A recent article in the New York Times by Kermit Pattison on freelancing brought to mind one of my favorite Winston Churchill quotes: "The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."

I recently had a client say he was seeing so much opportunity that he was having a hard time narrowing down what projects to pursue. He started up a technology consulting firm late last year and is considering additional business opportunities.

An executive friend of mine just left a company to start his own real estate development firm, something many people probably find hard to fathom given the real estate situation.

While so many people are lamenting job loss and economic decline, others are seizing the moment to make their dreams and goals come true. Why is that?

Part of the answer lies in that many individuals too often look for security or job openings instead of opportunity.

Long before the current recession, the world of work has been undergoing a radical transformation from globalization and technological advances. In the 1995 best-selling book, Jobshift, William Bridges argued that the move to an information- and service-based economy meant that employment would revert back to a project-based model that had dominated the world prior to the Industrial Revolution.

As mass manufacturing began to take hold early in the Industrial Revolution, the only way to attract workers was for management to offer set hours, wages, and working conditions. Even so, many people balked at the notion, fearing wage slavery because they were accustomed to setting their own working hours and wages based on supply and demand.

In 1998, Bridges authored a new book, Creating You & Co.: Learn To Think Like the CEO of Your Own Company, to help individuals adjust to new employment realities.

Now, more than a decade later, virtual and remote teams are increasingly commonplace. And the way people acquire education has also undergone a transformation made possible by the Internet and 24/7 delivery of educational programming and services. Students can earn reputable degrees online. These are just some of the benefits of globalization and technology.

As Pattison highlighted, more small businesses are turning to the freelance market to find skilled professionals to help them with a wide range of services. That's one reason why recessions often breed new entrepreneurs.

"A new generation of online service marketplaces is giving small companies more opportunities than ever to find specialized expertise and affordable labor," wrote Pattison. Companies are eliminating in- house services to slash costs and turning to independent contractors. Because of downsizing and layoffs, many skilled professionals are entering the freelance marketplace.

Examples of general freelance marketplaces are Guru, Elance, and oDesk. Many types of services are available, including graphic design, creative services, software engineering, IT support, administrative services, data entry, accounting, HR, and marketing.

In just the first quarter of 2009, Elance saw its freelance business more than double over the same time period last year, wrote Pattison. Who are using these services? Elance's CEO said his clients include mom-and-pop retailers, real estate agencies, physicians, and manufacturers.

So if you're attracted by flexibility, variety, and growth potential, then you may well find that freelancing is a great career option.