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I don’t write that much about technology topics; I actually like technology, but in a utilitarian way (What can this technology do for me??) rather than for its own sake. However, I recently had to/needed to purchase a new primary work computer, plus everything that goes along with that (selecting the computer, moving everything over), so I thought that my experience might help you in your own IT struggles! 

Step one: When? 

My old computer was still working well, but I bumped up against a few issues:

• It runs Windows 10, which will only be supported until October 14, 2025
• My last (and, thankfully, only) massive computer failure resulted from upgrading the operating system myself, so I didn’t want to repeat that experience
• The 250GB hard drive was nearing capacity
• I bought that computer in 2020; I’m a fan of the Lenovo ThinkPad, and they’re known for their physical durability (shoutout to my old-old ThinkPad that survived me falling on top of it on a sheet of ice!) but four and a half years is pretty old for a laptop and I don’t like to push my main work computer until it dies.

Step two: What? 

Deciding what to buy can be a major source of stress, but I was pretty set on another ThinkPad. I’ve used ThinkPads for my entire freelance career, and I’ve never had a significant hardware failure. I also prefer to use the integrated keyboard and I like the ThinkPad keyboard a lot. I don’t run “heavy” video or graphics applications. If you do, you might want to consider a gaming laptop. I ended up choosing a ThinkPad E16 with a 16 inch screen (the largest available), an AMD Ryzen processor, and a 500 GB hard drive. I ordered it from Best Buy, simply because they were having a sale, and with tax I paid around US $850 which I thought was reasonable. 

Here, it’s worth mentioning my other favorite piece of computer hardware: my Dell 14 portable monitor. This isn’t an affiliate deal (retail price is around US $290 and lots of brands make these types of monitors now), I just love this little guy so much that I can’t stop talking about it. When folded up, the monitor is about the same thickness as a laptop screen (about a quarter of an inch), and because it runs power and data through one USB-C cable, you can use it anywhere. Not only does it not require a separate electrical outlet, you can even use it while you’re running your laptop off the battery. 

Step three: How? 

I’ve blocked the details out of my mind, but the last time I got a new computer (in 2020), I used PCMover to move my files, and it was a major nightmare. Again, I can’t really remember what went wrong, but it fell into the category of Never Do This Again, so I didn’t. Instead, I did a few things that I think helped the process go much more smoothly: 

• Deleted a lot of unnecessary files before I made the switch. It’s amazing how much space you can take up with translation memories, multiple copies of large files (the 30 MB PowerPoint, of which the client sent you three versions), plus the usual space hogs, photos and videos. 
• Really thought through the applications that I did and didn’t want to move over, or run on the new computer. 
• On the new computer, deleted the pre-installed applications that I knew I didn’t want. For example I used Norton antivirus, so I deleted the McAfee installation that came with the computer. Ditto with OneDrive: I hate it for various reasons and I use Carbonite for backups, so I removed it as soon as I booted the new computer. 

Another reason this computer switch was easier: software subscriptions. I hate the monthly payments as much as you do, but/and it’s definitely easier to just sign out of Office 365 on one computer and sign into it on another one. 

Moving files

As mentioned above, I use Carbonite for backups, and I give Carbonite a 10/10 for portability, although you need to allow a lot of time for your files to download. Essentially, you sign into Carbonite on the new computer, tell it you’re setting up a new computer, and then it goes to work moving everything over. Even over a wired internet connection, it took about 30 hours to move all of my files, but the migration was totally seamless: everything in the right folders, exactly as they were on the old computer. 

New software that I like

I recently switched from Adobe PDF tools to iLovePDF, and while I actually don’t love PDFs, I’m happy with this software. I finally dumped Adobe when they started charging to rotate PDFs (really??); the premium subscription to iLove is $60 a year, and I find its OCR capabilities similar to Adobe Convert. 

I also recently purchased Scrivener for working on book manuscripts. It’s also $60, and although I’ve done fine writing books in Word, Scrivener really does have some awesome features: letting you flag chapters as not started, started, finished, setting daily or weekly progress goals, allowing you to add notes and research, etc. I like it! 

Not exactly software, but a procedure: I used this computer migration as a motivator to set up two-factor authentication on all of my password-protected accounts. I recently talked to two freelancers whose primary work e-mails were hacked, and it’s definitely true that web-based e-mail providers are not super-proactive about getting you to set up two-factor (as opposed to my bank, where I had to enter my password, a code they texted to my phone, and then my debit card PIN in order to send a money transfer!). Set this up now if you haven’t already!! 

The new computer is happily up and running, the hard drive is only 1/3 full, and the migration was fairly painless! Hopefully these tips are helpful if a new computer is in your future!

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Nudging dormant clients: it’s probably:

🥱 The world’s most boring marketing method; *and*

🎆 The world’s most effective marketing method

Reviving an existing connection is so much easier than creating a new connection. You can:

🔌Nudge an agency that onboarded you but never sent any work

🔌Nudge a client who said good things about your work, but you haven’t heard from them in a while

🔌Nudge a client who expressed an interest in working with you, but never followed through

For a while, I’ve been meaning to create a Nudge Kit, to help you understand both the “why” and the “how” of nudging. If you’re on the Training for Translators mailing list, you got the Nudge Kit link in yesterday’s newsletter; if you’re not on the mailing list, sign up here and the link will be in your confirmation e-mail!

If you do some nudging, let me know the results!!

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You may know by now that I’m a frustrated travel writer (a goal for my next life!). I honestly love just about everything about traveling. I love people-watching in the airport lines. I love the tiny snacks on the plane (anyone else obsessed with those chocolate quinoa puffs that United has started distributing?). It’s the only time I drink tonic water. Things that other people find crazy-making, like Southwest’s open seating policy, I kind of get a kick out of. It’s also fun to write up blog posts about my travels, not least of all because it helps me remember the details of what I did!

Over New Year’s (2024 into 2025), my family (husband, 22 year-old daughter and I) took a really unique trip, to Costa Rica’s Osa Peninsula. This is actually the second time we’ve been there; the first time was in 2011, when my dream for my 40th birthday was to sit on the beach with a wild tapir (and I did!). On that trip, we met some people who had hiked into the ranger station we were staying at (my daughter was 9 at the time and we got there on a boat). We had always dreamed of going back to do that…and we did! Here’s the report!

Overview

In my opinion, you really can’t go wrong with Costa Rica unless you truly hate hot weather. It’s a really easy place to travel, it’s one of those countries that really does have it all (mountains, beaches, jungle, rainforest, animals, volcanoes, hot springs, and options at all price points). Costa Rica is generally more expensive than Belize (where we went last year), and to me it feels safer than Mexico (where we went in 2023) and you can also drink the tap water (no one got sick on this trip, compared to everyone getting sick in or after Mexico; I know that’s a stereotype, but in our case it was also true!).

The Osa Peninsula is a remote area in far Southwestern Costa Rica (near the Panama border). You can drive there (slowly!), but to save time we decided to fly. So we flew from Denver to Houston to San Jose on United (more on costs later), spent the night in an airport hotel, then the next day flew on Sansa (local airline) to Puerto Jimenez, which is kind of the base town for the Osa Peninsula.

Phase one: Jungle lodge

We spent our very first night at the Marriott Courtyard Alajuela. It’s nice! They have a free shuttle that picks you up right outside the airport, the staff speak Spanish and English, the rooms are clean and quiet, and they have an on-site restaurant that’s open early and late. We ate both dinner and breakfast there and it was tasty! I would definitely stay there again.

After flying to Puerto Jimenez, we stayed for two nights at Encanta La Vida, a jungle lodge that’s about a 45 minute drive down a bumpy dirt road from Puerto Jimenez. We didn’t rent a car, which was definitely the right decision for us; the roads around Puerto Jimenez are largely unpaved and also very washed-out from flooding, in some cases down to one lane, or you have to drive through streams, etc. Shuttle van was definitely the way to go. We loved Encanta La Vida. It’s set in the jungle, about a five-minute walk from two different beaches. The grounds are low-key but gorgeous, with a nice pool and a really great restaurant (shoutout to them for making special vegetarian food for us!). The prices include your food and there are no stores or restaurants in that area anyway, so your only choice is to chill out, go hiking (there’s a nice waterfall that’s about an hour walk down the dirt road), go to the beach, or take their twice-daily yoga classes (also included in the price).

We did all of the above and particularly enjoyed the waterfall (you can swim in the pool at the base) and the yoga classes. We rented the Treehouse Nest suite, a really cute setup with two bedrooms, a full bathroom, and a large covered porch with couches and hammocks. The place is (literally!) crawling with animals; monkeys watched us do yoga, we saw toucans right on the property, tons of iguanas, agoutis rooting around in the garden, the whole deal! We’re not big-time beach people but the beaches are very pretty to hang out on, and there were a fair number of people surfing; Encanta La Vida has surfboards and paddleboards available as well. For us, this was the perfect start to the trip, and the perfect amount of time. We met a few people who were staying there for a week, which I think might have been a bit too much total relaxation for us, but three days was fantastic.

One thing to note: Outside of Puerto Jimenez, the Osa jungle lodges largely rely on solar power and thus do not have air conditioning (Encanta La Vida has no air conditioning that we saw). I personally prefer open-air, but this is something to consider if you’re really sensitive to heat and humidity. Additionally, while it’s a great idea to avoid being outside at dusk due to mosquitos, most restaurants in the area are completely open-air with no real walls or screens, so it’s pretty much impossible to avoid mosquito bites.

Phase two: Trek across Corcovado!

After a few glorious days of relaxation, we headed back to Puerto Jimenez (same shuttle van driver!) and the offices of Osa Wild, through whom we did the three-day Corcovado Intense Trek. It lived up to the name (definitely intense!) and is was a truly incredible and unique experience in a really special place.

Day one: We had an orientation at the Osa Wild office (air conditioned!) where they described the hike, went over the gear requirements, and allowed us to store the luggage that we were not taking with us. We walked to the nearby supermarket to buy some additional snacks, then the Osa Wild driver took us in their Land Rover to pick up our guide (Leiner Garcia, can’t say enough good things about him!) and continue on to La Tarde, a lodge right on the edge of Corcovado National Park. La Tarde is a very well-kept and comfortable place, especially given that it’s in the middle of nowhere! They have a large open-air dining area and a number of individual cabins with mosquito-netted beds and outdoor showers. After checking in and having a snack and some juice, we headed off on a hike with Leiner where we quickly saw a prehensile-tail anteater (so incredibly cool), a kinkajou, a flock of scarlet macaws, squirrel monkeys, a few non-venomous snakes, and tons of other birds. Seriously amazing! We then hung out at La Tarde for a while, had dinner (totally decent) and went on a night hike with Leiner (more anteaters, including one climbing a tree, plus lots of frogs) and then went to bed. We slept well! It’s totally quiet out there!

Stuff in Costa Rica tends to get going early because it’s dark by 6 PM year-round. The next morning we got up around 5, had breakfast, and La Tarde packed us lunches to take with us. Then we set off on the long, steep, muddy hike to La Sirena, the ranger station in the middle of Corcovado. The guide had told us that this day could take around 11 hours of hiking (6 AM to 5 PM); we were motivated to get to Sirena with some time to hang out, so we moved pretty quickly without a ton of breaks and ended up arriving at 3:30. This hike is pretty amazing in terms of being totally immersed in the jungle, and you need to be prepared for serious mud (like you’re literally wading through mud for hours at a time), and the first few hours involve a lot of steep up and down as you cross a number of ridges between La Tarde and the Los Patos ranger station where you can refill water and use the bathroom. After that it gets flatter, but also muddier (if that’s even possible!) with a number of knee-high river crossings.

We were happy with the gear we brought: three-liter Camelbaks, into which we crammed our overnight stuff. Shoes for this kind of hike are a major dilemma, because you’re going to get very wet no matter what. The guides all wear knee-high rubber rain boots (seem like a good idea but I think I’d get blisters in the first hour), and we brought light (fabric, not leather) hiking shoes which meant you’re just hiking with wet feet after about the first 10 minutes. The one thing I would not recommend is heavy leather boots!

La Sirena is a really cool place; we were lucky to arrive early (3:30) and take showers before many people got there. There are 150 bunk beds with individual mosquito nets, everyone eats dinner between 6-7 (food was totally decent) and then they shut the electricity off at 8, so pretty much everyone goes to bed. Our guide told us, “There will be people snoring, shining flashlights, but you’ll be so tired that you’ll sleep anyway.” This was 100% accurate. The next morning we got up at 4, took our breakfast to go, and left at 5 AM for the really gorgeous hike out along the beach. This is honestly like being at the end of the world. You’re on the Pacific coast, so the next land mass is…I don’t know…French Polynesia? The Marshall Islands maybe? It’s stunning. In general, we found the second day much easier than the first, but the one sketchy moment is the first river crossing, where you’re about chest-deep in the water (holding your bag over your head), with the guide urging you on (let’s go let’s go let’s go) in case a crocodile makes an appearance. Fortunately we saw no crocodiles and continued on our way!

Day two involved walking along several gorgeous beaches and through the nearby jungle with minimum up-and-down, then eventually you get to La Leona Ecolodge, where you can get a cold coconut water or a soda, then you get to La Leona ranger station (water, bathrooms), and finally to the Carate airstrip, where the Osa Wild driver picked us up. This experience was really unique and special; we really enjoyed the “intense” version, but there are tons of ways to access the Sirena sector of Corcovado. In 2011 we took the boat both ways (from Drake Bay), and you can also take a boat one way and hike one way. Talk to Osa Wild and they’ll hook you up! We were 100% pleased with their services, and there are also very few guide services with permits to do the “intense” hike.

Phase three: Collapse in Puerto Jimenez

The Osa Wild driver very kindly picked our bags up at their office and drove us to our hotel, the very peaceful and scenic Cabinas Jimenez, right on the water. We got the Rancho Upstairs which has a nice balcony and two bedrooms with air conditioning (very welcome after the long, sweaty trek!). Puerto Jimenez is a pretty laid-back place, you can walk everywhere (including to the airstrip) and there are a couple of good coffee shops and restaurants. Interestingly enough, the Marisqueria Corcovado (theoretically a seafood restaurant) has excellent vegetarian food, and we really liked the fruit smoothies at Cafeteria Monka.

On our last day, we did a really cool tour of a chocolate farm where you get to see cacao beans grown, dried, and roasted, and then make them into chocolate! Definitely stay for the home-cooked lunch if you do this tour; it was outstanding!

Finally, we walked to the airstrip, and our somewhat dicey plan to fly home all in one day (Puerto Jimenez-San Jose-Houston-Denver) worked! There really is nothing I would change about this trip; it was perfect.

Logistical notes, in no particular order

• We had no real need for Costa Rican money; everywhere takes credit cards or US dollars. I brought US cash for various things (tipping the guide; Cabinas Jimenez only takes cash or PayPal) and that was useful, but you really don’t need much if any Costa Rican cash.
• I was semi-panicking because Sansa airlines has no visible way to check in ahead of time. They send you a receipt and that’s it. Don’t panic. Show up at the domestic terminal of the San Jose airport, show your passport, and they give you a boarding pass. Neither of our Sansa flights was anywhere near full, and in Puerto Jimenez some people literally showed up 10 minutes before the flight and just walked out onto the runway.
• If you fly on Sansa, check your e-mail as the flight approaches; if they change the flight time, they e-mail you and that’s the only notification you get.
• Speaking some Spanish is definitely helpful; probably not totally necessary but allows you to, for example, eat in local restaurants where the staff don’t necessarily speak English.
• Vegetarian food was no (zero) problem. Costa Rican food is not generally super-exciting, but we had some excellent “casado” plates (rice, beans, vegetables, fried cheese, fried eggs).
• We were glad we didn’t rent a car. Taxis are easy to get, and they gave us a fixed price and accepted US cash.
• We brought a good amount of snack food from the US (trail mix, energy bars) and this turned out to be a good idea: you can buy such items in Costa Rica but they’re expensive and it’s a smaller selection.
• There is not much food to purchase at La Sirena (understandable, given the location) and the dinner is a fixed portion (no self-service). BYO snacks!

Costs

Finally, here’s some information on costs! Costa Rica really does have options at all prices ranges. Particularly for lodging, you could spend a lot more or a lot less than these figures, but here’s what we spent:

• Roundtrip airfare from Denver to San Jose on United: $1,100 each, roundtrip
• One night at Marriott Courtyard Alajuela: $213 per room, per night. This includes their shuttle to and from the airport but does not include any food. The food there is good, but not cheap (breakfast buffet $25 per person).
• Sansa flights from San Jose to Puerto Jimenez: $329 each, roundtrip. For what it’s worth, I don’t love small planes, and Sansa was fine.
• Encanta La Vida Treehouse Nest (two-bedroom suite): $584 per night for three people, but this includes all of your food (three delicious meals per day). The only extra cost is transfers from Puerto Jimenez ($100 each way) and alcoholic drinks if you order them.
• Intense Trek with Osa Wild: $534 per person. This includes everything: shuttle to La Tarde, overnight at La Tarde with dinner, breakfast and packed lunch, overnight at La Sirena with dinner and breakfast, shuttle back to Puerto Jimenez, and your own guide (request Leiner, he’s awesome)). Tipping in Costa Rica is a bit amorphous; restaurants don’t even give the option to tip when you pay by credit card, some places add a service charge, Costa Ricans themselves don’t seem to tip in general, but it felt weird to me to not tip the guide for such personalized service, so I tipped him $150 in US cash ($50 per person).
• Rancho Upstairs suite at Cabinas Jimenez: $160 per night for three people
• Meals at local restaurants were pretty inexpensive, like US $50 for three people for dinner
• Chocolate farm tour: $200 for three people including the tour and lunch; just the tour is $45 each
• Taxi to chocolate farm tour: $20 each way, Cabinas Jimenez arranged it for us

That’s it! It was an incredible trip! Here are a few photos to wrap it up.

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When I assess the year, I try to look at three things:

• How much did I earn, compared to my goal?
• How much did I enjoy the work?
• How happy am I with life in general?

The executive summary for this year; details below!

• I’d rate my 2024 income as an 8 out of 10. I made US $125K, down from 135K in 2023 but still meeting my goal. While I’m not unhappy with that amount, it’s frustrating to look back at my 2021 wrap-up, where I set a medium-term goal of 140-150K (the freelance equivalent of a six-figure salaried job) and realize I’m still not there.
• Enjoyment of work: Honestly probably a 10 out of 10. I’m happy with my mix of translation, interpreting, and teaching/writing, and I turn down work that doesn’t seem interesting, meaningful, or both. My work really hasn’t been affected by AI, for which I’m grateful.
• Life in general: Life is good! I achieved all of the goals I set in my 2024 post (other than one that I voluntarily abandoned), plus some additional things (started working with a business coach, more on this later), and am allowing myself to jettison a few things that no longer serve me (ditto: more below).

Where did my income come from?

This year, I worked for 19 clients (agencies and direct clients, not counting individuals), I didn’t track how many words I translated, but I interpreted 189 days, including 93 court and 96 conference. This is pretty much a repeat of 2023, when I worked for 22 clients and interpreted 193 days, but I did slightly more conference interpreting work this year.

My translation work came from fewer, larger clients this year; the piecemeal nature of my translation work in 2022 and 2023 bothered me, so this was a good change after I landed a couple of law firms and a couple of NGOs as direct clients.

I earned exactly US $125,000. When I say “earned,” I mean gross income (everything I made) minus subcontracting. I subcontract a small amount of work to guest instructors for Training for Translators, and I don’t count that as income. This came from:

• Book royalties: 2K
• Direct language work (translation and interpreting): 72K
• Teaching and consulting: 51K

For various reasons, I’m giving one number for “direct language work,” but I’m roughly 2/3 interpreting, 1/3 translation, and I’m OK with that mix.

Income data points

I track my income based on how much I deposited that month, not how much I invoiced. My highest-earning month was November (more than 16K), and my lowest-earning was October (5K). This wasn’t surprising given that interpreting work drops off significantly in July and August and I don’t run Training for Translators classes in July or August, plus the summer was extra-extra disrupted by my husband being badly injured in a mountain bike accident (now on the mend), but it’s a pretty dramatic difference!

Of the 12 months in 2024, I made more than $10,000 in eight out of 12 months. I’m happy with that number, but I’d like to aim for more consistency; ideally I’d like to be down to maybe one sub-10K month rather than four!

Letting go of what no longer serves you

As an Upholder, I have a hard time letting go of unfinished things. And yet, sometimes I have to admit that I need to “let it go.” This year, I’m doing that with two things:

• Reedsy, an online platform for book publishing services that I was really excited about joining for book translation work. The application process was pretty extensive: you have to have five published book translations, then do a live training session, then have them approve your profile. In a year on Reedsy I got only two inquiries, both of whom decided to go with someone less expensive, so I decided to deactivate my profile.
• AIIC, the International Association of Conference Interpreters. I’ve been a pre-candidate for three years (the maximum), and I have more than enough conference interpreting days, but no sponsors (you can read more about the AIIC candidacy system on their website if you’re interested). AIIC is a really great organization, and/but it’s all about the network, and it’s a very different network than the network I have. As someone who doesn’t live in a major city and does almost exclusively remote conference interpreting, I just don’t come into contact with many AIIC members aside from other new-ish interpreters (and you can’t be a sponsor until you’ve been an AIIC member for a number of years), I could have used my dual Swiss citizenship to work in Europe, but that’s difficult with the AIIC domicile policies, and AIIC has a lot of in-person events that I could have attended, but didn’t. This isn’t anything negative about AIIC, just something that’s not going to work out for me, at least right now.

Trends I see in the language professions

I feel like this was the year that Things Really Changed, especially in the translation world. ChatGPT came on the scene in late 2022, and by early 2024, it felt to me like most agencies had made the leap to machine translation with a human editor. I just don’t see agencies offering that much “pure” translation work any more, unless the files aren’t readable by a computer.

I see a few results from this:

• In my experience, translators (and here we’re not talking about interpreters) who either diversified (copywriting, multilingual SEO, subtitling, high-end editing, etc.) or boarded the direct client train a few years ago seem to largely be doing well or even very well.
• On the flip side, translators who worked primarily or exclusively for agencies seem to largely be struggling.
• At this year’s ATA conference, I talked to a number of translators in the direct client market, who said, “Work has never been better,” and I talked to a number of translators in the agency market who said, “I’m barely holding on,” or who had even taken other, totally unrelated jobs (restaurants, pet sitting) to make ends meet.

My direct translation clients rarely mention MT/AI, other than out of curiosity (“Do you use it?”) or to verify that I don’t use it. This may be due to their own areas of specialization (law firms, NGOs) or this may just be the direct client market in general. But I do think we’re seeing, and will continue to see, a radical reshuffle of the translation profession and a lot of people looking for other careers.

Working with a business coach

This year, I tried to broaden my perspective on my business. That led me to join a couple of freelance writer discussion groups, which in turn led me to start working with a business coach. This has been tremendously helpful, and one of the best things I’ve done in a long time. I’ve been a full-time freelancer since 2002, and I tend to hang out in a lot of the same places online. I value that kind of continuity, but especially when it comes to marketing Training for Translators, I needed some new perspectives (and I got them!!).

Many of us are cheap about investing in our businesses; even if we’re willing to pay for advice, we want someone who will talk to us for an hour and fix all of our issues. I accepted from the start that I needed to make a longer-term investment, and decided to spend $1,500 on a three-month coaching package. I recouped that investment in the first month, and I’m now in a groove of spending an hour a day on business development work, where I work on my own, non-urgent, “when I get around to it” projects.

Goal analysis

Let’s wrap it up with a goal analysis, then over to you to look at your own statistics! Here’s how I did on last year’s goals:

• Maintain income above 125K: I was actually right at 125K, but we’ll put this in the Achieved column.
• Take a subtitling class: No, simply because I decided that with the amount of interpreting I’m doing, it’s too much audio-based work. So we’ll put this in the “Decided not to” column.
• Finish Getting Started as a Freelance Interpreter. Yes! Not published yet, but the publisher has the manuscript.
• Keep up the same volume of translation work: Yes, and I was able to land a couple of translation anchor clients.
• Keep prioritizing my wellbeing and happiness: Yes. Aside from my husband’s bike accident, life this year was really good. I took an impromptu trip to Switzerland with my sister-in-law, spent part of the summer in British Columbia, climbed nine 14,000-foot mountains with my daughter, meditated regularly, rang in 2025 in Costa Rica, and did a couple of challenges at the yoga studio!
• Go to cello camp or play in a community orchestra: Check! I joined Denver Adult Strings Camp and played in two of their orchestra sessions!

Looking ahead, here’s what I’m aiming for in 2025:

• Higher income. It’s bugging me that I’ve had the goal of 140-150K since 2021 and haven’t gotten there yet.
• Work roughly the same amount I’m working now: I’d like to keep the same volume of translation and interpreting work I have now.
• Mix it up with Training for Translators: Working with a business coach made me realize that there’s a ton more I could be doing with Training for Translators. I have ~4,500 people on the mailing list and I’m consistent with the newsletter, but I tend to do the same things, in the same way, over and over again. Lots of new ideas on this front!
• Prepare the 20th anniversary edition of How to Succeed as a Freelance Translator. I honestly don’t feel old (I’m 53) but somehow, HSFT is coming up on 20 years since I published the first edition. Maybe I wrote it when I was in second grade?? At any rate, that’s my next book project, to be published in early 2026.
• Get in a routine of spending an hour a day on things I choose to work on. I think this is really important: I want to devote an hour a day to work that is not for clients and not immediately deadline-driven. So far I’ve done this for the five days I’ve been back at work…lol…now I just have to keep it up!
• Meditate daily, exercise most days, and keep cultivating my non-screen hobbies, attend an in-person cello camp: These are all things I’m either doing or are in the works, but I just want to put them out there for accountability purposes.

That’s it! 2024 in a nutshell! I hope this analysis helps you with your own business goals, and thanks for reading!

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Greetings, Training for Translators subscribers, and happy 2025!

Overheard recently, from a teacher at the yoga studio I go to: “It was a great year, largely because I was great to myself.” To which someone else responded, “Right, but don’t you feel guilty when you take all this time for yourself?” Response (get ready, it’s good!): “No, actually, I feel guilty when I’m horrible to the people around me because I’m being horrible to myself.”

It’s a simple but profound message that I think is really important to us as freelancers: life is good, when you’re good to yourself. How can you do more of that this year, in a way that nourishes you as a person, and thus as a businessperson? How to do this really depends on the phase of life and business that you’re in:

• When I was a beginning freelancer and the mom of a tiny human, I made very little money ($9,000 my first year!) and I was either working or taking care of my daughter nearly every moment of the day. Traditional ideas of self-care (Get your nails done! Treat yourself to a night at a fancy hotel!) were honestly ludicrous. At times, my dream for the day was to cut my nails. I looked forward to going to the dentist, because it meant that I got to lie down and listen to music for an hour with no one talking to me. But even if you’re a freelancer and a parent, being good to yourself is still possible! At least, remind yourself that you’re doing your best in a tough situation, and that you’re intentionally prioritizing what is important to you. Those things are really important!
• These days, I try to be my own “best boss.” If I’ve been working too much, my boss says that I should take Friday afternoon off. I get a year-end bonus (this year, probably cello camp!). I avoid working with clients whose values don’t align with mine, and I focus on work that I find meaningful, interesting, or both (if it’s neither, I don’t say yes to it!).
• I relentlessly remind myself that I Am The Business. If I crumble, the business crumbles. This means that keeping myself physically and mentally healthy is the main priority in my business.

I also notice and nurture little things in the “being good to myself” department: I feel better when I dress better. I let myself spend as much money as I want on books. At least twice a day, I shut the lights off in my office and lie on the floor and just breathe or listen to a meditation podcast. I pat myself on the back for saying “no” to things that aren’t a priority for me. It all adds up: every year, my goal is to feel happier than the year before.

Let’s all make this one of our guiding principles for 2025: Life is good, when you’re good to yourself. If you commit to this, I think you’ll see the benefits in your freelance business this year! I’m excited for everything that we’re all going to aim for.