Another Girl at Play - Women Artists Making Creative Dreams Real

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AUGUST 2002

Last month, I tried to buy art from my artist friend but she had no interest in taking my money. Instead she offered to swap art - I would get her fabulous cards and she'd get one of my prints.

My first reaction was, "that's not a fair swap for her. My art isn't worth as much."

However, after thinking about it I decided if she felt comfortable enough to make the offer, I should be comfortable enough to accept. I did and that changed everything.

July brought me a lot of projects that I needed help with. For my book proposal I needed to find someone that knew how to bind books - and I did. She gladly offered her services to me, being patient with all my requests and information. When I asked her what kind of payment she wanted, she was shocked.

"Oh, no payment!" she said.

"But your time and effort is worth something," I told her. "If you don't want payment, perhaps I could send you some of my art?"

This, she was excited about and gladly accepted.

I called on another friend for an illustration, which she quickly accepted and completed. Again when I approached the subject of payment, she told me not to worry - she was happy to do it. Again I told her that her time and effort was worth something and offered her a trade instead, which she too, accepted.

There were several of these instances where I needed help and people give it to me freely and rejected payment. They all thought their product or service "wasn't worth something because I'd do it happily for free!"

I understand. It wasn't until I read Emira & Lauren's profile on the Another Girl at Play site that I realised I, too, had been selling myself short. They said, "Don't undersell yourself. We've found that a lot of people -- women especially -- who are starting their own businesses don't create business plans that will pay them enough to live well. It's true that you may spend a few months, or even a couple of years, building up the business and scraping by (and racking up your credit cards), but you'll burn out pretty quickly if you can't see the light at the end of the tunnel. Plan to pay yourself what you're worth; build in a health plan budget; try not to touch your tax money; and basically treat yourself like a valued employee."

As women, we tend to sell ourselves short for many reasons - lack of confidence, trying to be nice, just getting started. But at some point, we have to realise and accept that our efforts and products are worth something and it's OK to say so, especially if we're running a business.

The old saying says to find something you're passionate about and figure out how to get paid for it. I'd like to add, "and figure out a way to be comfortable about being paid for it" because our efforts and our products are worth something. We just have to learn to say so.