Don’t Quit Your Job But Follow Your Passion
Below I cover quite the controversial topic in my latest blog post below. This was inspired in part by a Struthless Youtube video. He considers work: low risk, low reward, and passion: high risk, high reward. An interesting thought for sure, but that might or might not be true for us all. I discuss my takes on this topic and my personal experience with the highs and lows of this kind of life structure.
That phrase “quit your job and follow your passion” is scary and big, and while I think a lot of people should do this, maybe its an “eventually thing”, here is the stop gap. I haven’t yet! In fact I just got a new job, so I’m not going anywhere in a while. Of course, if you can make this work and you wish to make your creativity into a source of income, then please, go ahead. You should do what makes you happy. All I have below are my thoughts and experience. However, I think not all people should eventually quit their work to follow creative passion.
Turning your passion into work can lead to dark things where you are only thinking about art in commodifying terms. A few examples of this include: Jumping on trends. This is something that is essential for creative work as income (especially in the beginning). It can be a real mental drag that has peaks and troughs, and can stop you from actually honing your true craft. In the modern world, it will lead you to spending more time on social media, (like any of us need that). You will need to spend time hunting for gig work. This one I struggled with the most the constant need to search for work and never feeling like I could say no to any opportunity that came up. The worst outcome is that it might result in you switching from creating art you enjoy, too potentially something you don’t. This is something that is the death of most creative careers, in my experience.
Your “day” job can provide many good things in your life. Obviously each industry will have different perks and struggles, however the ability to grow as a person cannot be understated. These good things are wide in scope. It gives you purpose outside of your art. Even if this only includes the personal gain of “time to think about something else, while your creative well fills”, this can be very important. Sometimes in your work, you are helping people (depending on the industry). It can bring a sense of community. Your work mates provide more outlets for communication and viewing the world through others’ eyes. A stable schedule. This can give you time to work on your art in a more structured approach. Challenge in a different way to your creativity. This has been the biggest thing for me. In my creative life, I am my own boss. In my work life, I have direct reports and staff who I manage. I would never get that opportunity in my creative life to explore those skills. You can begin exploring other parts of yourself. The time to think about other parts of your professional development and “soft skills” are really important. You might learn some new skills and be able to apply that to your creative career, such as finances for example. One of the biggest is something people don’t consider: teaching you things about people and professionalism. The need to learn less selfish tendencies, learning more appropriate conversational skills, managing up and being around many other people: can all give you an edge in the creative life you pursue.
You gain the benefit of a constant cash supply (and stability for you and those you love). This also includes the benefits of superannuation, money for insurance and constant savings. This is essential and might be the tilting factor for those who do have loved ones they need to support. I bring this up separately, because it is a key one. While talking about this, I recommend that the work you choose brings you the right balance of challenge, hours and income. You want to have spare time time to work on your creative endeavours, so a job that forces you to work long hours won’t facilitate this. You want challenge and a rewarding career, so the type of level you are at and the type of work you do is important. However, you don’t want it so challenging that you have no energy to work on creative projects. I have struggled with this. I find it ebbs and flows. Overall there is balance, but over day-to-day experiences, you might not see the balance as clearly. You also obviously want enough income so that you can support yourself and your family, comfortably. The balance between these is tough to figure out, but I know you will find it.
I have worked in creative roles before. From live sound, to lecturing, gig promoter, paid performances and paid technical roles on larger art exhibitions. These have been hard to find consistent work in. I have struggled with work to pay ratios, that seem to get less and less fair. It has meant I have had to work several gigs at once. Personally, I find that trying to find embedded creative roles are most fulfilling. I have worked corporate audio/visual gigs for a larger company. Doing this work paid well, had more consistent hours and gave me the flexibility I needed to my other creative work. I have worked doing marketing and comms for university departments. This has helped me learn more creative skills like mailing list development, social media analytics and website design practice. For more on my career, see here.
Following your creativity is something that I truly believe in. I encourage everyone to do it. A lot of people who don’t follow a creative life ((in or outside of work), can often refer to the practice of following creative work outside your “day job” as a “hobby”. I truly hate this word. It diminishes the importance of the work us creatives do. We have trained (either through institutional or practiced education) for hours of our lives to get our art to where it is today. I encourage those to still make art that inspires themselves and others, to do the occasional paid gig that interested you. To merely call it a hobby, is disrespectful. Something else I preach to those that want to get started on their creative journey, is that you should do what do enjoy spending your life doing. Find work and creative endeavours that you enjoy. Work (as mentioned above) can be challenging and fulfilling in many ways. You should try to do something in that space, that you enjoy. While it brings you income. By not having to make your art, your source of income, you have the freedom and flexibility to make art that truly aligns with your goals. This could be more people seeing it, to creative expression. Whatever it is, do and explore what you love.
While having a job you can still do all of the things you would normally do if it was your job. The biggest difference, is that you have more time to do so. Dear reader, you may think this is a contradiction. You may be thinking “but if it was my job, I wouldn’t have to go to my other work for eight hours a day”. What I mean is that you have the time to develop your craft at your own pace, as you don’t have to rely on that income stream. You have time to build a brand authentically. This takes dedicated focus time and you can dedicate many evenings or off periods to this. You can develop your craft. This includes, spending the right amount of time with your work until you want to release something. It could be saving money from your day job to get the right gear you need to improve your outputs. It gives you time to explore the creativity path that actually inspires you. It allows you to find what you want to do by practicing many creative outlets. You will see with my blog recently that I have explored many creative outlets. The freedom to do this, and not stick to one creative niche that gives you the most online clicks, is very clearing for the mind. Finally it can allow you to find what can actually give you a financial extra. This means it gives you the time to search for the things you couldn’t in the first paragraph of this piece.
The the biggest question I see is “how do I find time to explore creativity out of work hours?” I know its hard and you’re tired. We have all been there. I find the most effective approach is to schedule dedicated work time. I have set activities I do every week, (see more on that here). I work on these all throughout the week, but I have a deadline of the Sunday to post and schedule all of my next weeks work. This does mean that sometimes, I spend several hours in one afternoon working away. This is ok, because I am still keeping up my mantra: Keep up the work, keep up the work, keep up the work. I have turned some of my passive creative outlets into creative work. I turned listening to music into writing mini reviews (see my latest one here).
I always recommend that you spend the spare time doing meaningful, creationist activities, instead of watching/listening to things that turn your brain off. This means that sometimes when you come home from work, you write a poem, instead of watching television. It means that on your bus ride home, you listen to a creative interview podcast, instead of that latest YouTube video about pyramids. Thinking about creativity means you are more ready to do it when you have allocated time. I am still an advocate of taking breaks and self care, of course. However, a few nights a week, spending an hour or two on a creative activity will see big results in the long run. I find my creative work freeing and fun, so I definitely do not mind doing it of a night time. I also recommend that you spend a portion of your holidays having “creative sabbaticals”. This dedicated time can yield great results, and be a self care activity, when you have some build up projects that need finishing. Your time-off activities can be creative in nature. Reading, video games, films and listening to music; all promote creativity.
The main thing I can suggest is that you plan. Having a plan of things you want to post, letting that create your path and setting future goals can yield great outcomes. It promotes consistency and constant work towards your outcomes. Even if the goals aren’t grandiose but just “things I want to achieve this week”, and then “this month”, and then “this year”. It all counts. Trying many creative paths will lead you to a small project that eventually becomes a big one. A personal example is like me writing graphic scores every day for almost a year became, made me want to write a small book about this (still in the works).
If you re wanting to incorporate more paid creative work into your life, I recommend that you start small. Take on projects you are passionate about, and eventually paid work will come around if you share your exisiting portfolio to the right places! You can choose what paid creative jobs you want to do, rather than needing to do all of them that come up. Best of luck in your creative endeavours and stay strong. I believe in you.
