A Guide for My Fellow Sell-Outs
Am I a hack? Or just a realist?
I had a vision when I joined Medium. I would write about my passions, my feelings, and my dreams. The crowd would go wild! I’d sit on a yacht in the Bahamas and fritter away my royalty cheques under a tropical sunset.
Okay, maybe I was a tad more realistic than that. But I did believe that reflections on my childhood traumas would draw more attention than they ever did. Articles about my obscure interests entertained my friends, but they didn’t bring in the claps or pay the bills. I soon realised that if I wanted to get traction on Medium, I’d need to pay more attention to what readers would click on as opposed to indulging my own whims.
I knew what it was that people wanted from me. It had been my day job for eight years. It paid my mortgage. It motivated people to send me emails in the early hours of the morning. Sometimes it made me pound my desk in frustration.
People wanted me to help them write.
As soon as I started writing about writing, I got curated. I got accepted into publications. I got new followers. And, on top of all the good stuff, I started to worry about work corrupting my passion. Is this really who I want to be as a Medium author? Is this really the kind of writing that’s best for my heart and soul?
This is a dilemma that many people in the creative industries face. Educating others in our craft is often the best way to make a living. I know several musicians who perform for free and make an income from tutoring school students in their instrument of choice. My friends who are artists hold workshops to make money. Their exhibitions are more for enjoyment than profit. We can all name actors who are millionaires in Beverley Hills, but you’re more likely to come across one teaching high school drama. That’s not a reflection on the talent of anyone mentioned above. It’s a reflection of the fact that very few people make an income entirely from their art of choice.
I’m part of this statistic. There are several people who have assumed I make money off my books. I really don’t. I make money by being a university lecturer who talks about books. I’d love to retire in my early 30s and devote my days to beautiful prose, but that’s not how life works.
Yes, maybe I’m a hack. But maybe I’m also a millennial trying to make it in a world of casualisation, job insecurity, and stagnant wage growth.
So what should I do? What should you do?
I think, after considering myself with a little more compassion than normal, we should carry on making a living whilst peppering our lives with expressions of the arts that we love. For me, poetry can be the sprinkles on a cake that was made with the hard labour of marking essays and addressing students who’d rather be out at the pub.
Keep some things pure. Do write for passion, but don’t expect anyone to care. Keep painting those images no one will ever buy. Keep singing your heart out in exchange for a free beer at the bar (no spirits). If it means something to you, then it’s meaningful enough.
All I can say to those in my position is ‘keep dreaming your dreams’. But, also, ‘keep paying your bills’. Maybe one day we will all be in the Bahamas in designer bikinis. But until then, don’t beat yourself up when you feel like a phoney and a sell out. You’re simply a realist, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
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