Freelance career change at 61: How copywriter Bronwen Armor reinvented her purpose
Want to bulletproof your freelance business and fall back in love with your work? University research shows that combining autonomy, curiosity, and purpose is the ultimate recipe for career fulfilment. When copywriter Bronwen Armor unlocked this mix, her entire life transformed.
Katherine Steiner-Dicks talks to the former PR agency owner about the process she used to rebuild her business and renew her mindset later in life—all while moving abroad and adopting a colourful crew of alpacas and goats.
When a client slowdown forces you to start from scratch at 61, how do you rebuild? For expat copywriter Bronwen Armor, swapping a stressful life of running a Welsh pub for a French farmhouse hosted by adopted alpacas was just the beginning.
If you feel unmotivated or stuck in a professional rut, Bronwen’s remarkable journey proves that combining continuous curiosity with a clear freelance career purpose is the ultimate secret to staying energised, adaptable and driven.
Here we offer steps to achieve this on your terms, as Bron has.
The power of curiosity and purpose
Curiosity and purpose are a brilliant mix. When you combine them, they keep your perspective fresh, energised and driven. Work stops being a chore. Instead, it becomes an exciting journey of discovery for yourself and your clients.
Research on intrinsic motivation shows why this happens. Edward Deci and Richard Ryan at the University of Rochester studied this deeply. Their work proves that exploration lasts longer when it aligns with personal values.
As a freelancer, you do not have a boss to guide you. You must create your own energy. If you understand why new ideas matter, you stay engaged. However, curiosity for curiosity’s sake only gets you so far. It needs a clear direction to lead to any amount of success or outcomes.
Real-life resilience: Restarting at 61 across borders
Self-discovery can happen at any age or point in your business life cycle. Take Bron’s wider experience. Having been self-employed for decades, she co-founded a successful UK agency, only to be unexpectedly let go following a client hiatus.
Suddenly, she was thrust back into solo freelancing. She had to start from scratch after 15 years, sitting in a farmhouse in France, facing a market flooded with competitors, complex cross-border regulations, and the sudden rise of generative AI.
“Regarding working ‘across borders’ as they say, from my experience, having moved here just before Brexit, so five and a half years ago, the transition would have been a lot less stressful if ChatGPT had been around then as a sounding board, provider of answers,” Bron reflects.
She continues, “I don’t speak French and so it was a bit of a minefield which was quite disorientating and unsettling at times. Having to relaunch myself as a freelancer again three years ago was challenging but by reaching out to everyone I knew, I was able to develop my solo business once again, stand on my own two feet and push myself in ways I probably hadn’t for a while.”
I was entering the freelance market in quite a difficult time. AI was just coming to light, and there was a real fear of it… My age, the madness of social media, and how that was what the market wanted. They just wanted social media managers or content creators. So, I was coming back in a complete wash of so-called freelance copywriters. I was quite fearful, really.
Instead of giving up, Bron used curiosity to rebuild. Her immediate reaction was to set up a website to focus on her core offering. She reached out to her network and started teaching herself new tools to compete with digital natives.
Practical steps to success
In the article Putting Curiosity to Work by IE Insights, experts outline distinct ways to turn curiosity into a disciplined strategy. Here is how you can adapt these research-backed tips to find your freelance career purpose:
1. Use deadlines as allies
It is easy to waste time when you explore new ideas. To avoid this, use time limits. Constraints actually enhance your focus. Set firm boundaries around your research. Give yourself one hour to learn a new tool. This pressure sharpens your mind and ensures your inquiry leads to quick action.
2. Focus where it matters
Do not try to learn everything at once. Focus your attention on high-impact moments, particularly during times of market transition. When technology and job skills shifted with AI, Bron dedicated herself to learning Canva, Squarespace, editing in CapCut and how to schedule in Meta.
“Our chat has prompted me to write what I’ve learned this year and the importance of staying curious and learning in order to stand a chance of competing with the digital natives – Canva, Squarespace, CapCut and Meta – and it’s all thanks to ChatGPT that I’ve been able to learn these as I’ve used ‘him’ as a guide and tutor,” Bron says. “Being able to use these tools has certainly added another string to my ever-bending bow.”
“It’s kept me current,” she says. “There would be a tendency to just go, ‘Oh, that’s for the younger people.’ … I spent a long time last year, months and months learning Canva, learning how to build a digital portfolio… which then I feel more confident sending out to potential clients. I’m hugely proud of myself.”
Investing heavily in self-teaching paid off. She created an impressive digital showcase and successfully built a new bilingual platform for a French real estate client, La Gascogne de Marianne. Once again, this wouldn’t have been possible without AI, as Bron uses it to translate her copy into French, then has a native French speaker give it a once-over which has meant she can now support clients locally through content creation and social media management. It has opened up a whole new market.
3. Model curiosity in a visible way
Clients love working with professionals who want to learn. Ask thoughtful questions during briefings and listen actively to their business problems. This approach builds deep trust and opens doors to unexpected opportunities.
Testing yourself can reveal entirely new horizons. Bron recently accepted an invitation from a contact to be a guest speaker for an exclusive group of CEOs, discussing internal communications.
I hate public speaking. I suffer from imposter syndrome. I’m already feeling anxious. But I thought, ‘For God’s sake, you’re 61, just do it. You never know what you might learn about yourself. You might enjoy it’.
This upcoming leap pushed her out of her comfort zone and sparked a powerful vision for her business. Preparing for the talk made her realise she possesses a rare skill for extracting human backstories from corporate leaders. Looking ahead, she is now focusing her future business direction on becoming an executive storyteller, helping leaders share genuine narratives that inspire staff, bypassing vanilla corporate speak.
4. Anchor curiosity in purpose
Connect your exploration to your core values. Remind yourself why you chose independent work or why you’ve been thrust into self-employment and can use the freedom to your advantage. Anchoring your curiosity in purpose brings broader meaning to your efforts, preventing exploration from becoming a mere distraction.
For Bron, purpose meant satisfying a passion to do something good and worthwhile. She began handling the press and PR pro bono for a major charity, the Child of Wales Awards.
The decision to support a charity to satisfy a passion to do something good and worthwhile has opened unexpected doors. This could be a route others could take to both gain experience and network and has helped me identify a service offer: Executive Storytelling for Trust, Culture and Visibility, which I’m now excited to explore.
(You can watch the inspiring work being done by the organisation in the Child of Wales Awards event video).
5. Be like Morph
Bron recently shared a LinkedIn post comparing herself to the plasticine character Morph. Just as he changes shape, she has morphed her skills to suit different life stages and market demands: moving from traditional PR to digital copywriting, website creation, and social media management. This willingness to adapt, rather than being rigidly defined, is what keeps an independent career alive.
As for Bron? Her next creative venture is already underway, channelling her storytelling skills into her personal life. She says, “Now to write my first Substack about goats headlined: ‘They came, they saw, they legged it’.”
Check out Bronwen Armor’s Portfolio or her blog post: Freelance Lessons After 60
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