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That rant I've been talking about... I've been spending so much time thinking about it, and honestly, I really think that I've been chasing a pipe dream for far too many years.
Amateur.
It's a dirty word, isn't it? It's what people say when they want to insult their peers' ability, or their experience. Never mind that I've met amateurs in various fields that would blow certified professionals out of the water with their skill or their experience or their passion for the work. "Amateur" is still treated as an insult, because they don't get paid for it. Since the professionals earn money for what they do, they must be better, more worthy.
I've been spending a lot of time thinking about this in the last few days. You see, I've been writing for a very, very long time. I've never clocked myself, but I'm pretty sure that I've spent over ten thousand hours writing so far during my lifetime - and it's the only thing that I've spent that much time on over the years. I've spent a lot of time doing it, I've spent a lot of time studying it, and I've dreamed of being a professional writer for... I don't even know how long, to be honest. Probably since high school, when I calmed down enough to actually write, and got my first story published in some high-school journal.
But I've been thinking. Do I really have it in me to be a professional writer, to actually earn an income off of what I write? For that matter, when everything is said and done, is that what I really want to do with my life?
There's no doubt in my mind that I enjoy writing itself. It's one of my favorite things. The feeling that I get when everything comes together and I can entertain people and make them think is a fantastic feeling, and I love it and I always will. But making a living off of it... I'm reminded of something that my roommate said, once, when we were talking about his college work. He has always loved computers, so he's studying programming, specifically hardware programming... and he hates it. He hates something that he's loved for years, because he's studying to make a living off of it.
I've already had moments when I hated writing because of the pressure involved. I think that's going to get many, many times worse if I ever go professional. As in, if I have strict deadlines that I have to meet to get food on the table. If I have to write and rewrite to suit publishers and editors and critics who are never going to be entirely pleased anyway. If I ever have to write something that I really don't care about, or even like, for the sake of a contract. And I don't want to hate writing. I just want to tell stories.
Besides, let's look at the facts, here. I met last year's word count goal, and exceeded it. Two hundred and fifty thousand words. That, for reference, is approximately five hundred pages, which would be a respectable length for a novel and would hold an awful lot of short stories. When I first started on this goal last January, I started at least ten original projects during that month alone. And now, a full year later, how many of them do you think are finished? Have I managed to see a single idea through to completion, or even to a finished rough draft? No, not a single one. Seriously, the ONLY stories that I've managed to see through to something close to the end this year were started in either November or December, for a fanfiction exchange. Even when I try to force myself to work on the other projects, as so many published authors suggest that the amateurs do so that they can join their prestigious ranks, it doesn't work. I hit a wall until I switch to another project, and with all of the switching I've done you would really think that at least one thing would've been finished by now.
Unless something in me just really dreads the next step enough to not want to finish them at all. I really think that's the main problem. I have a much easier time writing something - anything - that I know is unpublishable for whatever reason. If I'm writing original fiction that could conceivably be put on the market, I often choke, and I never managed to finish anything.
I'm not accomplishing anything, and I know it. I mean, I enjoy writing. I have fun with it. I just don't think I'm really cut out to make a living off of it. I enjoy the craft and the art of writing, but I don't know how to deal with the mechanism that waits behind it. So no, I'm not going to give up writing because I love it too much, but I don't think that I'm ever going to be a professional. I'll be an amateur. And I'm not going to let that be an insult anymore, because being an amateur, in a way, requires more dedication than being a professional; it means that you're giving up your free time to do something, if it's something that isn't earning you a paycheck.
I have to say, though, that admitting it is really, really hard. Part of me wants to delete this whole rant and keep right on chasing the pipe dream, because it doesn't know what else to do. It thinks I've spent too much time writing NOT to try to make money off of it. It thinks that my only alternatives are to be a writer, or to spend the rest of my life at the same dead-end job that I'm at now, or to sit around the house letting someone else support me and not really accomplishing anything. I really think that most of the reason that I'm still trying to be a writer is because I want to defy that feeling, but even though I'm not really accomplishing anything, I stick with it because doing something else would be harder.
Let's be honest, I don't know what else I would do. I'm afraid to try to find out. Actually, no, it goes deeper than that. I don't even know how to start pursuing something else without bankrupting myself (in the emotional, physical or financial sense... probably all three, truth be told.) Worse, I have no idea what to pursue and I'm currently depressed and confused to the point that I can't bring myself to care. I'm afraid that I'm probably going to end up doing a lot of running around in circles and wasting a lot of time and energy and money, when I do not have anything close to an ample store of any of the three.
Still. Maybe I can at least find something that I want to try, or find things that I know I don't want to do and go from there. I'm not happy with the way things stand. I have to do something different, or I'll be in the exact same place ten years from now, and still unhappy.
At least I have a few other ideas. Granted, I have no real clue how to learn more about them without spending money I don't have, but I'll just have to do research and find out. It can't be impossible. I know too many others who've done it.
I have to try something new. The old way isn't working.
Amateur.
It's a dirty word, isn't it? It's what people say when they want to insult their peers' ability, or their experience. Never mind that I've met amateurs in various fields that would blow certified professionals out of the water with their skill or their experience or their passion for the work. "Amateur" is still treated as an insult, because they don't get paid for it. Since the professionals earn money for what they do, they must be better, more worthy.
I've been spending a lot of time thinking about this in the last few days. You see, I've been writing for a very, very long time. I've never clocked myself, but I'm pretty sure that I've spent over ten thousand hours writing so far during my lifetime - and it's the only thing that I've spent that much time on over the years. I've spent a lot of time doing it, I've spent a lot of time studying it, and I've dreamed of being a professional writer for... I don't even know how long, to be honest. Probably since high school, when I calmed down enough to actually write, and got my first story published in some high-school journal.
But I've been thinking. Do I really have it in me to be a professional writer, to actually earn an income off of what I write? For that matter, when everything is said and done, is that what I really want to do with my life?
There's no doubt in my mind that I enjoy writing itself. It's one of my favorite things. The feeling that I get when everything comes together and I can entertain people and make them think is a fantastic feeling, and I love it and I always will. But making a living off of it... I'm reminded of something that my roommate said, once, when we were talking about his college work. He has always loved computers, so he's studying programming, specifically hardware programming... and he hates it. He hates something that he's loved for years, because he's studying to make a living off of it.
I've already had moments when I hated writing because of the pressure involved. I think that's going to get many, many times worse if I ever go professional. As in, if I have strict deadlines that I have to meet to get food on the table. If I have to write and rewrite to suit publishers and editors and critics who are never going to be entirely pleased anyway. If I ever have to write something that I really don't care about, or even like, for the sake of a contract. And I don't want to hate writing. I just want to tell stories.
Besides, let's look at the facts, here. I met last year's word count goal, and exceeded it. Two hundred and fifty thousand words. That, for reference, is approximately five hundred pages, which would be a respectable length for a novel and would hold an awful lot of short stories. When I first started on this goal last January, I started at least ten original projects during that month alone. And now, a full year later, how many of them do you think are finished? Have I managed to see a single idea through to completion, or even to a finished rough draft? No, not a single one. Seriously, the ONLY stories that I've managed to see through to something close to the end this year were started in either November or December, for a fanfiction exchange. Even when I try to force myself to work on the other projects, as so many published authors suggest that the amateurs do so that they can join their prestigious ranks, it doesn't work. I hit a wall until I switch to another project, and with all of the switching I've done you would really think that at least one thing would've been finished by now.
Unless something in me just really dreads the next step enough to not want to finish them at all. I really think that's the main problem. I have a much easier time writing something - anything - that I know is unpublishable for whatever reason. If I'm writing original fiction that could conceivably be put on the market, I often choke, and I never managed to finish anything.
I'm not accomplishing anything, and I know it. I mean, I enjoy writing. I have fun with it. I just don't think I'm really cut out to make a living off of it. I enjoy the craft and the art of writing, but I don't know how to deal with the mechanism that waits behind it. So no, I'm not going to give up writing because I love it too much, but I don't think that I'm ever going to be a professional. I'll be an amateur. And I'm not going to let that be an insult anymore, because being an amateur, in a way, requires more dedication than being a professional; it means that you're giving up your free time to do something, if it's something that isn't earning you a paycheck.
I have to say, though, that admitting it is really, really hard. Part of me wants to delete this whole rant and keep right on chasing the pipe dream, because it doesn't know what else to do. It thinks I've spent too much time writing NOT to try to make money off of it. It thinks that my only alternatives are to be a writer, or to spend the rest of my life at the same dead-end job that I'm at now, or to sit around the house letting someone else support me and not really accomplishing anything. I really think that most of the reason that I'm still trying to be a writer is because I want to defy that feeling, but even though I'm not really accomplishing anything, I stick with it because doing something else would be harder.
Let's be honest, I don't know what else I would do. I'm afraid to try to find out. Actually, no, it goes deeper than that. I don't even know how to start pursuing something else without bankrupting myself (in the emotional, physical or financial sense... probably all three, truth be told.) Worse, I have no idea what to pursue and I'm currently depressed and confused to the point that I can't bring myself to care. I'm afraid that I'm probably going to end up doing a lot of running around in circles and wasting a lot of time and energy and money, when I do not have anything close to an ample store of any of the three.
Still. Maybe I can at least find something that I want to try, or find things that I know I don't want to do and go from there. I'm not happy with the way things stand. I have to do something different, or I'll be in the exact same place ten years from now, and still unhappy.
At least I have a few other ideas. Granted, I have no real clue how to learn more about them without spending money I don't have, but I'll just have to do research and find out. It can't be impossible. I know too many others who've done it.
I have to try something new. The old way isn't working.
