Congratulations to Evelyn Durnell for Winning the October 2025 Barefoot Writing Challenge! (Your $100 prize is on its way!)
The challenge was to write an essay that answered this prompt:
If you could change one thing about what you’ve done so far to achieve your paid writing dream, what would it be?
Evelyn shared a relatable story about retrospect and present-day action. Enjoy her winning submission:
The One Thing I Wish I’d Known 15 Years Ago
If I could change one thing about my journey to becoming a paid copywriter, it wouldn’t be a tactical mistake. It would be time itself.
I wish I had discovered AWAI 15 years ago.
Here’s the math that haunts me: If I had started building my persuasive copywriting business in 2010 instead of 2025, and earned just $50,000 annually (a modest goal for a skilled copywriter), that’s $750,000 in income I left on the table. But it’s not really about the money I didn’t make — it’s about the life I didn’t live.
For 25 years, I’ve worked in health care as a nurse, cosmetologist, and prior-authorization specialist. I’ve comforted anxious patients before procedures, explained complex insurance denials, and bridged the gap between medical necessity and coverage approvals. I loved helping people, but I was trading time for money, missing my grandchildren’s milestones, and wondering if retirement would ever be possible.
The irony? I was sitting on a gold mine the entire time.
My unique trifecta of nursing knowledge, aesthetic experience, and insurance expertise makes me the perfect copywriter for the booming medical aesthetics industry. I speak patient, provider, and payer fluently. I understand why a 52-year-old woman hesitates before booking that first Botox appointment, what doctors need to hear to trust a new dermal filler, and exactly how to position treatments to maximize insurance reimbursement potential.
But I didn’t know copywriting was a career. I didn’t know AWAI existed. I didn’t know I could turn my expertise into six figures while working from anywhere.
Now, I’ve built everything: my website with regular blog posts, my LLC with EIN and CPA, a FreshBooks invoicing system, AWAI business templates, a LinkedIn presence with my newsletter The Copy Rx, 500+ connections, and a growing portfolio of sales letters, email sequences, and conversion-focused content. I’m a Circle of Success member, showing up to weekly coaching calls, implementing Steve Slaunwhite’s strategies, commenting on five posts daily to build relationships, and actively building my email list.
I’m doing everything right now. But I’m 15 years late.
If I could go back, I’d tell my younger self: “That feeling you get when you explain a complicated procedure to a scared patient and watch their face relax with understanding? That’s copywriting. You can do this for aesthetic clinics, med spas, and health care companies — and earn the freedom you crave.”
I’d tell her not to wait. Not to doubt. Not to think she needed permission.
My paid writing dream — the true Barefoot Writer’s life — is earning six figures as a freelance copywriter while taking my grandchildren on vacations, being present for family moments, and building wealth instead of worrying about retirement.
I can’t get back those 15 years. But I can make sure no other health care professional with a story to tell and expertise to share makes the same mistake.
The best time to start was 15 years ago. The second-best time is now.
And I’m finally running.
