Jovan Cicmil's Blog - Self Improvement

The Elephant in the Room: Where You’re From Matters

The Elephant in the Room: Where You’re From Matters
We would all like to be judged on merit alone, but that’s not how the world works. Here’s one example: in a job interview, we should be judged only on our fitness for the role. But, in reality, we are judged on our appearance, our choice of words in an introductory email, our small talk prowess - and the interviewer’s current mood. As freelancers, this truth takes another form, one we ...

How To Use Downtime Between Projects as a Freelancer

How To Use Downtime Between Projects as a Freelancer
Freelancers dread dry spells. The moment a client project is finished, we feel a void that can only be filled by a new project. Every day not spent working on client projects feels unproductive. It makes us anxious and stressed. Does it really have to be this way? After a decade of freelancing, I’ve been through it all. I’ve been overworked, underworked, evenly worked, and oddly worked. ...

Seven Pieces of Freelancing Advice I Wish Someone Gave Me When I Was Starting Out

Seven Pieces of Freelancing Advice I Wish Someone Gave Me When I Was Starting Out
I got a lot of things right in my decade-long freelance career: I found a bunch of great clients, helped others transition to freelancing, bootstrapped a successful startup, and did the digital nomad thing for a while. But, it wasn’t perfect. When I was starting out in 2011, I didn’t know a single freelancer, let alone a more experienced one. So, I had to learn on the job and adapt ...

How To Avoid Burnout as a Freelancer: The 70-30 Rule

How To Avoid Burnout as a Freelancer: The 70-30 Rule
Have you ever pushed yourself so hard for so long that you woke up one morning and found yourself unable to work? If the answer is yes, you’ve experienced burnout - something that many live through, but far too few talk about. The consequences of burning out can be dire. To name a few horrifying ones: sleep disorders, aimlessness, depression, social isolation, and even diminished ...

How I Evolved My English Skills as a Non-Native Speaker

How I Evolved My English Skills as a Non-Native Speaker
Have you ever watched a lecture, or read an article, where the author had a lot of knowledge but struggled to express it clearly in English? I’ve personally dropped at least a dozen Youtube tutorials for this reason. If you’re a non-native speaker thinking about creating content, it can be a daunting prospect. Will native speakers mock you? Will your friends find you pretentious? Will your ...

The Evolution of My Productivity as a Freelancer

The Evolution of My Productivity as a Freelancer
Those of you who have been following my work know that I have been freelancing for 9 years . During that time, my productivity has improved dramatically. How? Through trial-and-error, as well as by reading many books on the subject, I have evolved a series of rules and principles that I adhere to on a daily basis. I am sharing ...

How To Adopt Radical Open-Mindedness

How To Adopt Radical Open-Mindedness
I recently read Ray Dalio’s book, Principles. Dalio is one of the most successful investors in history, and a person of remarkable breadth and vision. In this book, he outlines the principles that he built over a long and rich career, and that we can use to guide our life and work. Out of all the concepts in the book, possibly the most important (and certainly the most widely applicable) is ...

Applying Lessons From Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War” to Your Business

Applying Lessons From Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War” to Your Business
One doesn’t need to be a literary expert to understand one thing — if a literary work survives for millennia, there is value in it that is intrinsic and timeless. There are messages within that have found application to the lives of people across centuries and continents. Thus, such works must not be ignored by anyone seeking to educate themselves. The Art of War isn’t merely a ...

The Declining Value of a University Education

The Declining Value of a University Education
How many people do you know that went off to university with admirable academic goals and returned disillusioned, broke and scandalously unprepared to contribute anything productive to the economy? This has become the norm rather than the exception, but why? In theory, we go to university to acquire knowledge which allows us to join the ranks of our desired profession. In practice, we stumble ...

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