But, as you can guess it, the road less travelled is not nicely paved, so there could be a lot of patches, holes, dust, dirt, broken patches, and even molten pitches, so to speak on the road to freedom. You need to be cautious when faring through such road. That is why part-time freelancing is always a good idea before you embark on this life-changing journey. To help you take an informed decision, I am going to show you the 3 biggest benefits that part-time freelancing offers.

3 biggest benefits of part-tome freelancing

Get an opportunity to test the water

It is always wise to test the water before you leap into it completely submerging yourself up till your nose. By starting part-time freelancing you can test if the quality of your output is worth its salt or not. Based on the feedback you get from your clients and experiences you earn, you can fine tune your skills and yourself to make it marketable.

Extra bucks in extra time

Part time freelancing also helps you put some extra bucks in your pockets, every single day. This money could be used to meet your financial obligations and even you can use it to finance your vacation. Yes, you can earn this much to support your vacation.

Still get to put bread on the table and smile on your kid’s face

This is the biggest benefit of part-time freelancing. It allows you to keep your current job, which inevitably mean putting bread on the table and smile on your kid’s face — well, on the faces of everyone in the family.

Before you utter the highly motivated, adrenaline-charged two-word phrase, “I quit”, you should start your freelancing career as a part-timers, which you can turn anytime into a fulltime venture.

Writing group

Join a writing group in your neighborhood. Make sure it is not very far because distance works as a deterrent for many new writers. If you could not find a writing group in your neighborhood, form one.

Book reading club

Become a member of a book reading club. This will help you refine your existing ideas, and it will also help you get new ideas. Reading is the best advice that can be given to a writer. A writer who does not read cannot produce a good quality work for long. If there is not any book reading club in your neighborhood then form one.

Socialize with writers

Talking to fellow writers will help you unearth many hidden issues, and it will also help you find answers of many unasked questions as well. A practicing writer can become a better guide in telling you how to write, how to use different writing tools, and how to keep your writing simple yet powerful.

Meet someone who is not like you

Meeting a person who is not like you, and who has different point of view, desires, values, etc., will give you a good understanding in human nature. Meet a person of such standing and reflect on the experience you have by meeting him, and the experiences he or she shared with you.

Leave your couch

This is important. Your couch has become your comfort zone, or is it your chair that has become your comfort zone? Challenge yourself and break free. I am asking you to leave your comfort zone, and try meeting new people, and experiencing new things. The more experience you will bag, the better accomplished writer you will become.

Work on your body language.  You want to have a good healthy natural posture, and to look positive and upbeat.  Smile, not a ridiculous fake smile, but a genuine smile that shows you are a positive person.  People want positive attitudes in the office, as they make getting work done all the easier.  Nobody wants more negativity in the air, and appearing as though you’d only add some is a very bad thing.  So make eye contact, keep that smile working, and stay relaxed and comfortable.

Make sure that you’re a friendly and fun person through professional, and appropriate joking or laughing, or conversation.  Stay away from politically charged topics that people tend to have strong opinions about, like religion, government, etc.  Stick to more simple ideas or topics, or anecdotes about your own life and experiences.  Anything to show that you’re an open person, and one that is genuinely interested in communicating with others.

Keep your attire professional, and make sure that you match.  You want to choose clothing that’s flattering, as well as professional.  Anything to help you look more positive and friendly.  Pick an outfit that says you’re a friendly open person.  Hardworking, but also a good person to have around, to make the environment more comfortable for everyone around.

Is your résumé ready?

Sounds familiar? Yeah…every job requires you to have a résumé, and freelancing is no different in this regard. You will need an up-to-date résumé throughout your freelance writing career, and particularly when you are starting out when you have no portfolio to show. Your résumé will tell your prospective client about your experience.

How good is your cover letter?

You cannot do without a cover letter ever in your freelancing write. You will need this every day and for every project you bid on. It is a thousand times more important than your résumé. You need to know that you are not alone when you apply for an online writing gig. You are competing with hundreds of freelancer who is vying for the gig. Hence, to get noticed, you need to have a very attractive cover letter properly outlining your skills and experiences.

The things written above were good enough for any freelancer, but what makes a cover letter more important to a freelance writer is the fact that through your cover letter your prospective client will get the first glimpse of your writing; hence, if it is very impressive then consider your job half-done.

Do you know how to apply?

Well, doing this is not very difficult. It is just time consuming. Before you apply for a gig, you need to find out how the employer or the freelance board through which you are applying wants your application to be.

Some boards just need one cover letter, which you post with your bid, while others may ask you to write a brief introduction while posting the bid, and the rest of the details in a private message.

There is one more difference. The difference is in the way your client will accept your samples: some will ask you to send them links to your sample, while others will be okay with your attachments, and you will also find a handful of clients who will ask you to paste a brief article in the body of a private message. It is also not uncommon to find a client who wants you to write a custom sample for him on the topic or on the subject chosen by the client himself.

Get these things ready, I will be back in the next installment with some more checklist items. Meanwhile, I will also request you to tell me what you feel about the items I have listed above.

One main stratagem is to just allow yourself to write badly.  Often a writer with writer’s block feels disappointed with anything that they are able to write.  One way to get beyond this is to just keep working even if you are unhappy with the quality of what you are writing.  By allowing yourself to write badly you are still writing and influencing the creative process, increasing the likelihood of you escaping your dreaded writer’s block sooner rather than later.

Take a break and clear your head with a trip outside.  Take a nice long walk, or go for a jog or run, do some yard work, anything around fresh air that involves a relative amount of physical exertion.  After which you’ll feel better and your mind will feel much more clear, taking away the stress you felt before from your inability to write.

And if those don’t work, there’s always one of the best methods in music.  Listen to some of your favorite music, something that moves you, makes you emote whether in anger, happiness, sadness, etc.  Anything that inspires your emotions to come out or come alive, as that will facilitate the artistic need to create, inspiring you to write, and to write words you are connected to, that you feel.

What we need is a codec. Codec is an amalgamation of two words: coder and decoder. A codec is used to either encode or decode a particular file. Video file formats are encoded in different formats to address various needs and a codec is used in creating those files and later on, decoding them. Some video formats allow for a more secure file. They are usually used for videos that are being sold commercially on the internet so that only those with the required license will be able to watch the video. Other video formats are used for compressing the videos so that the size of the video will be small enough for easy transmission over the internet. Finally, some video formats are used to stream the video to your browser as opposed to downloading them to your computer in one file.

One of the most popular video formats on the internet is the Flash format. The flash format is usually used by websites that stream the videos to your browser. Some examples of these sites are YouTube, DailyMotion, and Multiply. To play these videos, we need to install Adobe Flash onto the computer. Adobe Flash Player is available for free from www.adobe.com.

How about videos that we’ve snapped up using our cellphones or perhaps our digital cameras? These videos are usually encoded in 3gp or mp4(H.264) formats. While some videos that can be downloaded from the internet are in xvid(avi), mkv(matroska) or divx(avi) formats. Other websites would encode their videos in rmv(real video) or qt(quicktime) formats as well. So how do we open this confusing mix of codecs and how should we know which one to use to open them? Does it mean that we need to download a separate player for each of these videos? Well, you could do that, or an easier alternative would be to download a player that can play all the formats mentioned.

Codec packs are usually included with some of the free multiformat video players on the internet. Codec packs are bundles of codecs that are installed on your computer so that you can play any movie format concievable. Two of the most popular players that have these codec packs are VLC Player and Media Player Classic. VLC Player can be downloaded from http://www.videolan.org/vlc/ while Media Player Classic can be downloaded as part of the K-Lite Codec pack at: http://www.free-codecs.com/download/K_lite_codec_pack.htm .

Once you have installed these programs, you’d be hard-pressed to find a video you are unable to play. So sit back and relax; enjoy the movie.