Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Episode 208: From Floundering to Freelance Superstar with Wudan Yan
145 Plays4 years ago
"That was always my understanding that if you want to be a freelance journalist, you're probably going to have to do a lot of things that you don't want to do. So it creates time space, resources for you to dig into the things that you want to do," says Wudan Yan, @wudanyan on Twitter.
This episode is sponsored by Scrivener, created by writers, for writers.
Be sure you're subscribed wherever you get your podcasts and keep the conversation going on social media @CNFPod.
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Sponsorship
00:00:00
Speaker
ACNFers, the creative non-fiction podcast, is sponsored by Scribner. Scribner was created by writers for writers, brings all the tools you need to craft your first draft together in one handy app.
00:00:15
Speaker
Scrivener won't tell you how to write. It simply provides everything you need to start writing and keep writing. I'm using it now for my insufferable rewrite and retype and it's amazing. My only regret is not having ponied up for this amazing program sooner.
Freelance Journalism Reflections
00:00:34
Speaker
So, whether you plot everything out or you just plunge right in, write and restructure later, Scrivner works your way. That was always my mindset. That was always my understanding that if you want to be a freelance journalist, you're probably going to have to do a lot of things that you don't want to do, so it creates time, space, resources for you to dig into the things that you want to do.
00:01:09
Speaker
Well, I guess we're doing it. I guess we're doing the thing that we do.
00:01:16
Speaker
First, let me say something. For some reason, I'm feeling all kinds of mushy. Maybe it's because I'm in the throes of what can only be described as existential despair and depression, perhaps? I don't know. But from the bottom, middle, and top of my Grinch-like heart, I want to say thank you for listening. Some podcasters say that in the most insultingly of perfunctory ways
00:01:44
Speaker
And I just want to say how thankful I am that you choose to spend an hour with your buddy, Brendan. And as always, gracious guests. I mean, you feel free to hit that fast-forward 10 or 15 seconds, but I'd encourage you to stick around. That's what this part is.
Creative Nonfiction Podcast & Guest Introduction
00:02:02
Speaker
This is the personal part of the show.
00:02:06
Speaker
Oh, the show, by the way, is the Creative Nonfiction Podcast show where I speak to badass people about the art and craft of telling true stories. Today's guest is Wudan Yan. She is a Seattle-based freelance writer and co-host of the Writers Co-op Podcast, a business podcast for writers. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
00:02:26
Speaker
Subscribe to mine, too, man. I mean, shoot. It's what we do. Also, subscribe to Casualty of Words, my writing podcast for people in a hurry. I publish about five a week, usually Monday to Friday, and they're all under two minutes, give or take.
00:02:43
Speaker
head over to BrendanOMara.com for show notes and to subscribe to the monthly newsletter where I give away books, I give writing and reading recommendations and what you might have missed from the world of the podcast. First of the month, no spam.
Personal Reflections and Life Challenges
00:02:58
Speaker
Can't beat it.
00:03:00
Speaker
And I was debating whether to go through like I have just some things I felt like saying this sometimes things spew out and I'm like, ah, should I read that in the intro? Do I even want to weigh down the listeners with what the hell? What other bullshit is on my mind? And I was like, Oh, whatever. What the hell? Oftentimes I delete it, but this time I'm, I'm just going to run with it. Take it or leave it.
00:03:25
Speaker
I'm just going to say it. In any case, this is the final podcast of my 30s. I get a clean new decade through which to chart this life. It hasn't exactly been what I hoped for when I was younger, back before the weight of the world crushed my spirit.
00:03:43
Speaker
I have to believe things will be better if and only if I take some agency and don't hide behind meaningless and menial day jobs. I already look back on the last 15 years with about as much regret as I do happiness so I can only imagine how much this compounds as you really make the turn toward the big fade when there's statistically fewer years ahead of you than behind you.
00:04:09
Speaker
certain things really need to happen. I think I know how to do it. It's just a matter of believing that I deserve it. And if I work for it and not get bogged down by thinking, well, if I can do it, then it can't possibly be special. Or if success was meant for me, I'd already be successful.
00:04:30
Speaker
Lots of inner voices I get from my loving mother. She is loving, of course, but deeply damaged, and damage has a way of transferring like a goddamn horcrux. And seriously, what a prick I am. Earlier this year, I had a friend die of brain cancer at 32. I have another friend from high school who's 39, and he's got the same damn brain cancer.
00:04:59
Speaker
Like, here I am complaining about this fucking bullshit. Pardon my language, but that's just where I am at. I don't have kids. This guy I went to high school with, he's got like four kids under 10 years old. You know, he married a high school sweetheart kind of situation. And it's just like, I don't do anything that affects lives.
00:05:17
Speaker
Alex, my friend, who died earlier this year, he was a doctor and one of those guys who was just gonna do so much good in this world. The other guy, his name's Trevor, he's a coach and a teacher and these guys have impact, like real impact on people.
00:05:35
Speaker
Meanwhile, I'm wondering if someone will like my damn podcast and leave a freaking review for it. You know, these are the things I'm measuring a life by. It's so silly. And this is the spiral to the portal of bullshit and the guilt is compounded by my incredible privilege and the nose of the plane just keeps tipping farther and farther down.
00:05:58
Speaker
I wish I knew how to pull the nose up to get thrust and lift and get out of this self-induced funk, and it is self-induced. Shit, people are dying. There's a pandemic, there's social unrest, and people are unemployed, and I can't get out of my own rotten head.
00:06:15
Speaker
Like I said, sorry about this. I don't have many people to talk to, so I talk to you. I also want to take this time to wish Robin Flanagan a listener to this podcast, who was also born on July 1st, Canada Day. She enters a new decade as well. Happy birthday, Robin. May you have a CNF and great day, and a greater decade devoid of all the bullshit that I'm talking about.
00:06:42
Speaker
Wudan Yan, like I said,
Introduction to Wudan Yan
00:06:44
Speaker
she is here. She's one of those people who gets it done, son. She was internet famous. A year ago for a piece she wrote on her blog about chasing down late payments. She's a freelancing wizard, and in this day and age, freelancing feels more stable to me. I work for a Gannett newspaper, so every day, no matter what good work I'm doing or anybody else is doing adjacent to me, feels like it could be your last day. It's just the way it is in corporate news.
00:07:12
Speaker
You know, we chart in this conversation how Wudan escaped from grad school to pursue her career as a writer. And the results speak for themselves. You can follow her on Twitter. She's a great Twitter follow at Wudan Yan. Her website is, let me see, do I have it here? Oh, look at this, wudanyan.com.
Wudan Yan's Educational Journey
00:07:34
Speaker
That's nice. That's easy to follow. So let's throw up those horns and riff.
00:07:47
Speaker
rockers or the athletes or the bookish people, who's who's your crew? I was a really big nerd. And my parents would say that I was also really rebellious, especially as a teenager. Yeah, in high school, it's interesting to think about high school and all the conversations that we're having about race and privilege right now. I
00:08:09
Speaker
you know, I think whether it's upbringing or parental pressure or because I wanted to be there, in part because I wanted to be there. I was taking a lot of advanced classes, AP, honors, whatever. I was on the track and field team. I did science research. I did design for the student newspaper. And yeah, it was kind of all over the board. I was, well,
00:08:34
Speaker
My parents and I were preparing me to be sellable, to be admitted by a university, right? Because they wanted every generation to be stronger than the next. They wanted me to have opportunities that they didn't have. Yeah, and that always seems to push a certain generation either to be like a doctor or a lawyer, doesn't it? That's exactly the vision they basically had for me, like the acceptable careers that I could have gone on to
00:09:03
Speaker
take on where to be a doctor or a lawyer or work in business or consulting or finance. Writing was not ever an option that I considered, an option that was discussed. I think because it wasn't seen as economically viable or stable.
00:09:24
Speaker
That's another key point too that I think a lot of people will feel the parental pressure, generational pressure from parents. A, they just want what's best for you and sometimes that feels more stable going into those professions. Then there's also you want to impress your parents or you want to not let them down.
00:09:48
Speaker
Talk a little bit about your journey through undergrad or through college where you were on a certain path and then diverged. That must have been a tough moment for you. It's interesting to think about that question because
00:10:04
Speaker
First of all, I went to Brown University for undergrad and for people unfamiliar with Brown, they are a liberal arts college and there's also no fixed curriculum. It is really choose your own adventure.
00:10:19
Speaker
When I was in high school, I took a few years and dedicated it to studying a computer science program. Meanwhile, I was really interested in biology and medicine. When I sent in my application, I wanted to concentrate in computational biology.
00:10:36
Speaker
That quickly changed when I realized I couldn't sit in a computer lab for about five hours a day and code and so I decided to study biochemistry instead, which was a slight pivot and I thought that was a good move because I could I would still be taking the classes if I wanted to go on to med school or something else so all throughout college I
00:11:03
Speaker
I'd say I was doing everything right to put myself on a medical path or an academic path. And then of course, there must have been some sort of an itch or a moment where you're like, this isn't quite right for me. So what was that inflection point?
00:11:23
Speaker
Yeah, it's interesting that you're going so far back. So the first inflection point was, I think, in my mind to appease my parents, or because I thought it was
00:11:35
Speaker
a well-defined path, the path of least resistance. I decided to go to med school. Now, this is the summer between junior and senior year of college. I was interning in Boston, and I was scheduled to take the standardized test to apply for med school.
00:11:54
Speaker
It really wasn't, it was not inspiring me. And I remember sitting in my dorm, my internship basically put us on dorms and I was on the phone with my mom and I just told her that I wasn't going to take the MCAT in a few weeks. And I think that was kind of scary because she was quiet for a moment and she goes, well, what are you going to do instead?
00:12:23
Speaker
So I think that was turning point number one. And I said, well, I still have the classes. I think I'm doing this summer of research. Maybe I'll go for my PhD.
Yan's Journalism Beginnings
00:12:34
Speaker
And who are you reading at the time that is starting to create this idea virus that you might want to have a more artistic career, a career in words? What were those seeds? And maybe when were they planted?
00:12:52
Speaker
Oh gosh, I was not reading that much in college. So fast forward a few years.
00:13:02
Speaker
I graduated college, I took a gap year as a research assistant, I was applying for PhDs, I survived taking the GREs, and I wanted to do my doctoral degree in cancer biology. So I applied, I got into a bunch of places, I chose to go to Sloan Kettering in New York City, which is pretty world-renowned for its cancer treatment and also cancer research.
00:13:27
Speaker
And it was very quickly into that period that I started branching out. I was reading a lot of articles on The New Yorker. I was reading narrative nonfiction in Harper's. I can't really point to a lot of specific books, but I will say
00:13:51
Speaker
I was about, I want to say nine months into my PhD, and I went to the World Science Festival. And this is what somebody who I had just started dating, he was like, let's go do something on the weekend. Let's go to this talk. And it was about science and story. And I think that was the first time I realized that science writing wasn't just a hobby, it was actually a career path. And I was really, really super intrigued.
00:14:17
Speaker
I was intrigued because it was a way to keep science in my life, but not to be immersed in it. And I think from my time in grad school so far that I kind of had an inkling that maybe it wasn't something I wanted to do full time, not even for like a concentrated five or six years.
00:14:37
Speaker
At what point do you realize that you have a knack not only for understanding complex biological systems and other biologically derived esoterra, and to be able to digest that into something that's readable, then digestible for a reader in this case?
00:15:00
Speaker
That's an interesting question too. So when I was plotting my escape from grad school, I basically was testing myself to see whether or not that this writing thing was actually something that I liked. So I started a blog. I think it's still
00:15:17
Speaker
active. I don't think any I don't actually remember what the URL is. But I just started practicing that science communication, I would go, you know, once or twice a week into one of the top science journals, find a study I found interesting and like try my hand at translating it for a lay audience without the help of an editor, right. So
00:15:40
Speaker
That was for me, honestly, it was do I enjoy this and do I want to be a writer, right? Like I had taken creative nonfiction classes in college, but I didn't really, this was a new version of me. Like I was a few years older, right? So I had to experiment and see if this was actually something I wanted to do.
00:16:04
Speaker
And anyone who listens to the Writers' Co-op podcast or certainly follows you on Twitter knows that I think you have a very pragmatic, systematic approach to this, where a lot of artistic type people tend to be more on the craft side of things. I think you have a really...
00:16:21
Speaker
methodical way about going about it, which is why you're successful and why Jenny's successful at what you guys do. So at that point, you've got the bug, you're like, this is it. So what was the next logical step for you as you started to pave your own road?
00:16:40
Speaker
I was trying to figure out if I should go to a writing program because a few classes in college and having written for my high school newspaper was not going to cut it.
00:16:55
Speaker
I was planning to escape from grad school. Or I was thinking, like, should I finish my PhD and start writing? Or could I write and do my PhD in parallel? There were a lot of open questions about that. I think I was not in the right lab for me at that time. And I also started talking to other journalists who I admired and were doing the type of work that I wanted to who were a few years ahead of me to talk about
00:17:25
Speaker
unconventional ways that they got into journalism.
The Role of Fact-checking in Journalism
00:17:30
Speaker
I was doing that because I couldn't see myself going to graduate school. Going back to your point of me being a pretty practical person, being in a PhD program means that I don't have to pay to go to school. They are paying me with government grants to be there.
00:17:49
Speaker
you know, my financial privilege in life is that my parents worked incredibly hard to put me and my sibling through college, right? So I had no debt. And the idea of taking on debt to go into journalism school and I mean, the prognosis after that is not great, right?
00:18:07
Speaker
your entry level staff reporter somewhere and you're getting paid $30,000 to $40,000 and you most likely have to live in New York City. That was really uninteresting to me and I wanted to know if there was a workaround. So yeah, I started talking to a lot of reporters who basically suggested
00:18:24
Speaker
you know, keep writing, keep doing your own blogs to convince yourself until you are convinced that you want to write and then write to publications that you really admire and see if they might have a spot for an internship, for fact checking, for copy editing, basically anything for me to get a seat at the table. And what would you say were some early growing pains you experienced?
00:18:50
Speaker
Well, the first day of my internship, so I took that approach, I should say. I emailed a lot of people quite nervously, full of imposter syndrome. And I asked that very question. Nautilus magazine took me on as an intern. That was my first internship. And the first day I was given this 2000 something word story to fact check.
00:19:15
Speaker
And little did I know that fact checking meant that I had to pick up the phone and call a stranger and ask them some questions. It seems really basic now because I still work as a fact checker, but it was really terrifying in that moment of like, why calling a stranger? What am I doing? So that was the first growing pain. The second one was really
00:19:38
Speaker
knowing that I wanted to write, I had no clips, I had to build up this clip database, and I didn't really know how to pitch. I really had to learn that things I found cool from the perspective of a scientist weren't necessarily stories, or there is a new scientific study, but how do I tell this in an engaging way so that somebody would actually want to read it?
00:20:02
Speaker
Right? Like I didn't have those skills yet. I will say with a few mentors at Nautilus, I was really lucky to be able to cultivate that. What about fact checking gave you an insight into reporting and the rigor that goes into doing any kind of, you know, reported feature or even things that are shorter? Definitely. So I will first say that
00:20:30
Speaker
Fact checking was a great bridge between bench research I was doing during my PhD and applying very similar skills to journalism. Fact checking allowed me to reverse engineer a story. I would be able to see the draft. I would be able to see
00:20:49
Speaker
hopefully, are writer's annotations and see how they took little snippets of information and how all those little snippets painted a bigger picture. That is the full story. I thought that was fascinating.
Yan's Career Development
00:21:01
Speaker
I think it gave me a framework to think about how to interview, what questions to ask, right? Because when I call up those sources, I am trying to ask the same question that the reporter did. It was just cool to get a glimpse into other people's writing processes and
00:21:18
Speaker
you know a lot of people have said to me oh you'll grow out of fact checking it's only a stepping stone but i think i still have a lot to learn as a writer and i think so many of my colleagues are incredible and i want to learn from them and that's honestly the number one reason why i've continued doing it all these years
00:21:37
Speaker
Now, maybe take us into the the mud of fact checking a little bit. You know, when you're given this piece, you know, what are the are you prompted with the questions to ask? Is it annotated in some way and be like, check this, check this, check this. Here's phone numbers, whatever. Like, what does that actually look like? Well, if the writer fully annotates the story, it's going to look like a lot of
00:22:02
Speaker
It's a very busy word document. Some writers like to share their sources and comments. Some people like to footnote it. My job as a fact checker is to check literally every single fact. It is so granular. It is very tedious and it takes a lot longer than people would think.
00:22:24
Speaker
Right now, if there's a source onto a webpage, if somebody cites a scientific article, I need to read that article and make sure that what they put in the story squares with what the researchers found. I am making phone calls to people and making sure that their quotes are not taken out of context. There is no script for me to... I was never given a script. I've come up with my own script when I call up sources for fact checking.
00:22:52
Speaker
you know, I have to think about how I'm going to reverse engineer what's on the page into a question. So maybe the person will tell me the same exact thing, right? So it's a puzzle. And I think I like puzzles. I think that's why I've enjoyed science this whole time, right? It's solving a mystery, finding these missing pieces of the puzzle and putting it all together.
00:23:15
Speaker
And so you've got this internship with Nautilus. After this, what can you point to as an early win that put fuel in your tank, allowed you to feel like you were doing the right thing and paddling your oars in the right direction?
00:23:31
Speaker
I felt like I was fundering for a really long time. After my internship with Nautilus ended, I tried to freelance. In the middle of all of this, I moved from New York City to San Francisco, where my partner at the time lived. And I was trying to find gigs out of San Francisco. And it basically wasn't working. San Francisco's media culture, I felt too diffuse, especially for somebody like me who was just starting out. And I think I could have benefited more
00:24:01
Speaker
from organized writers groups and a stronger writing community. So I moved back to New York.
00:24:10
Speaker
And I took a full-time tutoring job that paid me a salary, gave me benefits, basically allowed me to live in New York City. And the nice thing about tutoring is that it doesn't start until the afternoon when the kids are out of school. And that freed up my mornings for freelancing. So I was doing that for a while. And then I pitched more. I pitched a lot more. I wrote new stories. I wrote features.
00:24:37
Speaker
I still needed a place, I think, where I could really feel more confident in my writing skills.
00:24:45
Speaker
Now we're in 2015. In the spring of 2015, I applied for an internship at Nature Medicine. I think that was a really big turning point because all of a sudden I dialed way back on tutoring because the internship was basically full time. And I think if I remember correctly, I wrote like four features, two news stories.
Freelancing Strategies and Time Management
00:25:09
Speaker
The magazine had this news brief section where I did anywhere from five to eight short, 150-word summaries of stuff that was happening in the realm of science and medicine and health.
00:25:24
Speaker
So that was really intense. And I'm so fortunate I had that experience for a number of reasons. A, my editor was amazing. She made me realize how terrible I was at writing very early. She once just read my draft out loud to me, which I think is the most horrifying thing a writer can have happen. But I was so grateful because
00:25:48
Speaker
Now I do that when I'm editing myself, so my editor doesn't have to deal with that on the other side of the screen. It also showed me how much writing I could get done if I really just put my head down and had to do it. And I think that's really relatable to what I'm up against right now as a freelancer.
00:26:11
Speaker
And I love hearing you talk about the organizational approach and the way you set up your days and block out, block out your time. It's, it's so important. I'm wondering, and I'm wondering, like, you know, when, when did you really lock in to the processes that you use to organize your day? Probably within the last year or two.
00:26:37
Speaker
I think a lot of freelancers will relate when I say that it takes some time to ramp up assignments to get to a point where you're doing the stuff that you want to do, right? And for me, it's a lot easier to slot things around, move it in my calendar when my schedule is already full and I can see how all the different pieces fit. I think when I have your assignments, for instance,
00:27:07
Speaker
It's a lot easier for me to dilly-dally around all day and what would take me an hour to write when I'm really put under the gun takes me four to five hours.
00:27:23
Speaker
Whether it was engineered because of the way tutoring and freelancing worked during that time, I have always been really, really, really good at writing first thing in the morning. And I told you that, right? Like when I have a lot of assignments, every morning I am writing a thousand words.
00:27:41
Speaker
Usually that gets done in about two hours. So that's a that's a known fact that I've just watched myself over a period of time and Realized like that's the rate at which I work and I'm just gonna put it in my calendar
00:27:56
Speaker
Yeah, I think creativity is a muscle, right? Like you want to exercise it a little every day, but you also want to be conscious of when that muscle tires. And yes, I am the exact same way. After 11 o'clock, I'm like, I'm going to go walk my dog. And then I'm going to do research or take on my fact checking assignment or get into nitty gritty edits. I think like my analytical brain turns on after that time.
00:28:24
Speaker
At what point do you realize that maybe doing like straight up freelance journalism is untenable and you start casting a wider net to maybe do like, okay, I'm going to thread in the fact checking, maybe do some brand work. And then that stuff will help subsidize some of the journalism I really want to do. You know, at what point, you know, take us to that moment where you're like, okay, I need to start
00:28:50
Speaker
diversifying this freelance nut, if you will.
00:28:56
Speaker
That was always my mindset. That was always my understanding that if you want to be a freelance journalist, you're probably going to have to do a lot of things that you don't want to do. So it creates time, space, resources for you to dig into the things that you want to do. So when I was doing my research, right? Like before I jumped out of my PhD program and started my, um,
00:29:21
Speaker
my career in journalism, I asked that question when I spoke with other journalists, working journalists. And it was like, diversification is the name of the game. And it's important to not only survive, but I think thrive. And I would say that diversity has taken on a lot of different forms. And I've done everything from copywriting,
00:29:46
Speaker
biotech writing, fact checking, definitely writing for institutional publications. And, you know, I think as a freelance journalist, the one thing I really have to make sure is that I'm not creating additional conflicts of interest for the journalism that I want to do. So that's the point where I've been really diligent about otherwise, you know, is this interesting
00:30:11
Speaker
That's usually the bar that I've used. Is this work interesting and is it going to pay me well? That's usually my consideration for non-journalism assignments. Have you ever run into a situation where maybe your journalism brain is running up against, there's this thing that's interesting, there's maybe a cool brand worth writing for, but you're like,
00:30:37
Speaker
But there's also this really cool journalistic angle that I could pitch to like some other kind of more journalistic magazine. Like, have you ever had to make that internal calculus to determine, all right, do I take the bigger paycheck and write for like the brand, but I sacrifice the journalistic integrity side of it? Like, have you ever had to wrestle with that? I haven't personally, but that's a great question. And I always tell other freelance writers who are struggling with that conundrum, like everyone
00:31:07
Speaker
Everyone has their own boundaries and you have to decide what they are, right? Like, is that copywriting going to be a regular gig? Are you valuing stability over like the byline, right? I think there are so many factors at play and I've never had to deal with that myself, but you know, if I'm copywriting for somebody and I come across something interesting, I would just pass it on to a colleague. I think there are so many stories that can be written four different places.
Generalist vs. Specialist Freelancing
00:31:38
Speaker
from different angles, right? That like, I don't have to do it all and I'm fine with that.
00:31:44
Speaker
Yeah, because then you run into the prestige question too, because it's like, yeah, that where that byline appears, like, do you want this, you know, this maybe this thing in the 750 words in the New York Times? Or can you or could you have parlayed that into like REI magazine for maybe two or three times as much money or something? It could go in either place, really. But it's like, what are you what do you value?
00:32:09
Speaker
Mm-hmm. And yes, and to elaborate on that even more, it's like what more kind of work do you want, right? Like if you want to do more journalism, probably like it's not the best use of time if you're taking on more copywriting if you and you know your point about prestige, right? Like there are some prestige copywriting clients that I just don't know about and I think Yes, it depends on what clients
00:32:34
Speaker
What arm of your freelance business you want to cultivate? I think that's what I really urge other freelancers to think about when making this decision. Yeah. When I had Jennifer Goforth Gregory on the show a while ago, probably almost two years ago at this point, she does freelance content marketing stuff and she's like a six figure earner type thing. Those mainly like stuff for tech companies and blog, those kind of blog posts and that kind of white papers, those things.
00:33:04
Speaker
Her big thing is having a pretty targeted niche. I've heard you and Jenny talk about really having a broad swath of topics. I was wondering if maybe you can talk about maybe the value or the plus and my cost benefit analysis of having something that's having a more targeted set of talents or being able to be more of a generalist.
00:33:31
Speaker
I think over time I've become more of a generalist. I think when I first started, it was I have this scientific background and expertise and I want to do science journalism. I think the more that I read, the more journalism I exposed myself to, my vision for what I wanted to do changed. And I think that's totally organic. And I think over time,
00:33:55
Speaker
I've also been grateful to have opportunities to network with people who would publish my non-science writing that I wanted to do and branch out to. So I think kind of similar to how we think about diversifying
00:34:13
Speaker
clients as freelancers, I think it's really a good time to start thinking about what are all the different skills that I'm interested in? What are the different topics I want to write about? I think it's okay to be a generalist. I don't know. I've never been an editor. This is a hard question for me because I think people come to me because I
00:34:37
Speaker
Whether it's because I live in Seattle and there's crazy stuff going down here, or because they want a very human story about science, or the environment, or social justice.
00:34:51
Speaker
I can't speak for people who come to me for assignments or commission me assignments. I don't know if they're looking for my voice or my expertise or the fact that I'm just there and they know that I can get something done. I don't know what that is like, but I think there's nothing wrong with being a generalist. I think about freelancing as kind of a T. You wanna be very broad, but you want to be specific and skilled in something. And I think that skill,
00:35:20
Speaker
that you really have the death, that's going to help you find markets that might be more profitable than just straight up journalism.
00:35:33
Speaker
I like early on in your podcast run and I nearly got through the whole season in two and a half days. I was able to digest it at one and a half times the speed. I love it. It got me really motivated in ways that I haven't been in a while.
00:35:53
Speaker
So that's a testament to what you guys are talking about and your skills at going back and forth and the way you structure your show, which is cool. But early on, you talk about the value system and being very specific and intentional about what that means. What do you value? How did you arrive at the values that you consider important and how the freelancing can then feed into that value system?
00:36:21
Speaker
My big value from the start was working on projects that excite me because if I just wanted to make things for somebody else that they would enjoy, I probably would have just gotten a staff job, right? Like my goals would have changed. I like my variety. That I think I've known about myself for quite a while.
00:36:42
Speaker
I'm a very goal-oriented person, and when it's November or December, I start scheming for the next year.
00:36:53
Speaker
on that list I make for myself. It's all the projects I want to do. Those goals for 2020 have changed a lot. But yeah, I set those goals and they're usually like make more money. And then these are the passion projects I really want to dig into.
00:37:16
Speaker
And everything is structured around when those passion projects get done. So before Corona hit, I was on the road for a month in the Southwest working on two separate magazine stories. Last fall, I was on the road for a month working on a magazine story. That's the stuff I really get excited about, just being out in the world, working on stuff that really matters to me and hopefully other people too. And
00:37:43
Speaker
creating the time and space for that. And everything else runs around that. So that's been really big. And Jenny and I talked recently on an episode about work-life balance that both of us really value vacation and basically getting away in the middle of the week to go on a hike or just to not work. I love the flexibility, not only in the topics that I do, but how much control I have over my schedule.
00:38:10
Speaker
I would say those are my two big values with regards to freelancing. I also like how you guys talk about how freelancing and writing itself can take different forms. I love that you frame that and let people know that it's okay to have all these different irons and different fires.
Balancing Personal and Professional Life
00:38:31
Speaker
Like I was saying earlier, you look up and see some of the people you admire and it just feels like they're just writing
00:38:38
Speaker
two features a year for The New Yorker and they're just killing it. But odds are they might be doing some ghost writing, some fact checking, all this. And all this feeds into the big arena that can be a writer's life. And so I like that you just are so transparent about saying like, yeah, you're not like a loser because you're doing this other thing that's not as prestigious, but this is
00:39:04
Speaker
all part and parcel of the industry. And yes, there's no shame in taking this other kind of work to subsidize the thing you really love that you're really gonna put in your Twitter bio or something.
00:39:17
Speaker
I agree. And at a moment where, you know, so many outlets are trying to figure out how to get a more diverse masthead, right? Or like more diversity from their freelancers. I think one of the biggest barriers to Black, Indigenous and other people of color is just getting a foot in the door anyway. And I think so many people struggle
00:39:42
Speaker
with like, should I only be making the thing that people are going to know me for or, but also, but also I have to make a living, right? And I think Jenny and I want to say like, you can have it all depending on how you want to structure your time and what you value. And like, it's okay to have a diversified income. What would you say is more important? Maybe for someone who's
00:40:10
Speaker
maybe more at the beginning of their freelance trampoline getting ready to jump off, like putting her energy toward craft or building relationships. I don't think it's either or. I think you can do it all. I would actually encourage fighters to do it all. Yeah, whether it's, well, we can't really do this now because of coronavirus, but whether it's getting a coffee or a meal or a beverage with
00:40:40
Speaker
an editor or talking to people who they really admire who are three to five years ahead of them in their career or like 10 years ahead in their career and having those informal conversations of like, how do you do the thing you do? How do you come up with your story ideas?
00:40:59
Speaker
Yeah, Jenny and I both encourage people who we coach from the podcast to do that, by the way. Yeah, I think you can do both. I think the really important thing in this very economically precarious moment is, you know, there are so many voices that we need to hear and learn from. And I don't want to I don't want people to feel silenced by that. And there are just so many things that people have still have the power to do, even though that the world is turned a little bit upside down.
00:41:29
Speaker
And how do you curate and just develop the ideas that you want to pursue? It's a really hard question. I think a lot of my stories emerge from other projects I've worked on.
00:41:47
Speaker
the project, one project I was working on in the Southwest in January was an extension of a story that I came across last fall when I was reporting in the Southwest, which came from a story that I was doing in Kazakhstan a year before. I think a lot of people
00:42:06
Speaker
When they ask me how I do what I do with regards to finding features, I always say that I'm always trying to get... I'm attracted to story ideas and topics for a reason, and I basically want to pursue that as long as possible.
00:42:23
Speaker
When I go on reporting trips, a part of me is like, I want to do this again. Again, that's what I value. That's what gets me motivated. And so I'm always looking like that's, that's the frame with which I'm viewing what stories am I going to pursue is.
00:42:39
Speaker
what stories are emerging from this trip that I also want to dig into. So I think that's also a good way for people to cultivate a beat. I think when you and I were emailing, I was like, I don't feel like I have a beat, which is also true.
00:42:55
Speaker
Yeah, and when you're lobbying or drawing up your pitches and trying to get the requisite access you need to then lobby the people you want to send you on these trips, how do you get the access you need and then convince outlets to subsidize your stories that involve travel? A lot of the time I don't have access confirmed yet.
00:43:25
Speaker
think people can tell from my previous work that I've done similar work before so that they should just trust me to pull it off. Now, I know that sounds very privileged, right? That's like the dream that a lot of freelancers want. But where I started was an editor saying like, we want to send you to Southeast Asia, but we like it's our first time working with you.
00:43:53
Speaker
It's our first time working with you. We don't want to take that financial risk. So I applied for a grant, right? And I got that grant. I produced that story. And the second time I went back to that same editor and proposed an international story. He was like, yes, well, of course, right? Like you've already proven yourself once you've continued to prove yourself being capable of going to places and executing on your vision and like writing the story in a compelling way that like, yes, we will trust you to do that again and again and again.
Pandemic's Impact on Ambitions
00:44:22
Speaker
And I think.
00:44:23
Speaker
I think that's important for people to cultivate their portfolio to show others what they're capable of. What were your early ambitions and how have your ambitions changed as that ratchet has turned? My earliest ambitions were just to create work that I was proud of.
00:44:44
Speaker
and start writing features, which is what I really wanted to do, which is why I got into this business in the first place. I still find that really fulfilling. I think this year with the coronavirus, it's really changed things. I feel like making a living as a freelancer right now is at odds with producing beautiful long-term work.
00:45:08
Speaker
That being said, I am working on stories I reported in the field earlier this year before all these travel restrictions were to put in place. But whenever I see a beautiful feature in The New Yorker, I can't help but get a little jealous. It's like those writers have some kind of financial stability from an institution and they have the institutional backing. So of course they have the time and space to produce something like that. I think a lot of what I'm doing now is
00:45:37
Speaker
honestly, just trying to survive. And that sounds shitty. And it makes it might sound like I've lost my vision for myself. But that being said, I think it's okay to recalibrate what we all need as writers based on the state of the world.
Privilege in Journalism
00:45:56
Speaker
And who knows, right? When the next time I'll be able to go on a month long reporting trip either to Asia, where many of my trips take me or
00:46:07
Speaker
across the US to a lot of rural places that don't have the capacity to deal with possible coronavirus cases. So this pandemic, this moment is really begs a moment of reflection for I think a lot of people and it's something that I'm thinking through for myself right now.
00:46:27
Speaker
Yeah, and you brought up jealousy, and that's something I always like unpacking on this show a bit because it's something. Yeah, go for it. Yeah, it's something I deal with just in my DNA. It is sort of the toxic cesspool of which this podcast was founded of me working through. Eight years ago when I started this thing, it was just like, all right, how can I
00:46:52
Speaker
rechannel a lot of the sort of jealous energy I have into being more celebratory. And so over the years, I think I've gotten better, but I still, of course, wrestle with it. So how do you process those feelings of competition and jealousy and turn it into something more positive and not not toxic? I think I need to say that I'm not usually a very jealous person. I think generally I'm jealous
00:47:17
Speaker
when somebody produces really good. And then I, the first thing I do is ask like, okay, how did they do that? Mostly because I want to know if that's replicable for myself, right? Like, do they apply for a grant? What was their business model that created the space for them to produce this beautiful piece of work? I am pretty uninterested
00:47:38
Speaker
This is going to sound terrible, but I'm going to say anyway, I'm really uninterested in writers who have a lot of financial privilege and can just wait like 10 months for a $5,000 paycheck for a story that they poured their heart into.
00:47:52
Speaker
I am a very practical person. If they're able to do that, that's amazing. And I'm probably going to read and share the crap out of their story. But how they did it is not going to be replicable to me. It's not going to be replicable to other people unless they are in a position of financial privilege. It's really not going to be replicable for a lot of
00:48:16
Speaker
black indigenous and other people of color or like any other social group that's like chronically underrepresented in journalism right so that's the first step and i think you know that's that's what journalists do when they see something right like rather than judge it like we want to understand
00:48:35
Speaker
why people did something the way they did and how they did it. We want to understand. We want to have that empathy. I'm not a very jealous person. I think when people have a lot of economic and financial stability, if I'm frank, I think that's true for a lot of people in this industry. When I started doing this, I was not living with
00:49:00
Speaker
like the person who I was dating. I had a lot of bills to pay. My parents definitely were not going to send me money. I don't have a trust fund. I don't have an apartment in New York City that was already paid for. I think I really have always balanced these two things. So I think a lot of my jealousy is towards people who are more privileged. And I guess that's a shitty thing to say.
00:49:30
Speaker
I had Bryn Jonathan Butler on the show. He's been on several times. He was acknowledging that too. He's someone who teaches boxing lessons on the side. He's got three or four books under his belt. He's one of the most brilliant writers and journalists I know.
00:49:47
Speaker
And yet he's open about, yeah, I'm on Medicaid. And I do teach boxing on the side. And he's got bylines everywhere. But he acknowledges and is frustrated that people talk about freelance journalism and feature writing and fail to bring up that some people can just afford to do this almost like a boutique hobby. And yet they're acclaimed.
00:50:13
Speaker
acclaimed journalist as if that's a bar that most people can even reach. And that's where that disconnect is. Yeah, definitely. I remember reading John McPhee's draft number four. And I think in it,
00:50:28
Speaker
He takes these long trips into the American West, and his writing is incredible. I think it was in draft number four when I read that his wife was taking care of their very many children, and I had to put that book down. I was like, this doesn't invalidate the beautiful writing that John McPhee has put out.
00:50:52
Speaker
But having that safety net in part enables him to do the work that he is able to produce. And I think you like, right, like our job as journalists are to take all the available information and see how the things connect, right? Like, I don't think, you know, what's happening in a personal life or the privileges that we are born into are divorced from how we work professionally.
00:51:22
Speaker
or what we produce professionally. I think it's very much so.
00:51:29
Speaker
Yeah, and he also teaches at Princeton for nine months of the year. So then he does his, and he's done that for 50 years. So it's like he does that. His writing period is fallow for most of the year and then the summers are when he gets to do the work that he's famous
Investigative Journalism Challenges
00:51:46
Speaker
for. So yeah, it's like even in Roy Peter Clark's Murder Your Darlings, his latest book, he writes about McPhee and he's just like, you have to understand as great as he is, as kind to you, and brilliant and generous.
00:51:58
Speaker
He comes from a tremendous amount of privilege to be able to afford to do the kind of work he does and take years and not have to rely on drawing a check from the New Yorker. But we feel like those who emulate, those who idolize him, you have to remember that his situation is very rare and not replicable at all. So you can't hold yourself to that standard. Yeah, exactly.
00:52:27
Speaker
This isn't a dunk on John McPhee, I swear. No, no, no, not at all. And for you as well with some of the other feature writing you've done and the links that you're able to share, it was like Anyone's Son, I understand was a piece that definitely tested the limits of your comfort zone. So what was that experience like and how do you push yourself into those
00:52:55
Speaker
uncomfortable areas to test yourself as a writer and a journalist. Yeah, that's an interesting writing sample to talk about because I stumbled across the story on a Facebook group and the way the story was presented to me was
00:53:18
Speaker
from Samantha Eyre. And she told me about how her youngest brother was shot at 40 times by the Fairbanks Police Department. He was having a mental health crisis. He's Alaskan native. Also, did you know that Native Americans and Alaskan natives are killed
00:53:35
Speaker
at a higher rate per capita than any other racial group in the US. No, I didn't. I think when stories come to me in this form, I feel such a deep responsibility to the people, the families who are dealing with this right to bring these stories to light. Now, before this story fell into my lap, I had never
00:54:01
Speaker
I had never written critically about the police. I've never done an investigative piece about the police. I've never written a 5,400 word story, which is what that piece came to be. So I had a lot of learning to do. I have filed public records requests, which was a really big part of this. And I have appealed public records requests, which was another really big part of this. And I'm really good at reporting in person. Like I don't want to brag, but I'm really good at getting stuff when I'm on the ground.
00:54:31
Speaker
When I pitched this story, I felt like I had a much higher bar to cross. I had to prove that this story was worth a few thousand words. I had to show the research that I had done. I had to very clearly show in my pitch that this was a story and a story worth telling.
00:54:51
Speaker
I tell a lot of other freelance writers this too, especially people being like, well, I'm pitching a story in a topic that I've never reported on. It's outside of my usual beat. How do I do it? My answer is always do all the work to convince the editor that they can't possibly say no, right?
00:55:09
Speaker
I think that's what got my foot in the door and I'm really grateful. This was published in long reads and I'm really grateful for how patient my editor Mike Dang was in the fight for public records mostly. I think that was the most challenging part.
00:55:28
Speaker
putting the story together was also challenging because there are so many layers. There's the story of Cody, the story of his family. But there's also this, there's also all that history, right, that has made America the way it is. And I think it's particularly relevant as we talk about the protests against systematic racism and the Black Lives Matter movement right now. Yeah, that was a really fascinating piece.
00:55:58
Speaker
to report and I'm glad I did it. I think that's something I strive to do and a lot of stories I pitch is what skills can I develop or practice in reporting the story. I think
00:56:13
Speaker
as freelancers, especially there's nobody telling us what direction to go. Very rarely does somebody nudges and it's like, actually, it would be really great if you did this. It would be really great if he cultivated the skill like investigative journalism or something.
00:56:31
Speaker
that I think you'd be really good at. It's very rare for people to come in like that and hold our hand. And so for me, I get bored if I'm writing the same type of thing over and over again. That's just the person I am. I want a challenge. Like I want to learn. I think that's why I really enjoyed podcasting and creating the writer's co-op is because the world of audio is new to me and it's exciting and shiny and maybe over time it'll lose that shine. But for right now, like it's serving me a great,
00:57:01
Speaker
learning opportunity. And I think that's what I really wanted from anyone's son. Right, right. And, you know, what would you say and what can you point to that maybe you're better at today than you were five years ago?
00:57:19
Speaker
I'm a lot better at being authoritative in my writing. If you've read a scientific manuscript, there's a lot of hedging. Our results suggest this. We can say this with certainty, but here are 10 caveats. I think I brought that academic style with me for quite a long time.
00:57:48
Speaker
until maybe it was an editor who gave me this feedback and some of the questions were like, can we say this more definitively? And I was like, well, yes, I suppose we can. Like I can, not we, but me.
00:58:03
Speaker
And that's really changed my thinking on things too. I think I spent eight months, no, seven or eight months researching that story about Cody Air. So by the time I was ready to write, like I felt very, very, very expert. And now the challenge was then to like take the expertise and boil it down to something that anyone can understand.
00:58:30
Speaker
So yeah, it's kind of fun to think about writing like that, right? It's like, especially journalism, learn all the things, become an expert and then try and dumb it down again, but not too dumb because people like readers are smart.
Current Focus and Podcasting Benefits
00:58:44
Speaker
And given the, I know the circumstances are challenging, of course, and you've expressed that you like to look ahead to see some goals, some big things on the horizon. So maybe certain things were tabled for this year, but what would you say, Woodan, is something you're looking forward to, the next big thing that you want to tackle?
00:59:13
Speaker
That's a great question. I am turning around some larger, maybe more long-term story ideas that I can pursue locally in Seattle where I live. The other really big thing is, as much as coronavirus has appended
00:59:33
Speaker
a lot of my travel plans for this year, especially for reporting. And just as an example, in March, I was supposed to go to South Asia to finally report a story that I've been working on for five years. And that's just gonna have to wait for another year. I try not to dwell too much on like the things that could have been
00:59:58
Speaker
I will say I'm really grateful for coronavirus because it's given me dedicated time and space to create the podcast. And when else would I have that time to basically make freelancers school?
01:00:20
Speaker
That's been a real blessing. And Jenny and I are scheming and planning for season two and what to do between seasons. And it's such a fun project. And I think, again, as freelancers, it's so rare to work collaboratively on something. It's the two of us who co-host. And then we have an editor. We have an assistant. We do events and bring on other freelancers. Media lawyers, we're looking to bring on
01:00:46
Speaker
tax accountants who specialize in freelancers. We have all of these exciting things on the horizon and I don't want to use the phrase lean in but I am leaning into how this moment has like inspired me to pivot into journalism adjacent but still create things that are useful for other people. I think right like as journalists we want to
01:01:12
Speaker
We want to produce work that other people use. And for the longest time, I was like, nobody reads my stuff. Who's going to read it unless they really do some digging, which is classic imposter syndrome. But to create a podcast that is useful not only for
01:01:32
Speaker
freelancers who are two or three years into it, but all the folks in media who are getting furloughed or laid off because journalism is in a state of decline. We already have created this resource. This is the resource both of us, both Jenny and I wanted when we started out freelancing.
01:01:56
Speaker
This is the stuff that like nobody told us, but we wanted to know and now we get to make it for somebody else. So I think that's really incredible. And I'm super grateful for the time and space and also money. Yes. That has allowed us to do the work that we're able to do.
01:02:14
Speaker
There's sometimes a tendency to want to, especially when you have some hard-won advice or hard-won knowledge that you want to hold on to it. What was it about you and Jenny that you actually wanted to go the other way and have a more abundant mindset versus a scarcity mindset? Well, the idea for the podcast came last fall. And I was in the middle of the desert.
01:02:43
Speaker
I think I had just gotten off the phone with someone who needed advice on late payments. I should also say that last summer I didn't mean for this to happen, but I got internet famous because I was owed a lot of money from different clients. And then I held them accountable because I billed them a late fee. And all of a sudden people wanted to replicate that.
01:03:11
Speaker
or negotiate their contracts so they wouldn't be get paid late. And Jenny and I talk about this all the time. I mean, both of us live in Seattle. That's how we met. And I think people both asked us like a ton of advice about freelancing. And we both felt like broken records on very specific things, right. And
01:03:31
Speaker
Our vision for the podcast is really, can we just record this once and have it live somewhere and send people there, right? Like when they're looking for advice rather than us repeating ourselves for the 100th time. Not that we don't love talking about it, right? Because we have a whole podcast about it, but like, hello, this is a resource that it's an audio handbook.
01:03:53
Speaker
So yeah, I really believe in empowering freelancers. I don't think there's a scarcity mindset, even though publishers are not taking that much freelance. I think we, every individual is so unique, brings
01:04:08
Speaker
their life story and perspective and communities, shaping them. And we all have expertise in different things that we can tap into that can make our pitch stand apart from the next person's, etc. You know, even when people ask me about like anchor clients, I'm like, well, what do you like? Like, what did you what would you want to specialize in?
01:04:30
Speaker
The answer is different for everyone. And so, yeah, I don't think there's a shortage
Conclusion and Engagement Encouragement
01:04:36
Speaker
of work. I think it's just really a matter of taking initiative and knowing what your options are and having a framework to think about what your options are. Nice. And where can people get more familiar with your work, Wudan, and find you online? I have a portfolio. It's wudanjan.com. And I'm also on Twitter at wudanjan.
01:04:59
Speaker
Very nice. And the podcast is the writer's co-op and the logo is TWC. It's such a great resource and it's a great act of generosity that you and Jenny have done by starting that. So thanks for that.
01:05:13
Speaker
Yeah, thank you. Thanks for also listening to it. Yeah, well, Dan, thank you so much for carving out the time and doing this. It was a pleasure to get to talk to you, and I think you've offered so many tremendous insights for listeners to take and run, and hopefully just gobble up all your work and subscribe to your podcast, and yeah, just rise the tides, right? For sure. Thanks for having me, Brendan. I appreciate it.
01:05:48
Speaker
I like that one. Hope you dug it too. Thanks to Scrivener for sponsoring this episode. Go check them out. I love it. Love it. Love it.
01:05:58
Speaker
made by writers for writers. Thanks to Wudan also super busy. She made time to spend time on this podcast means a lot. Also, be sure you're following the show on social media, keep the conversation going at CNF pod across the big free head over to Brenda to Merit.com to sign up for the newsletter once a month, first of the month.
01:06:23
Speaker
those that can be this episode was produced by me and cattle hula hank and uh... in our conversations in hank we talk a lot one thing rings true if you can do interview