Can I Make a Living Online Again?

If you read my last published article you know that financial difficulty recently led me back to private clients. You also know that it was not by choice, since then I have done a lot of thinking about the way that I make my living. I have also done a lot of thinking about the increasing cost of everything and come to a few conclusions.

Conclusion Number 1. I have to lower the expenses that we have each month and dedicate a specific number of hours each week to working. I also have no choice but to note each expense and mark it off as I earn the allotted amount to cover it. The amount of time I have available to work without sacrificing my family is scarce. Actually there are only a few hours each day provided I can get up before they do and stay up later than they do.

Conclusion Number 2. It will feel as if there is never going to be enough money until I get the expenses that we have under control and my savings account built back up. The savings account isn't the only area that I need to build up. I also need to create what is known as a "stockpile" in order to prevent having to purchase a number of items on a regular basis for a couple of months. The problem is what to stock up on. I have an idea of items that we use everyday but I'm not sure if it's feasible to do so.

What am I going to do? I have decided to take the time to set a schedule around therapy and get a new battery for my laptop. The new battery for the laptop will allow me to write during the longer therapy sessions. I would love to have the therapy sessions a little more even but with one thirty minute speech session each day it's not possible. The Applied Behavioral Analysis sessions are almost two hours and the Occupational Therapy is varying.

I have no idea what to do with the schedules but to take my computer and invest in a new battery. I remember being able to take my computer with me and work wherever. That's a feeling that I would like to have again. I don't have to spend every second of the day writing, actually that's impossible for me to but I can spend a little more time writing while my child is already with someone else. That will make me feel less guilt about the hours that she's awake since that is time designated for her to spend with someone else.

What Do I Need to Do? I figured out that I can either focus on one site for my own writing or return to private clients and throw my stuff together in my spare time. I think that while I've read numerous articles on productivity and working on multiple articles at once but my short attention span as of late dictates working on a single article from start to finish. The problem is that I'd have to average at least four an hour which limits me to fifteen minutes an article provided I can receive a minimum of $3 per article. That only comes to $12 an hour, then there are the editorials that allow me to let my thoughts flow freely.

I need at least twenty to forty articles accepted for upfront payment at a single sight each week to make at least $40 to $80 figuring an average of $2 per article. That is not enough to cover expenses. This means I need the occasional article accepted elsewhere; I also need to increase ad revenue to make up for missing pieces in the budget. I can promote my latest articles via social networks and emails. Will it be enough? I also figure that I will have to return to private clients and that I will have to have at least one each month to come close to what I need to accomplish. The $2 an article average at fifteen minutes each is only $8 an hour but it's better than nothing. So taking the two figures that's anywhere from fifteen to thirty hours a week that I'd have to work to make ends meet.

Problems. I have unplanned expenses come up all the time. I really need to build up my savings account in order to have money there for these expenses as well as our regular expenses. I think if I can manage to once again devote about forty hours or more a week to my online ventures then I can make a living online again. I also believe that I can manage once again to have some money in savings for those emergency moments.

In the meantime I have to figure out what items I need to stock up on in order to prevent having to spend money on them each week or even each month.