Look at all my pretty eggs! This basket will hold them forever! Muahahaha!!!

One of the best pieces of advice I received when I first started freelancing was: Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.

Really, it’s pretty common sense advice for any freelancer or self-employed person. If you put all your eggs in one basket – in other words, if you devote all your time and attention to one particular client and job and come to financially depend solely on that job – you’re left with nothing when something happens to that basket.

Notice how I’ve used “when” instead of “if”; it’s been my experience that, eventually, something always happens to the basket.

Yes, this was one of those lessons I had to learn for myself, unfortunately.

Within my first few months as a freelance writer, I landed a cushy writing gig with a stable company (of the reliable, and not equine, variety). Work was plentiful (nearly 24 hours a day if I chose – and, as a newbie, sometimes I chose), the company paid well, and life was grand. I continued writing for this company for about two years, very rarely taking on additional writing gigs. Why should I? That weekly check certainly didn’t require additional jobs.

Then one day, the well dried up. Or, someone stole my basket. The company had no more work for its freelance writers because the project was complete. I felt an amazing sense of accomplishment – after all, I’d been working on the project for a long time – but that wasn’t enough to squash the feelings of fear and being lost.

Obviously, the story has a happy ending – I’m still here and freelancing, aren’t I? – but it didn’t come without some serious scrambling and the vow that I would never, ever, put all my eggs in one basket again.

Oh, the pain we can avoid if we would just listen to the advice of those who are experienced.

If you’re just starting out as a freelance writer, or if you’ve been freelancing for a while and just looked around to see that yes, all your eggs are indeed in one basket, here are a few ways you can ward off disaster before it strikes:

Regularly Apply for Writing Jobs

Applying for writing jobs when you already have a writing job might not make sense now, but the benefits will definitely be crystal clear when your big basket disappears. Set some time aside in your daily (or weekly) schedule to do nothing but search and apply for new jobs. You won’t get hired for every single job you apply for, so as long as you’re careful to only apply for those you can juggle with your current workload, you should be fine.

Of course, there are other good reasons to frequent the writing job boards. Deb Nj of Freelance Writing Jobs published an excellent post yesterday explaining why. Check it out.

Spread Yourself Out

This goes right along with regularly applying for new writing jobs. Having a big basket full of many eggs is a little safer if you also have a few small baskets full of a couple of eggs. Not only do having these jobs on the side help you in case your big basket disappears, but they also help build your portfolio, skill set, and contacts.

Just be careful to avoid spreading yourself too far out. It’s possible to have too many jobs that take up too much of your time and the finished products of which don’t accurately reflect your skills (i.e., you end up producing crap and having no life outside of writing).

Keep a Money Cushion

Many freelancers are familiar with the phrase “feast or famine,” and this should go without saying, no matter how many baskets you have, how long you’ve been freelancing, or really even what your job is: You need a savings account. Not just a savings account, but a savings account specifically for paying your bills and feeding yourself in the event you lose your big basket.

So, how about you? Have you ever made the mistake of putting all your eggs in one basket? What’d you do to survive it? What do you do now to avoid it?