There are so many ways to be a writer.<\/p>\n
Just to start with, there are numerous forms for the written word: poetry, essays, short stories, novels, memoirs, philosophic works, deep reporting, journalism of many types, advertising, plays, movies, television, speeches \u2026<\/p>\n
In the case of fiction in particular, some types are very experimental, some are very commercial, some fit neatly into genre categories \u2014 SF, fantasy, \u201cliterary\u201d, porn \u2014 some don\u2019t fit at all.<\/p>\n
There are best sellers and books that barely sell. There are books that are recognized only after the author is long dead.<\/p>\n
There are probably many very good books that never get noticed. There are many bad books that make lots of money.<\/p>\n
There are a few writers who get rich, a few who get famous. Some win all the prizes; some never even make the short list.<\/p>\n
There are lots of writers with day jobs. Some of them are trying to figure out how to quit their day jobs.<\/p>\n
If what really matters to you is wealth and fame, there are probably easier paths than the creative ones.<\/p>\n
So working on the assumption that you\u2019re not likely to end up wealthy or famous or a Nobel Laureate, what is it that would make you feel successful as a writer?<\/p>\n
I think this is an important question and one that can keep some of us from descending into the sloughs of despair. It\u2019s also useful in helping writers starting out figure out what they really want from their career, which is why I started with an incomplete list of all the ways to be a writer.<\/p>\n
If you can define what you want, you have a metric to determine success. <\/p>\n
And, of course, there are some disconnects in the process. For example, many, many writers would like to quit their day jobs and write full time. This is despite the fact that pretty much all advice on becoming a writer starts with \u201cdon\u2019t quit your day job.\u201d<\/p>\n
(Poets are more sensible about this than fiction writers, because they know the number of poets making a living from poetry is minuscule.)<\/p>\n
Of course, many people who aren\u2019t writers also want to quit their day jobs so they can spend time doing things they enjoy. This is not an unreasonable desire, given how awful many jobs are.<\/p>\n
(I recommend David Graeber\u2019s Bullshit Jobs<\/i> here as a reminder that an incredible number of jobs are not only annoying, but useless for anything except transferring a pittance of money to the worker.)<\/p>\n
Many day jobs can suck all the emotional energy out of you, leaving you with nothing to use when writing. And almost all of them involve putting up with bureaucratic nonsense that makes you want to scream, even if the work itself is fine.<\/p>\n
But here\u2019s the thing: given that very few writers without day jobs are going to hit the level of success that provides financial security without doing a lot of scrambling to make money happen, deciding to go out on your own means you\u2019re going to do all the underpinning work yourself. The freelance life looks wonderful, but there are all those things you have to do besides write.<\/p>\n
For some people, that\u2019s great. Those people, especially if they\u2019re also the kind of writers who can crank out a lot of work regularly, are probably well-suited for hybrid or self-publishing or for turning out successful series in commercial genres.<\/p>\n
For others, it\u2019s a nightmare. They might still want to quit their day job, but what they really want to be is one of those writers we\u2019ve all heard about who is beloved of some editor or publisher that not only publishes everything they do, but makes sure they turn it out and makes sure it gets noticed.<\/p>\n
I think that is harder to find than wealth or fame.<\/p>\n
For those of us not suited for the freelance life who also lack a well-employed spouse or a trust fund or a loving publisher, I suspect the solution is a day job that doesn\u2019t drain you dry.<\/p>\n
And here\u2019s another question: what about a writing day job?<\/p>\n
Some years back, I was seeing an acupuncturist for various aches and admitted that I was also feeling very stressed because of trying to balance my day job (which was as a legal journalist), my fiction writing, and my Aikido training.<\/p>\n
She asked if I couldn\u2019t be satisfied with the writing I did in my day job.<\/p>\n
The answer wasn\u2019t just \u201cNo.\u201d It was \u201cHell, no.\u201d I was, in fact, shocked that she even considered it.<\/p>\n
Because while I did write in the day job and did find it satisfactory work, it did not feed my soul the way writing fiction does.<\/p>\n
Nothing feeds my soul the way writing something that matters to me \u2013 which, by the way, includes essays and poetry as well as stories \u2013 does.<\/p>\n
(Nothing feeds my soul the way physical movement does, either, which is why giving up Aikido or the other stuff I do these days has never been an option.)<\/p>\n
In my case, that day job was probably the best of all possible choices. It has, in fact, enabled me to retire comfortably with a pension and savings. It was interesting work, taught me a lot about writing on the sentence level, and it didn\u2019t go home with me.<\/p>\n
There might not have been enough hours in the day for everything \u2013 the perfect job for me probably would have been half-time, but I couldn\u2019t afford that \u2013 but in the end it worked out pretty well. I wrote a lot of short stories, though I didn\u2019t really get around to novels until I retired.<\/p>\n
So that brings me back to what I consider success. At one point it was quitting my day job and supporting myself with my own writing. That one never worked out and was probably as pie-in-the-sky as fame and fortune (which I don\u2019t think I cared much about) and having a publisher\/editor who loved my work and made it possible for me to do it (which I probably did desire).<\/p>\n
Now I think my definition of success is to write things that matter to me, have them published, and have them acknowledged and respected.<\/p>\n
That first point is important: it isn\u2019t just writing, but writing things that matter to me, that defines success for me.<\/p>\n
That may not be true for you. For some people, making a living from writing might be more important than writing their own material. In my case, I did make a living writing, but that didn\u2019t meet my definition of writing success.<\/p>\n
I know plenty of people who like to write novelizations, just as an example of something that I would only do if I were desperate for money. I\u2019d much rather cover legal matters and analyze legal opinions than write novelizations.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m pretty sure there are also people who are happy writing about legal matters and don\u2019t feel the need to write other things. There are a lot of good people doing that these days \u2013 mostly people like me who realized they didn\u2019t want to practice law \u2013 and some of them are doing it on their terms.<\/p>\n
But even if I had Elie Mystal\u2019s or Dahlia Lithwick\u2019s jobs, which allow them much more scope in critiquing the law than mine ever did, I don\u2019t think that\u2019s all I\u2019d want to write about.<\/p>\n
The trick here is figuring out what works for you, what leaves you satisfied at the end of the day, what makes you feel like you\u2019ve done the work you needed to do.<\/p>\n
People have different answers to this question. Find yours.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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