds very scary.
Anna: It was
Liam: really scary. And I remember when you sent me that email, my heart just sank and I was just like, oh my goodness. It was one of those just, you know, kind of, I was in my thoughts the whole day that day and just followed you on from that moment.
So how long was it between diagnosis and the surgery?
Anna: So it was about six weeks. And one of those weeks was spent not exactly knowing what was coming because I got diagnosed in an emergency room and then met with a neurosurgeon and then had a follow up with a second neurosurgeon, so that, that took about a week.
So, and then they were scheduled at about five weeks after that. So that, that week was probably the hardest. because not knowing exactly what. Path that was going to take and what the outcome or the recommendations were going to be. But then once I said, okay, now you have a surgery date, we know what we're doing, that's when I really kicked into high gear and thought, okay, I've got a plan for my business and what does that look like for this recovery period where I'm really not going to be able to do very much.
Liam: Right. So you had like five weeks at that point basically to figure out what you were going to do. How were your, I don't know, tell me if this is too personal, but were you having really tough symptoms during those five
Anna: weeks? No, the way that it was found was I, in January of this year, I just started having like head pressure When I wake up, it was kind of very mild.
I just kind of felt like this pressure at the back of my head and I just move about my day and Google said, drink more water. So that's what I did. I just, I thought I was maybe just a little dehydrated, but after a couple of months I was like, you know, this is kind of weird. I'm just going to go to my primary care provider.
And she ordered a CT scan and that's when they saw a mass and she told me to go to the emergency room where I got an MRI and they found the brain tumor, which was benign. Yeah, I was, it's called a meningioma which is, so it was not cancerous. That was of the news to get, that was good news. But still needed to be removed because they just keep growing otherwise, and it would just start putting, so that was what I felt was pressure basically from the meningioma, and it would just keep growing and put pressure on more things, more important things.
So it had to come out.
Liam: Wow. I guess first of all, like a reminder to go to the doctor and talk to your
Anna: Yes. If you've got something weird.
Liam: Yeah. Medical ambiguity is, I mean, ambiguity is scary no matter what. Actually, the very first episode of this podcast, I do an episode by myself where I talk about freelance fear and just how it is a career path that requires fear because of all of the uncertainty that's built into it. What I think is interesting and a bit of an ironic twist is that you're someone who has specialized in coming up with systems that take a lot of that uncertainty away, right?
Of making systems that make it so that you don't have to think too much about your marketing because it's kind of running not on on autopilot, but a lot of the stuff that takes up brain space is removed and then you have this moment where you're like, oh, suddenly I have to change my own business without any warning and I only have five weeks to do it.
Really scary. Hopefully something most people won't have to experience. And yet also something that I think a lot of freelancers listening to this probably have experienced a moment where life just says. Actually, nothing else matters right now except for this. So what, how did you get into the right head space at that time and what, what did you do?
How did you manage those? Talk, talk me up to me about those, those five weeks.
Anna: So I really kicked into high gear and started looking at all different aspects of my business. Like I had to notify my clients that I write for, because they depend on me to deliver. I write blog posts and eBooks and things like that.
And so I had to say, you know what, I'm not going to be available after
this date for kind of an undetermined amount of time, but probably at least six to eight weeks. I had to think about like. Does somebody need access to my bank account or can it just kind of be okay, not touched for a period of time?
Liam: Anna: I had to think about, I work with a virtual assistant. Can she operate without any oversight or any interaction from me for a period of time? I also had to think I have three children. I had to think so outside of business and all of that, I also had to think about the logistics of, of my kids and, and all of this.
And honestly, I think for me it was a distraction and a good one. Because there were a lot of unknowns about the outcome of the surgery and like and so I was able to kind of focus on these logistical things and not have to focus on how terrified I was. Mm. But I can understand that people going through a medical crisis or a family emergency or something similar, that freezing and shutting down is also like a valid.
To something like that. And not everybody is in a mental head space where they might be able to plan as much as I did. But that, that's just the type of person I am. And so that's what I was able to do during those five weeks.
Liam: Hmm. Yeah. I don't want to say that any of this was a blessing, but those five weeks, I'm sure were like both, like you said, both painful and, and anxiety filled.
But it does give you a little bit of breathing room to set some things up. And I know you did set some things up. What, what did you end up doing to keep the ship moving during this unknown period?
Anna: So my client work basically had to shut down. And that's my primary source of income because the way that I work, I'm completely solo.
I was not comfortable subcontracting and my contracts with my clients did not allow it in some cases. So that really wasn't an option. I also produce a lot of content my own blog my newsletter, I write on Substack. And even though those aren't big income earning things for me I didn't want to just.
Pause those. I thought that was a risk because then picking it back up would be hard and a lot of implications of that. So I actually reached out to a lot of people. You were one of them. A lot of people volunteered. They said, how can I help? And that was a tangible way for people to help. I said, can you write like a newsletter takeover?
Can you write a guest post for my blog? Can you write something for my substack? And so part of that time in, in that five weeks was that everybody who said yes was keeping track of okay, who said yes. Did they get me a draft? Did they get, is it scheduled to go out? So there were, you know, so I still had to do things, you know, once the content was given to me.
But that was one way that I kept things moving. And then I also co-wrote and pre-scheduled a bunch of social media content to kind of keep my social profiles active, even though I wasn't. Around.
Liam: Yeah. With the client work shutting down. What did that, I mean, were you afraid that you would lose those clients forever?
Did, did you lose clients altogether? Did they, were they there when you were back?
Anna: So some of my clients, I do a ton of project-based work, not not retainers, and so it's based on what I deliver. Several of my clients are very long-term clients, and so they, I've been working them with them for several years, and they are larger companies that work with many freelancers and they said, don't worry, work will be waiting for you when you get back.
We'll just reassign to other freelancers during that time. I did lose one client that was a much smaller company and I was their only freelancer and mm-hmm. That I understand, like, they can't wait, you know, they've, they've got to keep producing things. And so that was a concern, like what's what shape is my business going to be in when I get back?
And also that I was not able to work at full capacity. Even once I came back. Just, I had a lot of fatigue. Things would take a lot longer. And so even with the clients that I was able to keep, I had to tell them, you know, I can't take on as much work right now as I normally do.
Liam: It is a kind of a, you know, a moving story.
The, the way that community actually played a role. You know, we talk a lot about freelance communities so much, sometimes to the point that it loses meaning I think, you know, or it gets reduced down to like a message board or like your friends on LinkedIn. But I think what you're talking about actually was a moment where you really needed community support from actual humans and they stepped up in a way that allowed you to.
You know, the problem is LinkedIn doesn't care if you stop posting because you have an issue. Right? It does not. It will punish you either way, whether or not you have a good reason to stop posting, and that can be detrimental to a freelance business or a solo solopreneur business. So I'm just reflecting on how moving it is that there was a, and I'm not saying this to toot my own horn.
There's a lot of people who stepped up to help you out, and I hope we would all be so lucky that, or, or so. It is not even luck. It's, it's the, well, let me actually turn this into a question because I don't think it's luck. Where did that community come from for you
Anna: years of building relationships with people?
In the freelance community. In the business community. One woman who wrote a post for, a post for my substack, her name is Nola Simon. She has a great podcast also. You should check it out. But I had been a guest on her podcast. And, and I also interviewed her previously for my Substack, never met her in person.
She lives in Canada. I've never met you in person. So I mean, these are people I don't like know in real life, so to speak.
Liam: Anna: They are online friends, but they have people I've built relationships with. I made an announcement on LinkedIn on threads. I said, I have a brain tumor. And a lot of people reached out and that was when they said like, how can I help?
And that was, I knew just that's the time to ask for help is when somebody says, how can I help? And you say, here's a tangible thing you can do that would really help me out.
Liam: That is such good advice. You know, when I, I'll share just a moment of my own story. So if, you know, five years ago now on October 30th, my mother passed away after a car accident.
She was in the hospital for five weeks herself. And that obviously I had no time to plan. You can't plan for a car accident. So I had to uproot my business very similar to you. I had to tell all my clients to put everything on hold. And a lot of times I have people asking me what can I do to help? And, and now when I'm on the other side of it and I hear that someone is going through grief or some sort of tragedy, I like to say the best thing you can do is suggest a way to help.
Like, don't say, how can I help you? But instead. Can I bring the lasagna over to your house tomorrow at 4:00 PM It's a lot more helpful. But it sounds like you had, you also had a list of things because you're such an organized person, you had a list of tasks that needed to be done and you have systems in place.
And I wanted, I wanted to ask about that too, is do you think being the kind of person who has processes, who knows about automation, who already had those systems in place, how helpful was that during this time period?
Anna: It was incredibly helpful. And I do want to echo what you said, that suggesting something.
Really powerful because when somebody's going through something like grief or an emergency or something, they, some, they a lot of times can't think, yeah, they don't, they're not in a space where they can say, this is what I need. It was a little bit different in this situation only because it was kind of business, you know, I was asking for business related things, but absolutely.
You know, if it's something, somebody, you know, where you can drop off or to drop off a meal or somebody mowed my lawn, you know, while I was in the hospital. So there, there are really tangible things that people can do and just offer and that, that removes the burden from the person who's going through something to have to think of something.
But to your question, the automated systems did help substantially. Because, you know, for example, my virtual assistant, she does some, some, some social media things after a blog post publishes. So. I had all this content that I had now pre-scheduled that I'd gotten from other people. So she, she was able to keep moving on those because the automation kind of picks up, okay, now the post is published.
Now here's the things you need to do. I also set up a system with an editor friend of mine to be able to dictate and get things over to her via automation. I wanted to share some more personal blog posts as I was recovering, but knew that using a computer wasn't really going to be an option for me in the early days.
And so I would dictate, and automation would pick it up and get a, the dictation over to her. She would transcribe it, you know, clean it up, get it over to my virtual assistant, who then published it on my blog. And that was able to just happen via a dictation tool and Zapier running in the background that I didn't have to like email her and say, Hey, this is ready for you.
Liam: Man, I, one of my biggest shames as a freelancer is that I have never used Zapier, and I feel like I need to maybe hire you at some point to help me get all set up on that because you know, I just think about how when my tragedy happened, I was still quite new to freelancing. I've only been doing it for about a year full time, and I didn't have any processes set up and things did come to a screeching halt.
And I still think that my LinkedIn has never really recovered from like, the six weeks that I took from off of posting. You said that with community, you know, it was years of networking, and maybe this is an ambiguous question, but how do you, how do you do it? How do you build connections that are strong enough and deep enough that they were willing to help you in your time of need?
Anna: I think it's just participating online. And maybe that's kind of a weird thing to say, but you know, engaging with people on LinkedIn and then it leads to a DM and then maybe it leads to a podcast or it's like, how can we collaborate? And I think those types of collaborations are important for freelancers, like kind of supporting each other, like this podcast or, and so those were just things that I had done over the years or like, Hey, I've, we've been commenting on each other's posts for a while.
Do you want to do a coffee chat? You know, let's just take it and let's just actually talk one-on-one a little bit about each other businesses. And so that's just something I had done for a long time. Just because I think community is important. Like there's nothing like. Monetary that either of us are necessarily getting out of it.
Liam: Anna: But freelancing is a lonely life. Solopreneur life is a lonely life. And so it's like, Hey, let's see what we can learn from each other or share with each other. How can we support each other along the way? And then turns out when you're facing a major medical issue and you actually really, really need support, then those people are willing to show up for you.
Liam: Right. I think just to echo what you're saying and the idea of breaking free of the transactional mindset that you know, it happens a lot. You're like, I'm going to send dms because I need, you know, X number of new clients. But I think it's more of like, you don't know when someone is going to become someone that you need or someone that can help you and when you're going to need that help, so.
If you go into it with a transactional mindset, you're going to be disappointed in my opinion. Whereas if you just go into it as in, I'm going to make a connection here with this person, I have no idea if and when this will turn into something that is actually what pays off in the long run in my experience.
Do you agree with that?
Anna: Absolutely. Like I, all of the people that ended up helping me, and it was a lot, I mean, across multiple platforms none of them, it wasn't a monetary thing like with any of 'em really ever. You know, it was always just people like, Hey, these people are in my orbit. We've, we've collaborated on something, we've talked in the past and there's, you know, publishing something in, in my newsletter or blog has a, does have a benefit to them also.
It gives them exposure to my audience and it helps me out. But. It's, it's like you said, it's far more than a transaction. It's about really showing up for people and not expecting something specific in return.
Liam: Hmm. I had was writing about in our community was talking about, just actually we're reflecting on the conversation you and I were preparing for and thinking about time and time off and how, like what we've been talking about so far is when like, you suddenly have to take time off and there's no warning.
But something I'm also an advocate for is that freelancers should have time off. Period. Like any other full-time employee, we need vacation time and we need time where we're not at our desk or we need time to care for our three kids and like give them our attention and not be glued to our desk all the time.
So many freelancers I talk to say I haven't taken a vacation in three years, five years, 10 years. It's, it's really upsetting to hear. I just got back from two weeks on vacation. I had a lot of automations running myself, which I was proud of, but I'm going to talk more to those freelancers who feel like there's no way I can take time off whether it's an emergency or not, I just can't take time off.
What would you say to someone who's in that situation who feels like there's just such a mountain of work that where whether it's administrative work or whatever, where do they start fixing that problem in your opinion?
Anna: I think. One of the first things to solve for is the financial aspect. Actually, a lot of freelancers probably have work like I do, where if you don't work, you don't get paid.
And so they may be feel like they can't afford to take time off. And the way that I solved for that when I started freelancing was putting aside a little bit of money every month into a separate savings account. That's literally my vacation fund. And so when I take a vacation and my income is lower for the month, I just pull from that account.
So it's just part of my budget, like as a freelancer is that some money goes into this savings account. And so I think that is a lot of it is just like I can't afford to step away from my business. And so once you solve for that, then other things become easier. Like so. Then I just, I just tell my clients like, I'm, I give them a ton of notice.
I'm like, Hey I'm not gonna, you know, it's the end. It's, I'm not sure when this podcast will air, but right now it's the week before Thanksgiving in the United States and people take time off for maybe us Thanksgiving people take time off for Christmas, new Year's and things like that. And to, to do that, you just talk to your clients, say, I'm not going to be available and I'm going to do this.
I know a lot of freelancers do working vacations and like you do, you know, if that, if you can step away and do a couple of log in once a day to check email instead of constantly or something. Maybe that's a way to start as well, is not fully stepping away, but getting comfortable with mostly stepping away and seeing what of your business can keep running.
And are there any like, complete fails, like this, this just stopped because I wasn't there, and then figuring out how to address those things.
Liam: Hmm. Wow, that's an interesting idea. Let it, let it fail a little bit.
Anna: Well, maybe not let it fail, but you know, log in,
Liam: log in one, let's test it. Test it. Yeah, I think that's a great idea too.
Maybe also something I started doing a couple years into fencing is I just made Fridays sacred and I don't work on Fridays. I blocked it off on my calendar. I take Friday off. I don't have kids, so I'm lucky. I just usually go and do something fun with my, you know, go to a museum or just go write in a cafe for a while creatively.
But that's another way field answers could maybe start, right? If you feel like I can't take a whole week off, do two months where you take every Monday off or every Friday off and see how that feels. Also to echo what you were saying about telling your clients so many problems, I feel like freelancers could resolve by just being honest and transparent with their clients more often.
So. Tell your, I say, people should say, you know, you should have a vacation policy for your business when you're ready to start taking vacation and make that part of the onboarding process. So when you take on a new client, let them know, Hey, I usually take a vacation twice a year and I give one month's notice, and I will help you get set up so that you're not lagging.
You know? But actually, this made me think of another thing I wanted to talk about. Something we've been talking about a lot is the different pricing structures. And actually you said you have a lot of project clients and not a lot of retainer clients. That, to me, was interesting because a lot of the mantra in the freelance world is you want a retainer, you want a retainer, so you can have more financial security, no more feast or famine.
But it actually sounds like, correct me if I'm wrong, did having projects work in your favor in this moment because you were able to kind of pause them more easily?
Anna: Absolutely. And, and that's, and that's true even with taking vacation, which I do, you know, because I have three kids, I kind of have to follow the school calendar, which means we have spring break and we have, you know, summers are kind of chaotic.
And then we have a winter break every year at the end of the year. So because I have project based work, it's just like I'm not working and I don't have to figure out how to make up the deliverables that I would need to under a retainer agreement.
Liam: Anna: I do project based work because I became a freelancer because I lost my full-time job.
And so it was literally one day I had a job and the next day I didn't. And I'm like, okay, the looked around and the job market didn't look great, so I thought I'm just going to freelance full-time. I'd already been freelancing on the side.
Liam: What year was that?
Anna: And what year was that? That was 2022.
Liam: Okay.
Anna: So it's been three years.
And I look, and I, I, you know, like everybody else, I thought I'm going to chase retainers. And what I found very quickly, because I needed work, what I found very quickly was that project-based work is a much easier yes. Because from the clients, it's not as much of a, it's not a commitment. And so I couldn't get clients to say yes to, you know, like a three month retainer even.
But they could say yes to project based work. Like they didn't need specific approvals and things like that. So it just made everything a lot faster. It needs a significant amount of project management. But I'm good. Yeah, I'm good at that kind of thing. And now I have clients that even though there's no retainer, I can pretty much count on them for a certain amount of work per month for the moment.
It's, it's worked out that way without needing to like negotiate a retainer-based contract. So I wouldn't say I went in with a business plan to be project-based work, but it has certainly worked out in my favor and given me a lot of flexibility.
Liam: Right. It is kind of a nice, it sounds like a nice little hybrid of, yes, it's project work, but it doesn't sound like you're doing onboarding every single time because it's repeat client project work.
Have you ever been, maybe this is too personal a question, but do you deal with feast or famine in that scenario? Do you ever find there's gaps between projects that lead you into Oh,
Anna: sure. Like, you know, maybe a client that was regularly giving me work, they just, they're like, our budget changed and we're not going to use you anymore.
I have done. Truly one-off projects like somebody hires me because they need a very specific deliverable for one thing. And a lot of freelancers would not take on that kind of work. Or, or a marketing agency would not take on that kind of work, but I will. So, you know, that's kind of more the feast cycle is like, okay, so now I've got my regular work plus a couple of little extra things.
But the famine then happens, you know, where work I kind of was counting on or had gotten used to just kind of falls off. But at the point now, a couple years into it where I kind of have enough rolling inbound inquiries that it's usually okay, it's usually pretty short lean time in my business.
Liam: Hmm. Yeah, that's, that's interesting to me because I am, I am also moving in the direction away from retainers and more towards projects. I have a lot of money anxiety, so I'm always like, oh gosh. Even when it's fine, I get anxious about money. But yeah, that, that's, that's interesting. And then I think it also is on a larger scale, there's a reflection here of the fact that sometimes I think a lot of people who don't freelance think of freelancing as this really risky, you're always on the edge of collapse.
You know, they think that you're hustling from job to job and, you know, have there been moments like that In my career? Yes. But they're less and less the longer I do it. And I think thinking about your situation or my situation, right? There are jobs that if I had gone to 'em and said, my mom's in the hospital and I need an indeterminate amount of time off.
Or you had said, I'm going to the hospital and I don't know how long my recovery is, they would've said, okay, the job is over and there goes a hundred percent of your income. Whereas with freelancing, often clients say what they said to both of us, which is, I'm so sorry to hear that. Let me know when you're back and we'll pick things back up.
You, you're just so much less likely to lose a hundred percent of your income, and I think that's a real unsung benefit to freelancing. Do you see what I mean? Do you agree?
Anna: I have said that not even about a medical thing, but I have said when I lost my job at a marketing agency, I lost a hundred percent of my income overnight.
If I lose a client, I lose a portion of my income. And so they're both risky. And choose your risk. You know, you can, you can risk a hundred percent of your income or you can lose a risk, a portion of your income, but then you also also have to be constantly, you know, dredging up new clients and things like that.
But it's just. There's risks either way. One is not inherently more risky than the other.
Liam: Hmm. Well put put that on a t-shirt because I think that is something I just, I find myself saying more and more often because we are hearing a lot of people getting laid off and, and you know, it's a little scary out there for some people.
So freelancing can be actually more secure if you do it properly. I want to end on a maybe more positive note. This has been a, not a hard conversation, but a serious one. How are you doing today and how are you, we're coming up, like you said, on Thanksgiving and I don't know about you, but December's often a kind of a write off for me because I, the holidays and everything.
How are you looking forward to the future? How are you feeling today?
Anna: So physically I'm pretty good. Like I said, there are a lot of unknowns after surgery. I had an excellent neurosurgery team. I'm lucky to live in an area I live in a suburb of Chicago, so I had access to excellent medical care. So of the side effects of surgery mine were pretty minimal, so that was really good.
I am back up to kind of full capacity with my clients after kind of, after first taking time off and then kind of being at half capacity for about an additional month. But I'm pretty much back to normal. I. December for me is actually very busy. All every year marketers one of my clients joked, we never learn, they all have marketing budget to use up by the end of the year.
Uhhuh.
Liam: Yes.
Anna: And so they reach out and they're like, how much work can you possibly take on?
Liam: Yes.
Anna: So I will take on a ton of work in December, and then for me, January is usually slow because they're all coming back from the holidays and now they're trying to think about the next year. So, that parts, you know, that.
So that part of my business feels good. The part of my business that feels a little more uncertain is the work that I do, just basically creating resources for solopreneurs. At the exact time when I found out that I had a brain tumor, I was about to launch a cohort for solopreneurs to talk about things like tools and systems.
And it was going to be a two week thing. And I had a wait list and I was just about to start to open it up for, to, for registration. And I was like, now I can't, I can't do this. And so I had to just, I had to shut it down and email everybody on the wait list and say, this just isn't going to happen and I don't know when it's going to happen.
So that part's a little hard. There's just not quite back to where I'm able to do that type of thing. I have some eye issues and, and stuff, so, you know that, that part's more uncertain. I used to host a lot of webinar free webinars for solopreneurs and just talk about different topics and I'm not back to a place where I can do that kind of thing yet.
So that, that's uncertain. So I just have to kind of focus on things that focus, don't involve me being on camera that I'm more comfortable with and writing, and just kind of see what happens over the next couple months.
Liam: Hmm. Yeah. We just, I just made a post about this time of year for freelancers and now December can be a real money boost if you know who to reach out to and, and to just remind people that they might have budget and taxes to cut back on at the end of the year.
I'm happy to hear that you are. Recovering, you're back in capacity. I imagine that that demand has not gone away. There are still plenty of free freelancers out there and solopreneurs out there I know who need that kind of help. So when it is back, when you are at a place where you can do it, you have to let us know, because I'm sure there's people within our community who want to know about it who weren't on the waiting list, myself included, actually.
So if people want to learn more about you and about that and be on in the know when that's happening, what should they do?
Anna: They could, I've got a kind of a one-page website start dot anna b yang.com. I've got a bunch of resources there, so it links to my blog, it links to my substack, it links to a free guide that I have about tools that I think solopreneurs should consider, like types of tools, like what should you consider in your business?
And I actually just wrote a resource called Preparing for Long-Term Leave linked to that on that page. And it's a checklist and a guide. It's free. Because I think that this type of thing is so important and so hard for people to think through. So I wanted to create a resource based on my experience so that if people find themselves needing to take, leave and feel just stuck, they at least have like a checklist of things to think about and work through.
Liam: Wow. I don't think I've ever heard of a resource like that, so, and it's so needed. So thank you for creating that. We'll link to all of those things here in the show notes and in the library as well. Anna, is there anything else you'd like to add before we wrap up?
Anna: I would say that people need to plan for the worst, and that sounds awful.
But when I first started freelancing, I thought to myself, what happens if I, well, what I thought at the time was, what happens if I get pneumonia and I can't work for two weeks? Like, nothing like brain tumor. With much, much more. But I did think like, what happens if I get really sick or something and I have to step away?
And that's what prompted me to just throw money in a savings account. So. Thankfully during my surgery and recovery, I did not have to worry about that financial aspect as much. It was still a worry, but not, not as much as it otherwise would've been. But I think not, not thinking about that worst case scenario is what leads to crisis mode.
And crisis mode is so hard to work through because you just don't know what to do and that's when people freeze. Whereas if you can, I hope nobody downloads my resource on preparing for long-term leave because they are in crisis mode. But if you are, it's there. But I'd prefer people to download it in advance and just throw it on your Google Drive and when you need it, it's there and hopefully you never need it.
But. That's just one way that I wanted to kind of give back, especially to people who are so helpful to me and just say, here, here's a resource that might help you someday if you need that type of support.
Liam: Hmm. Wonderful. I mean, it's a form of insurance, right? We have insurance because, you know, the worst might happen and you want to be prepared if it does.
But I think preparing but not dwelling on those worst case scenarios is a really good advice. And this sounds like a great resource to at least start having a plan in the back of your mind. That's a good place to start of, and let's hope it's just pneumonia for two weeks and nothing more than that, but you never know.
This has been such an enlightening conversation. I think this is something I don't hear people talking about, so I appreciate how open you've been with me, and I really think this one will be helpful to people. Anna, thank you so much for stopping by.
Anna: Thank you.
Speaker: Thanks for listening to the Freelance Success Podcast. We're bringing you new episodes every Monday, so be sure to subscribe to hear more. If you want to join the conversation with a bunch of other freelancers who are also growing their business together, come to join freelance success.com and claim your free membership for one month.
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