For ten years I've co-owned a media (podcast) business. It's done steadily (boringly?) well for the majority of the decade, but there was a two-ish year span where we made what my business partner and I referred to as "stupid money." It was fun, in a breathless, adrenaline-fueled way - and yes, the little influx of unexpected cash in those years, more than I'd ever expected to see all at once, allowed me to do some fun things I otherwise couldn't have.
But that success also brought with it a whole lot of stress. My tax bill in our best year was punitive and I was completely unprepared for it. We had to hire a whole slew of experts to help us manage a business that was growing faster and bigger than we'd ever anticipated, and that brought with it a lot of stress, too, as these growth-oriented changes threatened to move our business outside of the comfortable container we liked keeping it inside. We entertained acquisition offers and spent endless hours talking about the future direction and growth of the business.
Then, when the economics of the podcast industry started to shift, we realized that to stay "on top" - if that was even possible - we'd have to do it all over: re-invent the business, re-invent ourselves as partners inside the business. And...we just didn't want to. We decided to stop focusing on growth, stop worrying about selling, and just coast until we were ready to shut it down (which we will be in late June.) We feel really good about the way we're ending, because it feels so much more true to ourselves and by extension the people who have listened all along. And because we're winding down on our own terms, our friendship and partnership is as strong as it's ever been - and we're starting a new project together a little later this spring.
The problem with careers built on one's "competitive edge" is that you have to keep sharpening that edge over and over and over or you lose it. Some people, I think, love playing that game -but I'm finding that I don't care enough to keep focusing on being competitive for the rest of my life, whether as an employee or a freelancer or a business owner. It turns out that making a lot of money all at once didn't bring me any more lasting security than if I'd just made a normal amount and kept my life simpler and expenses lower.
So right now I'm enjoying a "poorer on purpose" lifestyle, leaning in on non-monetary currency, skills, creativity and simply doing what helps me feel most connected to my life, the world, and other people in it. The more we believe we MUST earn more and more to simply live, the more that becomes actually true. But what if we defy those assumptions and see what else might be possible?
As an aside, there can be such a thing as a "boring" freelance writing career! It's built not on bylines in prestigious publications but in steady, workhorse-style assignments. I've always liked to have a mix of both kinds of clients in my stable. And the best way I've found to secure those gigs is - as you point out - through relationship-building.
Thanks again for a great post with so much to chew on, Rosie.
"The problem with careers built on one's "competitive edge" is that you have to keep sharpening that edge over and over and over or you lose it." Yes! Same. Would rather want/require less in monetary terms so I can be less competitive.
It's crazy how quickly consumerism escalates within the competitive mindset, too. = "Time is money" so everything that requires time is looked at through the lens of opportunity cost rather than what it contributes to one's life satisfaction or community. All in all a not very peaceful or prosperous-feeling way to live, I've found.
I love the idea of “poorer on purpose.” ❤️ Your story hits home! I have a small business that also grew too fast at one point. So fast I was in major burnout. Instead of closing it, I cut it way back. It’s been small and sustainable for the last few years and there’s a lot to be said for running an enterprise on your own terms and not for “growth.”
Ditto! I grew my coaching business, got burned out, and have now totally pivoted my focus so it feels a bit like starting over. It's been somehow deflating and also liberating at the same time.
yes, this is a huge topic for me these days! I did a whole podcast episode called "i'm willing to be unimpressive" about the essence of this, but dang, so many ways it shows up!
I see the push for faster, more competitive now as wanting my soul in exchange for no real security, no real appreciation for the effort given and no real relationship developed but the illusion of all that really matters and doesn’t. Time is also energy and that is what I need most. Anxiety and fear suck energy right out of me. Maybe that’s their plan. Then I can’t focus on something other than survival.
I feel this. I used to run a travel blog full-time and also got to a point where I didn't enjoy doing what I "had" to do to keep it competitive. That was in 2019 and I was "lucky" in a sense that COVID came along as I instantly took it as a chance to build something new.
Unfortunately, that led (because of many many factors involved) to burnout a few years later.
Your story about the "stupid money" years really hit home. I’ve been diving into the illusion of business growth as freedom—and how quickly it turns into a trap we never wanted.
I write a project called The Red Pill Files where I unpack these shifts with a colder lens.
"I’ve accepted that no job is coming to save me. That security does not come from a one-way, linear transaction with a for-profit corporation. But rather, a rhizomatic network, one that grows not just upwards, but outwards, downwards, and sideways — with gains and losses, ebbs and flows along the way."
^Filing that under, things I wish I'd heard when I was still in school 🙃
This really resonated with me, having just spent some time in my garden attempting to tame some rhizomatic weeds. I didn’t realize I had so much in common with Creeping Charlie.
I retired last year after working part time for most of my life, because I am a mother and the man in my life earned a bigger salary, so he worked longer hours. I have a university degree and have worked in part time admin for 25 years. My pension is a joke, I could not exist on it.
After I left uni, I dropped out, I lived in communes, housing co-ops, worked in worker's co-ops, organised food share and communal gardening, we set up our own childcare, even started our own school. Most of it still exists, quietly, efficiently today. We left most of it behind for a variety of reasons but the underlying principle has guided all our decisions. What matters is community, small and large, sharing tools, land, food, childcare, schools, books, homes, transport, healthcare, also fun, looking out for/after others in your area, your environment and on and on. I/we have often barely survived financially but always knew about the network(s) of community, of sharing and supporting. Strangely, accumulating wealth has never come up.
Love this, Rosie! My kids are 9 and 19 now, but childcare drove all my career choices for a long time. I’ve been in a niche publishing job for more than 20 years and about 10 years ago I began to worry about what I’d do when the niche ended. My identity was wrapped up in my career to the point that I didn’t know my neighbors or my own skills or even my own desires. Slowly, I’ve pulled back from being all-in on the day job. I started a passion-focused side business and learned totally different skills, prioritized friends and family and neighbors, have a list of new skills I want to learn. I still have the day job, for now. Amazingly, once it stopped being the only way I measured my value, I became a better employee—easier to work with because the personal stakes were lower.
I love these reflections about care, relationship, and social currency. Yes, yes, yes. The majority of success in my 22-year freelance/self-employment career has been built on relationships. And I never had formal ongoing childcare, through many years of adding children to my family while FT freelancing. Instead we relied on a network of shared, community-oriented caregiving much like you describe: swapping days with friends and family and sharing paid help when we all needed more than we could give one another. It really can work, despite our cultural insistence that everything of value must be bought and paid for.
Rosie, you really write beautifully from the heart and soul, and put some of your deepest thoughts and concerns out there for all of us to see and read - I am very grateful. Your honesty but also your, well, rage? are refreshing, and are so necessary. It is also infuriating to read that you and your family have been hopscotching from patchwork solution to patchwork solution for months and years. I feel your pain and uncertainty.
As a 58-year-old single father of two pre-teen/teen boys and a journalist in Germany, who looks around him and sees so many people struggling and worrying what things will look like in the not at all distant future (while the bill and tax collectors relentlessly come calling), I can only agree with the idea of building your own community, and working on solutions with whoever you consider your tribe. There is nothing shameful or utopian about that. It's actually a wonderful prospect.
The social services system in Germany is in many ways far better than in Britain, but it too is terribly unequal, and the burden to do what needs to be done at home and with children falls disproportionately on women and mothers.
AI is just beginning to ravage professions and career pathways many of us thought might be relatively safe for at least a few more years, while climate change looms large for all of us (er, the not so well or not at all well off). And most if not all of the people reading this are in the relatively wealthy and incredibly fortunate "West".
I guess I don't have much more to say other than thank you. For being who you are, and for still daring to dream, even if it's daunting.
It’s exhausting to have a full time job but feel job insecurity. I already did that during my last break. Now I have a job, and the panic hasn’t gone away. What?!
This was wonderful. Thank you for articulating this beautifully. I’ve been having similar thoughts as I think about what I really want my life to look like and have been scared to let go of the full-time job security at a time when I’m planning to have children. But reading this made me realise that clearly it’s not an either or.
Also, lack of free pre-school care in this country infuriates me.
beautiful reflections - for the last two years we've been in the dance of work an childcare and just sort of gave up a little trying to pull it off in the US. we've moved back to Asia to be closer to my wifes family and a little more robust social services net around us in taiwan if we need it
I relate to so much of this as someone who’s been freelance for 10 years and a parent for 5, and feeling this anxiety (on top of the career anxiety I’ve felt pretty much since having my first kid). I love the reframe of security as the “rhizomatic” (!!!) web of relationships we cultivate, not just the artificial security of a job title. A small group of fellow writers in my city have supported each other for years, something I’ve thought of as lateral mentoring since it’s not hierarchical. That mutual exchange of resources and support feels like “job security” to me.
I'm just starting to get into the writer's community where I live after I finally started writing for myself again a few mo this agao and would love to know more about how you support each other, if you're willing to share.
Deeply appreciate this share right now. Upon running my Q1 totals I realized the last time I earned so little this quarter was 2021. The narrative in my psyche of "success means continuous and unbroken revenue growth" has come crashing down on me, and it's been a process. An an enneagram type 3 (Achiever), I've been doing a lot of work to divorce my own notions of value and self-worth with my net profit. Both humbling and liberating. And, I'm definitely at a new crossroads, pondering how to proceed with authenticity while also bringing in the cashflow I need to pay the bills.
thank you so much for this ♥️ I’m a gen z creative worker in a corporate job, and I’ve been feeling SO lonely as I go through these sorts of (re)negotiations with my career while trying to sustain my family. it’s such a balm to know I’m not alone in feeling and thinking this way.
Wow – you articulated something here that I have been feeling for many years, but I couldn't quite pin it down. Saving this so I can re-read it again and again. Thank you.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for articulating this, these feelings and whips of thoughts I've also have been having and have been grasping to explain. Reading this piece brought me to tears--it rings so deeply true in this moment. A million times thank you for the work you do here.
For ten years I've co-owned a media (podcast) business. It's done steadily (boringly?) well for the majority of the decade, but there was a two-ish year span where we made what my business partner and I referred to as "stupid money." It was fun, in a breathless, adrenaline-fueled way - and yes, the little influx of unexpected cash in those years, more than I'd ever expected to see all at once, allowed me to do some fun things I otherwise couldn't have.
But that success also brought with it a whole lot of stress. My tax bill in our best year was punitive and I was completely unprepared for it. We had to hire a whole slew of experts to help us manage a business that was growing faster and bigger than we'd ever anticipated, and that brought with it a lot of stress, too, as these growth-oriented changes threatened to move our business outside of the comfortable container we liked keeping it inside. We entertained acquisition offers and spent endless hours talking about the future direction and growth of the business.
Then, when the economics of the podcast industry started to shift, we realized that to stay "on top" - if that was even possible - we'd have to do it all over: re-invent the business, re-invent ourselves as partners inside the business. And...we just didn't want to. We decided to stop focusing on growth, stop worrying about selling, and just coast until we were ready to shut it down (which we will be in late June.) We feel really good about the way we're ending, because it feels so much more true to ourselves and by extension the people who have listened all along. And because we're winding down on our own terms, our friendship and partnership is as strong as it's ever been - and we're starting a new project together a little later this spring.
The problem with careers built on one's "competitive edge" is that you have to keep sharpening that edge over and over and over or you lose it. Some people, I think, love playing that game -but I'm finding that I don't care enough to keep focusing on being competitive for the rest of my life, whether as an employee or a freelancer or a business owner. It turns out that making a lot of money all at once didn't bring me any more lasting security than if I'd just made a normal amount and kept my life simpler and expenses lower.
So right now I'm enjoying a "poorer on purpose" lifestyle, leaning in on non-monetary currency, skills, creativity and simply doing what helps me feel most connected to my life, the world, and other people in it. The more we believe we MUST earn more and more to simply live, the more that becomes actually true. But what if we defy those assumptions and see what else might be possible?
As an aside, there can be such a thing as a "boring" freelance writing career! It's built not on bylines in prestigious publications but in steady, workhorse-style assignments. I've always liked to have a mix of both kinds of clients in my stable. And the best way I've found to secure those gigs is - as you point out - through relationship-building.
Thanks again for a great post with so much to chew on, Rosie.
"The problem with careers built on one's "competitive edge" is that you have to keep sharpening that edge over and over and over or you lose it." Yes! Same. Would rather want/require less in monetary terms so I can be less competitive.
It's crazy how quickly consumerism escalates within the competitive mindset, too. = "Time is money" so everything that requires time is looked at through the lens of opportunity cost rather than what it contributes to one's life satisfaction or community. All in all a not very peaceful or prosperous-feeling way to live, I've found.
I love the idea of “poorer on purpose.” ❤️ Your story hits home! I have a small business that also grew too fast at one point. So fast I was in major burnout. Instead of closing it, I cut it way back. It’s been small and sustainable for the last few years and there’s a lot to be said for running an enterprise on your own terms and not for “growth.”
Ditto! I grew my coaching business, got burned out, and have now totally pivoted my focus so it feels a bit like starting over. It's been somehow deflating and also liberating at the same time.
Britta,
Your comment on Q1 revenue + the collapse of linear “success” really stayed with me.
I’m writing about how this exact loop—"growth = worth"—has hijacked even indie creators. If you’re curious, I’d love to swap thoughts.
(The Red Pill Files is my space for saying what most folks just imply.)
yes, this is a huge topic for me these days! I did a whole podcast episode called "i'm willing to be unimpressive" about the essence of this, but dang, so many ways it shows up!
I see the push for faster, more competitive now as wanting my soul in exchange for no real security, no real appreciation for the effort given and no real relationship developed but the illusion of all that really matters and doesn’t. Time is also energy and that is what I need most. Anxiety and fear suck energy right out of me. Maybe that’s their plan. Then I can’t focus on something other than survival.
This is an excellent comment. The more I’ve progressed in my “career,” there more I’ve adopted the perspective you’ve described.
I'm glad to hear you were able to scale back and make the business sustainable for you! Yes to running things on one's own terms.
I feel this. I used to run a travel blog full-time and also got to a point where I didn't enjoy doing what I "had" to do to keep it competitive. That was in 2019 and I was "lucky" in a sense that COVID came along as I instantly took it as a chance to build something new.
Unfortunately, that led (because of many many factors involved) to burnout a few years later.
Hey Meagan,
Your story about the "stupid money" years really hit home. I’ve been diving into the illusion of business growth as freedom—and how quickly it turns into a trap we never wanted.
I write a project called The Red Pill Files where I unpack these shifts with a colder lens.
"I’ve accepted that no job is coming to save me. That security does not come from a one-way, linear transaction with a for-profit corporation. But rather, a rhizomatic network, one that grows not just upwards, but outwards, downwards, and sideways — with gains and losses, ebbs and flows along the way."
^Filing that under, things I wish I'd heard when I was still in school 🙃
This really resonated with me, having just spent some time in my garden attempting to tame some rhizomatic weeds. I didn’t realize I had so much in common with Creeping Charlie.
Weeds have a lot to teach us!
Same
I retired last year after working part time for most of my life, because I am a mother and the man in my life earned a bigger salary, so he worked longer hours. I have a university degree and have worked in part time admin for 25 years. My pension is a joke, I could not exist on it.
After I left uni, I dropped out, I lived in communes, housing co-ops, worked in worker's co-ops, organised food share and communal gardening, we set up our own childcare, even started our own school. Most of it still exists, quietly, efficiently today. We left most of it behind for a variety of reasons but the underlying principle has guided all our decisions. What matters is community, small and large, sharing tools, land, food, childcare, schools, books, homes, transport, healthcare, also fun, looking out for/after others in your area, your environment and on and on. I/we have often barely survived financially but always knew about the network(s) of community, of sharing and supporting. Strangely, accumulating wealth has never come up.
Beautiful!
Love this, Rosie! My kids are 9 and 19 now, but childcare drove all my career choices for a long time. I’ve been in a niche publishing job for more than 20 years and about 10 years ago I began to worry about what I’d do when the niche ended. My identity was wrapped up in my career to the point that I didn’t know my neighbors or my own skills or even my own desires. Slowly, I’ve pulled back from being all-in on the day job. I started a passion-focused side business and learned totally different skills, prioritized friends and family and neighbors, have a list of new skills I want to learn. I still have the day job, for now. Amazingly, once it stopped being the only way I measured my value, I became a better employee—easier to work with because the personal stakes were lower.
The entire thesis of this essay in one comment, love it.
I love these reflections about care, relationship, and social currency. Yes, yes, yes. The majority of success in my 22-year freelance/self-employment career has been built on relationships. And I never had formal ongoing childcare, through many years of adding children to my family while FT freelancing. Instead we relied on a network of shared, community-oriented caregiving much like you describe: swapping days with friends and family and sharing paid help when we all needed more than we could give one another. It really can work, despite our cultural insistence that everything of value must be bought and paid for.
Rosie, you really write beautifully from the heart and soul, and put some of your deepest thoughts and concerns out there for all of us to see and read - I am very grateful. Your honesty but also your, well, rage? are refreshing, and are so necessary. It is also infuriating to read that you and your family have been hopscotching from patchwork solution to patchwork solution for months and years. I feel your pain and uncertainty.
As a 58-year-old single father of two pre-teen/teen boys and a journalist in Germany, who looks around him and sees so many people struggling and worrying what things will look like in the not at all distant future (while the bill and tax collectors relentlessly come calling), I can only agree with the idea of building your own community, and working on solutions with whoever you consider your tribe. There is nothing shameful or utopian about that. It's actually a wonderful prospect.
The social services system in Germany is in many ways far better than in Britain, but it too is terribly unequal, and the burden to do what needs to be done at home and with children falls disproportionately on women and mothers.
AI is just beginning to ravage professions and career pathways many of us thought might be relatively safe for at least a few more years, while climate change looms large for all of us (er, the not so well or not at all well off). And most if not all of the people reading this are in the relatively wealthy and incredibly fortunate "West".
I guess I don't have much more to say other than thank you. For being who you are, and for still daring to dream, even if it's daunting.
The rage is definitely in there! I'm kind of glad it comes through.
It’s exhausting to have a full time job but feel job insecurity. I already did that during my last break. Now I have a job, and the panic hasn’t gone away. What?!
This was wonderful. Thank you for articulating this beautifully. I’ve been having similar thoughts as I think about what I really want my life to look like and have been scared to let go of the full-time job security at a time when I’m planning to have children. But reading this made me realise that clearly it’s not an either or.
Also, lack of free pre-school care in this country infuriates me.
beautiful reflections - for the last two years we've been in the dance of work an childcare and just sort of gave up a little trying to pull it off in the US. we've moved back to Asia to be closer to my wifes family and a little more robust social services net around us in taiwan if we need it
I relate to so much of this as someone who’s been freelance for 10 years and a parent for 5, and feeling this anxiety (on top of the career anxiety I’ve felt pretty much since having my first kid). I love the reframe of security as the “rhizomatic” (!!!) web of relationships we cultivate, not just the artificial security of a job title. A small group of fellow writers in my city have supported each other for years, something I’ve thought of as lateral mentoring since it’s not hierarchical. That mutual exchange of resources and support feels like “job security” to me.
Gray,
“Lateral mentoring” and rethinking security as human infrastructure—that’s such a powerful reframe.
I run a project called The Red Pill Files where I challenge these myths around success, independence, and what’s actually sustainable.
You might enjoy it if you're navigating this transition too.
I'm just starting to get into the writer's community where I live after I finally started writing for myself again a few mo this agao and would love to know more about how you support each other, if you're willing to share.
Thank you for beautifully articulating (yet again!) all the thoughts whizzing around my head. Your mailers always make me cry (in a good way) x
Thank you Bethia!
Deeply appreciate this share right now. Upon running my Q1 totals I realized the last time I earned so little this quarter was 2021. The narrative in my psyche of "success means continuous and unbroken revenue growth" has come crashing down on me, and it's been a process. An an enneagram type 3 (Achiever), I've been doing a lot of work to divorce my own notions of value and self-worth with my net profit. Both humbling and liberating. And, I'm definitely at a new crossroads, pondering how to proceed with authenticity while also bringing in the cashflow I need to pay the bills.
thank you so much for this ♥️ I’m a gen z creative worker in a corporate job, and I’ve been feeling SO lonely as I go through these sorts of (re)negotiations with my career while trying to sustain my family. it’s such a balm to know I’m not alone in feeling and thinking this way.
Wow – you articulated something here that I have been feeling for many years, but I couldn't quite pin it down. Saving this so I can re-read it again and again. Thank you.
Thank you for proliferating the concept of social capital. Also thank you for bringing the word broligarch into my vocabulary.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for articulating this, these feelings and whips of thoughts I've also have been having and have been grasping to explain. Reading this piece brought me to tears--it rings so deeply true in this moment. A million times thank you for the work you do here.