It’s Not My Crisis Anymore
Today I decided to stop jumping and running around like a chicken with it’s head cut off trying to rescue people who waited too long to come to me. Unless people are willing to say, “I’ll pay you anything you want right now, if you’ll help me do this today,” you’re on your own. I’m not worried that you’ll suddenly come up with the money to do that. You haven’t yet. You haven’t said, “Thanks for bailing me out. I screwed up and you didn’t have to help me, but you did.”
You haven’t said, “Here’s a $1,000 bonus for saving me a $5,000 rush fee from my other writer on that job.” You haven’t even said “thank you.” You scurry in, dump your mess in my lap and then yell at me for not being superhuman enough to pull off the perfect job when no one else on the planet would have even given you the time of day, let alone stayed up 48 hours to ensure your ass was covered.
It’s worse than that actually. I have clients who do respect me, respect my time, respect the fact that I like to take weekends off. They’ve suffered because I haven’t been my best for them because I’ve been trying to save you.
Because the thing is, I’ve been letting people run into my space, scream about something they need, like saying “I NEED IT NOW DAMNIT!” while acting like it was MY fault they didn’t plan ahead in the first place. But that ends now. Even if I have to eat dirt and live in my van again, it stops now.
I’m sorry you didn’t have time to write that blog post, article, copy or website pages this week. You can expect or hope or dream that I can drop everything and get to it right this minute (as I have in the past), but I can’t. I’ve decided a need a nap right now. Or maybe I want to watch a movie. It’s my time and I need it. It’s not that I don’t want to help you, but you don’t want to pay me enough to upset my life, change my plans and deny my happiness in order to ensure you get yours.
You can wait all summer and then come to me wanting a 100-page ebook in 3 days, but you’re going to pay dearly for it. I’m not worried though. It’s partly because you’re unthinking, uncaring, selfish and a moron that you think you can get away with that behavior. It’s my fault too. I’ve trained you that I’ll be your co-dependent mother and let you tell me the night before your project is due that, “it’s okay.” I’ve told you that you can go out and party with your friends while I slave away on your science project for .50 cents an hour.
But no more. Your crisis is no longer my problem unless you are able to pay me enough to make it my problem. And we’re talking thousands of dollars here, not chump change.
Why this sudden decision?
Because in my rush to help, appease and rescue the really disorganized clients I have, I discovered I have neglected the ones who show up, give me space, time and attention, pay my rates ($150 an hour) and value me. I wasn’t valuing or respecting THEM by putting them first. When you don’t value and respect someone who respects themselves, they leave. So, in order to attract clients who value me, I’m going to value the ones who value me.
Your crisis? That’s your problem now. Good luck with it.