Becoming a Freelancer

So, I quit the ole day job in hopes of becoming my own boss.

It’s a really surreal period of my life right now. I never thought that I’d be doing anything like this; quitting my job and completely depending on my own initiative for income hah! For years I’ve been yearning over being a full-time freelance photographer. Being able to have control over when I work and where I work and to a certain extent, what I work on. But I always thought of that as a far-fetched out of reach idea that would never actually happen (basically a dream), “c’mon Enda be practical, get yourself a real job”. But here I am. I’ve actually quit my job on the sole focus of doing everything I’ve dreamed of doing for the last 5 years and it scares the absolute shite out of me!

My biggest fear and the one thing that really is holding me back is the fear of not obtaining any clients or jobs, basically not getting enough money to pay the bills and live off of. I’ve had photography jobs in the past and I have had the incredible opportunity to work for some big clients and great people, but those gigs were intermittent and sometimes far between. Will I be able to keep a steady stream of work coming in?! It keeps me up at night. Its weird though, it’s like there is this internal energy inside of me that is just putting one foot in front of the other and willing me forward, even though my conscious is setting off alarm bells and saying this is a bad idea.

However, having written those two above paragraphs covered in doubt, fear and anxiety (apologies, just need to get those emotions out). I know that if I don’t take the risk and do this now I will always say “what if” and regret not trying this out for the rest of my life, and for future Enda’s sake, that’s not cool!

So here goes, let’s take the risk and eat into my savings for a bit, woo! My true aim with becoming a freelancer and essentially setting up my own business is for three very important goals that I want to achieve with the work that I produce and put out into the public eye. To Educate, Motivate and Inspire others to get out there into the world around them and explore and experience everything you can before you close your eyes for ever. This is essentially my philosophy in life. Now I know my initial work won’t be promoting this as I’ll take whatever I can get (to a certain extent) to pay the bills. But if this works, in the long run I want to create relationships with clients and people where I can produce work that embodies those three values. Now that I’ve said it, I give you full permission to call me out if my work in a few years does not embody any of those values! Call me out, or call me a fraud, whatever it is I probably deserve it.

With the work that I do I want to create a conversation and a community that helps each other out and inspires each other to get out there. So having said that, get in touch with me, let me know what I can improve on in my photography or writing skills (sorry I know the latter isn’t great), or story telling skills (this one is huge for me). Also, I write this blog in the most honest way I can to allow you to get to know me honestly and truly. This way if any future clients are reading this (I very much hope they are), they know exactly who they are working with. I strive for meaningful, real and positive relationships with the people I meet and work with. So I hope this blog has helped promote that.

Anyway I’ve blabbered on far too long and if you are still reading up to this point, I thank you very much! Lastly if you do know of anyone looking for a photographer, I would be forever grateful if you would send them my way, gotta get this show on the road! Please check other sections of my website for examples and a portfolio of the work I have done. Ok thanks again for reading and I hope I’ve somehow inspired others to go for it too in what ever project or ambition they want to do. If I can do it then so can you!