I quit my full time job last year and I didn’t really tell anyone. A disassociated experience in late 2019 triggered this deep urge to quit, but you know how the story goes. When COVID hit, I took it upon myself to put my head down and keep working; whatever this pandemic was, it wasn’t a big deal, stop thinking about this “unprecedented time” because there’s work to be done. I was over-performing at my day job while keeping community spirits high — staying active in slack channels and creating online programming for the Asian Employee Resource Group, connecting with Recess, virtual meetups with friends, being in a family house of 5. By the tail end of it, I was dragging myself through everything, eyes glossed over. It was hard to keep in touch with anyone, even myself. Even though I was overindexing on new hobbies like frame by frame animation, ukelele, bass, and skateboarding, it still didn’t feel like I was there.
I was in Bed Stuy around this time, two years ago. We just watched our airbnb cat catch a mouse while I was in a meeting. I realized that I lived in New York and the cat was the highlight of my stay. I didn’t even get to see much of the city because I was too tired to do anything. My director at the time already knew I was on my way out. Everyone knew. I wear my heart on my sleeve, you’ll know when I’m unhappy. I think my honesty planted a seed that eventually made me put in my two weeks notice in February. I didn’t really tell my friends. I was too tired.
Actual footage of our airbnb cat deliver its dead sacrifice to me while trying to sign off on something
I quit with the intention of relearning my relationship with work. I felt a change in me that made me rethink everything. Who am I in relation to people? as a friend, sister, partner? Who am I without them? Who am I when my core identity for so long was work? What is my core now? What am I choosing to revolve myself around?
Starting my own studio and practice (freelance, it’s freelance) is constantly asking these questions. There are no rules and stability set forth by an established organization, so I’m forced to find those rules and that stability by myself. I’m forced to constantly take notice of my energy, how I feel in certain situations and environments, who I surround myself with, what kind of projects bring me joy. What are my boundaries, what does stability feel like for me?
These questions are being answered slowly, but at my pace nonetheless. As people be people-ing, I don’t think my answers will be the same forever. What I can say for certain is that despite freelance looking like instability from the outside, I think there are some ways to make it less unstable so that one can bear it. For me, my greatest fear in freelance was not being financially stable. My buffer for fuckery (as in, the money I have saved up in case I absolutely cannot work) is 2 years: I have two years worth of savings to pull my shit together and stay afloat. This money factors in my emergency fund (when shit hits the fan for me or my family) and my fun fund (when I feel like travelling or spoiling myself). If it’s any kind of fuckery, I have enough money to (responsibly) throw at my problem. So the first order of fuckery was spending 6 months doing nothing. Every day, I chose to do what I want — I literally woke up every day and asked myself what I wanted to do that day. Sometimes those days just looked like taking care of my plants, or finding a new creative outlet. I only started working again because a friend had recommended me for illustration work. I probably would have kept on doing nothing if it weren’t for that, but I was excited to be doing nothing and having work find me instead.
I’m incredibly lucky to have friends who think of me. I haven’t had to do much client acquisition because of them, and I’m thankful to have made that kind of impression that people are confident in bringing me up knowing I wouldn’t let them down. It made me realize that networks are a big part of client acquisition. I don’t have to be swarming Upwork or lurking Linkedin job postings, I just have to tell people I’m doing the thing. Which makes me wonder if I should have at least posted about it in Linkedin or something. But that’s not me either.
I write this as a companion to my instagram post (because the shot was fire and I had to share it, thanks Shanik, god bless photographer friends), but if you’re curious about how you can support me (without having to sugar-baby me, though my email auto-accepts etransfers), please talk about me! I am classically trained in visual arts and graphic design, and I’ve worked in a corporate setting for over 10 years to understand what it means to build and work at an agency and product company. I can do a lot of things.
Maybe it’s more helpful to know what projects bring me joy:
- ✏️ Illustration, like the stuff you see in my feed. If your brand is looking for a chibi/anime style, if you’re looking for editorial illustration, if you want to explore 3D things. It me.
- 👩🏻💻 Web development, especially Webflow and Framer. These can be landing pages, or a whole website with blog functionality. I can also build some cute things with HTML/CSS/Javascript.
- 🎨 UI/UX/Product is my bread and butter — if you’re looking to bring an app to life, let’s build you an MVP.
- 💕 Community programming and mentorship with Recess! I love bringing people together so if you have an idea to connect people to a new skill or just want to bring people together too, I can help you bring that to life too!
I hope you think of me for your next project! And if you’re curious about getting started in freelance, please reach out. I don’t have all the answers, but we can chat through it.