When you start your life as a freelancer, you think that this type of work will give you the total flexibility of owning your time and working whenever you want. In a way, it is. But if you really want to live from that, in a short time you realize that this pace could not be profitable. You need to work hard.

In fact, the works that freelancers develop for their clients are often brief and that is why they should look for a large number of projects in order to reach the end of the month, financially speaking. This results in keeping busy many more hours of the day than initially desired.

Some tips to help you better organize your times:

Charge what you’re worth

Make yourself aware of the going market rate for the type(s) of work you do, and set your rate accordingly. Higher rates can mean higher-profile clients, with more interesting projects, coming your way. And who doesn’t want more money for more interesting work — for fewer clients?

Make client meetings count

’t let client meetings eat up time that could be better spent working. Keep them brief and focused. At the end of each meeting, you and your client should have a list of deliverables to take care of before you meet again. After the meeting, make sure to send a recap to the client, detailing what you agreed on, and what needs to happen next.

Stick to a schedule

Wake up at a set time each morning, and block out work hours in your calendar. You can still keep your schedule loose, but make sure that you've dedicated blocks of time to work. Setting your own hours is one of the advantages of being your own boss. Take advantage of that. But make sure that anything personal you do, like hitting the matinee or shopping, is balanced by dedicated work time.

Set realistic timelines for every project

enough time for every project will help ensure you deliver your best. For less intensive projects, it's okay to let deadlines fall on the same day. You’ll learn how to pace your work so that you're not overwhelmed by looming due dates. As the saying goes, you can have things come out good, fast, or cheap. But you only get to pick two.

Break things down

Break things down into smaller tasks. That way you don’t have to spend a lot of time on an idea that may not even work out. And in the future, you can use this to help you gauge how long a similar kind of project will take.

Minimize distractions

Pull up your email client maybe three times a day — in the morning when you’re getting started, right after lunch, and towards the end of the day. During these times you can take care of emails that only require a quick response and add to-do items to respond to your other emails at a later date or time.