The Mindful Freelancer: Nine Attitudes for Thriving in the Creative Economy – Part 1 – Non-Judging

I’ve been freelancing in the creative economy since the early 90’s. It’s been a wild rollercoaster ride with incredible highs and some not-so-fun lows.

The first step in me gaining some sense of agency with my freelancing was doing my MA in Creative Entrepreneurship in 2010-11. This gave me a set of business tools that allowed me to look at challenges and opportunities in freelancing through a strategic lens.

The second big step forward was in 2023-24 when I trained as a mindfulness and meditation teacher. This gave me a set of tools and techniques to manage my mind and my emotions. As a creative freelancer my mind and my emotions so often took me hostage and made it really hard to see the forest for the trees. This mindfulness training allowed me to zoom out and see the big picture (the forest) as well as how to manage my anxiety and imposter syndrome (even with a PhD, I still had imposter syndrome!).

I’ve spent the last year researching and writing a book that combines freelancing and mindfulness. It’s working title is The Thriving Freelancer: Successful Freelancing in the Creative Economy. I have a contract with Routledge for publication and the manuscript is due at the end of the summer, so this is a period of doing final edits as well as working with some Beta readers to apply the lessons and receive feedback.

In this blog series, I am going to explore the Nine Attitudes of Mindfulness of Jon Kabat Zinn, founder of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, and apply them to freelancing.

Each post will explore one of the attitudes along with some journal prompts to explore how you can apply this mindfulness attitude towards your freelancing.

I invite feedback on this series – what works? What doesn’t? Where are there gaps? Your feedback will help me refine this further.

Mindful Freelancing Attitude #1: Non-Judging

The idea of non-judgement is key part of Jon Kabat Zinn’s definition of mindfulness which is “awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgmentally.” Here’s a short video of Jon Kabat Zinn explaining his principle of non-judgement.

As we start to become aware of our thoughts, we quickly realise that we judge everything: I like that, I don’t like that, this is great, this is terrible, I like her, I don’t like him, etc. Our mind naturally wants to place everything into binary categories: danger, not-danger; pleasant, not-pleasant.

Starting to work with non-judgement is to invite ourselves to not immediately judge everything (even our own judging!). What if something just ‘is’ without having to judge it or label it. Can situations be neutral, can people be neutral, can a task be a task without having to label it a ‘good’ task or a ‘bad’ task? Instead of judging it, can we just get curious about it?

So how do we apply this to freelancing?

1. Non-judging: Seeing Clearly Without Self-Criticism

Being a freelancer means putting yourself out there constantly; after all you’re always looking for your next job. At the same time, we’re told we’re only ever as good as our last work; so the pressure is on the deliver every time.

So, you’re playing a high-stakes game and you’re playing All. The. Time.

This is the nature of freelancing.

But are you judging yourself while you’re doing it?

I mean, it’s one thing for us to assess the work and the quality of the work we are producing, but it’s so easy for that to turn into a constant assessment of who we are, as if we ourselves are our work. That my work and I are one and the same.

We need a division!

You produce your work, but you are not your work.

Mindfulness encourages us to take a step back. To create some distance between who we are and what we do. In this space, we can bring curiosity.

You are not a ‘bad freelancer.’ You are not ‘failing’ at freelancing. The statement ‘I’m not good enough’ is simply not true.

Applying the principle of non-judgement to our freelancing, we can create some separation between ourselves and our work. Your work may not always be 100%. That’s okay. You’re human. Show up. Do your best. Be professional. Be curious instead of reactive.

Even if you happen to fumble and produce work that’s not great, it is not a reflection on you. Maybe you were tired, maybe you had a bad brief, maybe you were distracted, maybe the client feedback took it in a different direction that wasn’t successful. Non-judgement means that sometimes sh*t happens. Don’t judge it.

2. Non-judging: Separating Facts from Story

To be a mindful freelancer we need to learn to look at the facts and not immediately attach a judgement or a story to it. A fact might be that you don’t yet have any clients. But that doesn’t mean you’re a failure as a freelancer. That doesn’t mean you’ll never find clients. That doesn’t mean that your Professor at University was right and you’ll never make it as a graphic designer! It just means that at this moment, you don’t have any clients. That’s simply a fact. You don’t need to embellish it with judgement, story or emotion.

Step back. Observe. Get curious. Don’t judge.

This is easy to say and hard to do, but it is essential to thriving as a freelancer.

When we start to invest in stories about who we are, or what ‘always’ happens to us, or ‘how the world is right now’ we spiral deeper and deeper into stories that really don’t help us. Focus on the facts. Facts are neutral, you should be too.

3. Non-judging: Not Everything Needs an Emotional Reaction

Cognitive behavioural theory identifies that our thoughts lead to our emotions. “I’m a terrible freelancer” leads to shame. Shame leads to inaction. Inaction leads to judging your laziness. And down we go into a spiral.

When it comes to your freelancing, you don’t really need to involve your emotions.

By practicing non-judgement, you can separate your work from needing to have a corresponding emotional reaction. You can just do the work! I don’t mean to imply that it’s easy, but the more you practice it, the easier it becomes. And when you start to just do the work, without simultaneously judging yourself (with the corresponding emotional rollercoaster) you will actually start to be much freer and more spontaneous in your work! New ideas come your way! Fresh approaches emerge! All because they aren’t being squashed by immediate judgment.

In improv, we learn to say ‘yes’ to everything. This is because judgement squashes ideas. Saying ‘yes’ opens you to possibility. Non-judgement is really the process of saying ‘yes’ to everything rather then habitually judging everything.

Emotions are great to share with people we love or for Hallmark movies. They’re not so useful to getting your freelance work done.

4. Non-judging: See Clearly to be Strategic

Creating this distance we have been speaking of, this non-judgmental, non-emotional, fact-based view of things, creates the space for you to be strategic instead of reactive. It allows room for curiosity and consideration.

Creating a distance between the facts and your reaction to them allows space to be strategic about that reaction instead of knee-jerk.

While a dramatic strop, or tearing your work into pieces, or stomping away can feel (in the moment) quite triumphant, it solves nothing and is often an embarrassment. Practicing non-judgement, being non-reactive, allows us to then make a considered response. A strategic response. A response that is aligned with our greater goals and objectives. This leads to long-term sustainable success as a freelancer.

Reflection:

I invite you to reflect (or journal) on these questions:

1. What judgments am I placing on myself or my freelance career right now? How would the situation look if I just described the facts?
2. When have I judged a situation as “bad” or “wrong” — but it actually led to unexpected growth?
3. What would change if I replaced self-criticism with curiosity today?