Hey guys! 👋
Okay, this is the post I didn’t expect to write.
When I thought about diversifying my income as a designer/solopreneur, I pictured the usual suspects: Figma templates, icon sets, illustrations, maybe even career advice kits or checklists. But getting paid for writing? Nope, never crossed my mind.
I’m a visual person. Writing isn’t something I naturally enjoy, and English isn’t even my first language. I’m from Belarus, lived in Poland for five years, and have never been to the US — even though 90% of my clients and design network are based there.
It takes me a huge amount of effort, endless rounds with ChatGPT, and a human sacrifice (aka my partner, who proofreads everything) just to finish a single post. Even Instagram captions feel like a stretch.
But visual work? I could make illustrations and thumbnails for hours without blinking.
And yet… here we are.
Screenshot from my Medium stats page
Last month, I earned $350 USD on Medium from a single article I originally wrote for my newsletter.
Was it a lot? No.
Was it satisfying? Absolutely.
Because passive income is the kind of income that keeps giving — you do something once, and it keeps working for you. That $350 didn’t come from a design gig, or a client, or hours of deliverables. It came from hitting publish on something I already had.
Here’s how it happened (and how you might do it too):
Write about stuff no one’s talking about
Living and working across different cultures as a digital nomad made me notice all sorts of design differences. One question kept nagging at me: Why do Western and Asian interfaces feel so different? I couldn’t find a solid answer online — just scattered bits, nothing deep.
