“Free? You call this free?” -Cypher, The Matrix

You consider yourself a freelancer, yet you’re tied down to your office desk 10 hours a day and find yourself working on Easter break. In fact, you hardly ever take a break.

If you truly want to find what you were searching for when you left your 9-5 and began freelancing then you need some help. If you really want to discover how you can take long weekends whenever you desire then you need to focus. You can’t accomplish something until you make it a plan – a goal.

Here are the tips, tricks, and resources that will take you where you want to be…

Productivity

The more efficient you become with your time, the more time freedom you will have.

Tips

Million Dollar Leverage: How to Stay Focused – Some distractions are very important, but they are still distractions. By focusing on one thing at a time, you’ll finish more than ever before.

Anywired: 3 Steps to Productivity – The necessities: priorities, goals, and action.

Men With Pens: How to Finish a Project in 10 Minutes – Can’t get something done? Promise yourself 10 minutes of quality effort and you’ll be set.

Tim Ferriss: The Not-To-Do List: 9 Habits to Stop Now – The four-hour workweek guru brings delivers a list of bad habits that you need to cut in order to grow.

Freelance Folder: 3 Uncomfortable Ways to Make More Money as a Freelancer – Push your comfort zone to get more done.

Freelance Folder: How to Avoid Procrastination as a Freelancer – Don’t let the luxury of a freelance career turn into a curse.

InkThinker: Beating Procrastination – Find your root cause to bypass your distractions.

Tools

RescueTime – Ridiculously easy time management software for freelancers.

Harvest – Time tracking for teams.

Michael Masterson’s Personal Productivity Secrets – An eBook that will help you get more out of each day.

Organization

You won’t be free unless you plan to be.

Tips

Freelance Zone: Organize Your Office Space – Win the war against clutter.

Jarkko Laine: Dream Big, Set Goals and Make Things Happen – Goal-setting and dreaming big can help you get through each day and build for success.

Bootstrapper: 50 Ways to Create a Motivational Workspace – Your workspace has a profound effect on your level of motivation.

Tools

FreshBooks – Invoicing made easy.

SidejobTrack – Job tracking, invoicing, reporting, and project management for part-time independent contractors.

Mozilla Lightning – A calendar that sycronizes with Mozilla Thunderbird, a popular email client.

Google Calendar – There are many options, but this one is great for the Google maniacs out there…such as me!

Remember the Milk – Works with anything Google as well as other applications to send email, SMS, or IM notifications to remind you of your to-do list.

MyStickies – Goodbye bookmarks?

Mobility

The easier it is to access your work, the more you can travel without feeling out of the loop.

Tips

Freelance Folder: What To Do Before You Take Your Business On The Road – Worry less while you’re on the go.

Anywired: Taking Your Show on the Road – 10 tips to help you escape the office.

Anywired: How to Build a Mobile Office and Work From Anywhere – Mobile everything.

Tools

Campfire – Password protected chat rooms for discussing projects with clients.

Meebo – Bringing all the instant messenger programs together under one roof.

Paypal – Send and receive money online.

Zoho – Everything you need to work online.

Windows Live SkyDrive – 5 gigs of online storage with the option to share your files with others.

Google Pack – Great tools for your computer including Skype.

Google Docs – A free alternative to Microsoft Office.

XE – Currency converter for when you’re traveling.

Passive Income

You don’t need it to start developing freedom, but the more of it you have the closer you’ll be to complete freedom.

Tips

GeniusTypes: Passive Income – Brian Lee discusses passive income and the need to eliminate passive expenses.

GeniusTypes: Five Ways to Create Passive Income with Little or No Money – You don’t need to follow all of these methods (or any of them) to develop a passive income, but you need to understand the ideas behind them.

NorthxEast: Writing an eBook For Your Blog – A great way to add some income to your blog.

About.com: Passive Income – How to earn more and work less.

Tools

Microsoft Office Live Small Business – Free website and tools to start an online business today.

Bonus Resources

Education Portal: 7 Universities and Websites Offering Free Business Entrepreneurial Courses Online (found via Anywired)

Sun Microsystems: Open Office – Free software series for writing, photo editing, math, calculating, design, and more.

Zen Habits: Automate Your Income to Simplify Your Life – “No more long to-do lists, no more meetings and days full of calls and emails and co-workers. No more commutes. That’s the ultimate simplification.”

Men With Pens: 27 Secrets to Avoid Internet Burnout – If you find yourself online a lot, this will help you out.

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