Good to hear that you realized that management is not for you; it's not for everyone.
Alas, being a consultant is a lot about being in sales, how are your selling skills?
I think for a while you need to continue what you're doing, as you're doing; AND - along the way - investigate ways on where to bring your consultancy. Besides the usual suspects of books on selling, I also recommend the following reading:
I don't really know. I never learned sales, but I sold Kotlin to a lot of companies successfully in the last few years. It is something that I think I can do if I put the time in.
What if you simply found a few projects people are working on and consulted for them until they got their MVP to market and iteratively improve the product market fit until they have a revenue stream that allows them to pay you for the work you've done? Then you can use that income to do it again for some new projects and get a good reputation built up. I believe you need to initially build a reputation in order to have something to attract clients. It's something I'm doing currently on the side. I both want to see my friends become successful and I also believe if my skills can help them achieve their goals it will validate my strategy. I have about 3 years of pre-sales engineering experience and lots of software development experience so I'm not far off from where you are it sounds like. Best wishes, I hope you find a nice groove :)
Alas, being a consultant is a lot about being in sales, how are your selling skills?
I think for a while you need to continue what you're doing, as you're doing; AND - along the way - investigate ways on where to bring your consultancy. Besides the usual suspects of books on selling, I also recommend the following reading:
* So Good They Can't Ignore You: Why Skills Trump Passion in the Quest for Work You Love * https://www.joelonsoftware.com/ * Rework * Little Bets * http://www.paulgraham.com/articles.html