Contracting as a solo dev is taking on sales and marketing as well as development. You have to charge accordingly. But you also have to be comfortable doing all of those roles, or else you won't have any work.
You seem to have a lot of people on forums like this who are just looking for some magical web form to fill out which will result in money flowing in after a couple of emails. Maybe that exists for some really transactional low-paid small tasks. But, as you say, it's not the reality for most opportunities. In "semi-retirement" (as I prefer to call it), I've contacted various people I know about random possibilities, that may or may not bring in any money, but it keeps doors open.
If that's "torture" (per an upstream comment) I don't know what to say.
