Reflecting on 2025

2025 was the year I started something I’ve been wanting to do for a very long time: freelancing.

I had already been a freelancer twelve years ago, and it did not go well. I was working too much, for too little, and some clients never paid me for my work. I was young(er) but I learned my lesson: freelancing is a whole extra job, on top of your core offering.

So when the opportunity arose last year, I knew I needed to get better at being a “company”.

A year of freelancing

I started freelancing at the very end of 2024. After a taxing four-month job search – that only emphasized how broken some tech companies are – I decided to switch my approach.

I reached out to Sunny – an internet pal I’ve known for years – and asked him if he needed an extra pair of hands to ship more features for his company Cults. And he said “yes”.

A week later, Yves – a Le Wagon alumnus – asked me if I was available to help his team tackle their more complex tasks and get some of their velocity back. And I said “yes”.

Both clients needed half of my time. So I was able to fill my week almost instantly.

Working with both Sunny and Yves has been an absolute joy. Some cool projects I built for them even inspired some recent posts on this blog.

Professional wins

My professional goal for 2025 was to survive the year. Between layoffs, AI coming for our jobs, and the overall LinkedIn-ish narrative, it felt as if I was doomed to switch careers (again).

And yet, in case you didn’t notice already, 2025 was a good year for me work-wise:

• Two happy clients with whom I built (and keep building) a relationship based on trust, values and value. You can’t get better than that.
• A lot of projects shipped and billed which leaves me with a full year of runway.
• A solid progression both technically and product-wise:
  • I’ve kept digging into Ruby and Rails internals.
  • I discovered new patterns and products.
  • I worked hard to make sense of Typesense (pun intended).
  • I’ve started building some foundational knowledge back on the front-end side of things (HTML, CSS, JS and the whole Hotwire).
• A lot of impactful features were shipped with little to no disruption for users. Some were critical and done on a tight schedule.
• Working with two teams allowed me to create bridges, and to apply what I had learned within one codebase to the other.
• I worked on my tooling and processes, which allowed me to deliver faster and better.
• In early 2025, I joined a local cooperative to which I delegate most of my admin. It’s a great way to reclaim ownership of my work environment, and the people there are both great and super helpful. This has proven to be a true multiplier for me.
• From the get-go, I knew I needed to work on how to run my business. I built simple processes for time tracking, invoicing, note-taking, etc. This has allowed me to spend less time on boring tasks and more time on being a true partner for both teams.

An aparte on the job market

Whether you’re looking for a job or a freelance gig, the market has been rough for a few years now. Let’s not even talk about the rest. *gestures wildly at everything that has happened in the world*

But here’s my main takeaway: a lot of the “hot” companies from a few years ago now have ridiculous expectations for candidates, while offering very little in return. This has created an interesting shift: companies that weren’t sexy now attract great people. And great people get to work with smaller teams, cooler products, and often healthier finances.

Personal wins

I don’t like to share personal stuff on the blog. There, I said it! What can I do, I’m a very private person. But I’ll make an exception today.

The five coolest things I did this year:

• Making time for my family: Wednesday afternoons with the kids, lots of time off during school holidays, and a real effort to make the little ones active participants in our family life.
• Keep working on my relationship with my partner of 16 years 🫶.
• Getting my health in a better place: resumed boxing after a 10-year hiatus, finally got treatment for my allergies.
• Working on my friendships: It won’t come as a surprise if I say men usually suck at understanding what makes a friendship and how to nurture one? Well, I worked on that. And I’m happy about it.
• Realized I’m likely ADHD and/or on the spectrum: Not through a formal diagnosis, but by ticking boxes as others got theirs. I also stopped masking, and started learning what actually works for me.

Manifesting for 2026

As I said earlier, my professional goal for 2025 was to survive the year. And I think I’ll keep this as one of my goals for 2026.

But I also want to leverage this good first year to plant some seeds.

Here’s what I’m planning:

• Make my clients happy: This one goes without saying. I’ll keep delivering great features, good communication, and value to the people trusting me with their business.
• Learn HTML and CSS from the ground up: I want to develop a deeper appreciation for these languages (and build more stuff with ‘em)!
• Invest in my freelancing practice: Time, money, work on website, nail my main value proposition, write more, etc.
• Get help: I can’t do everything alone. This year, I’ll invest in getting help. Most notably, I need help building stronger foundations for my business and shaping a new offer.
• Meet people as people: In the age of LLMs and the content rat race, I believe genuine connections will matter more than ever. I plan on going to more Rubyist meetups, joining some Cults folks at Rubicon in Rimini in May, and simply getting a lot more genuine human interaction.

If you’ve made it all the way to the end, thank you for reading words written by a human. You rock! (And do know I have a RSS feed? Just saying.)

Cheers,

Rémi - @remi@ruby.social