The Freelance Emotional Price Tag
Mental health looks different when you work alone.
Sure, freelancing can be freeing. Everyone loves to talk about how you get to set your hours, choose your projects, and build your work around your life. But there’s another side which is not so fun to talk about.
This is Part 1 of a multi-part series on freelancing and mental health. Hang on, ‘cause it’s going to get worse before it gets better.
The numbers tell the story
Since COVID-19, more people are choosing to freelance across industries. Yet, as COVID proved, the world they're all choosing to freelance in is very uncertain. For example, artificial intelligence (AI) taking all the jobs is something I wrote about recently.
Work is evolving fast, and the numbers show that freelancers don’t have the systems they need to support themselves. Here are some of the stats reported in the last four years:
- 35% of freelancers say their work is frequently impaired by stress or anxiety
- 41% were unable to work at some point due to mental health issues
- 42.9% report burnout caused by working long hours
- 55% have experienced depression related to their work
- 62% report feeling stressed by their work
- 64% feel lonely every day
- 64.3% report burnout from poor work–life balance
- 71% experienced feelings of isolation or disconnection in the past year
Freedom doesn’t equal safety
Traditional jobs come with hidden guardrails. You might not have noticed them, but consider for a moment that:
- Someone else sets your schedule
- You have colleagues
- You have policies, processes, and a payroll system
Freelancing doesn’t have that. You’re in charge of everything, but while that sounds empowering, it can also expose you:
- Your income is unpredictable
- Your work-life balance blurs
- You have fewer people to lean on
- Your successes and failures feel deeply personal
> Although gig workers obtained the manifest and financial benefits of employment on mental health and life satisfaction compared with the unemployed, they did not obtain similar financial and social connection benefits compared with traditional workers.
Wait, what? Freelancing is better compared to being unemployed. Am I reading that right? Yup. I am. Gee, you don’t say.
The study also points out that autonomy alone isn’t enough. Without those invisible structures in place, the freedom of freelancing can actually make stress worse.
Which brings me to my next point:
Most freelancers spend their early years in the dark
I’ve freelanced in sound engineering, video editing, and photography, and I’ve started two business ventures that failed spectacularly.
But the failing isn’t the hardest part. It’s the silence. There’s something about putting yourself out there again and again that has a way of getting nothing back that can really defeat you.
When you get nothing back—no response, no feedback, not even a no—it starts to get into your head. You start to believe it’s not the work that’s lacking, it’s you.
If all this feels a bit familiar, you’re not imagining it. Burnout doesn’t wear a name tag. But there are signs, and once you start noticing them, they’re hard to miss.
Am I burned out?
There’s no blood test for burnout. But here are a few signs that show up often:
- You can’t unplug, even when you try.
- You’re working nonstop, but feel like you’re spinning your wheels.
- Your empty inbox gives you anxiety.
- Criticism hurts more than it should. Praise barely registers.
Mental health isn’t a side issue in freelancing. It’s the base you build everything else on. So in Part 2, we’ll also look at what the science actually says helps when you’re carrying it all on your own.
References
Leapers. (2022). Mental health of freelancers and the Self-Employed in 2022. https://www.leapers.co/research/2022/report
Overdevest, L. (2025, March 12). The Freelancer Loneliness Survey. The Viking Blog. https://blog/.viking-direct.co.uk/freelancer-loneliness-survey/
Reclaim. (2022, October 7). Burnout Trends Report: 200+ Employee stress Stats by Department. https://reclaim.ai/blog/burnout-trends-report
Wang, S., Li, L. Z., & Coutts, A. (2022). National survey of mental health and life satisfaction of gig workers: the role of loneliness and financial precarity. BMJ Open, 12(12), e066389. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2022-066389