Balancing Your Writing With Your Job After Graduation
It’s been almost a decade since I started writing. I love writing.
During my initials days of college, I used to read and write blogs everyday.
Blogging was new and cool back in 2009. I wanted to be a part of that cool club. The desire to write blogs started with this fantasy.
Today, I have a full time job as a Software Developer, which means a certain part of my day will be spent working for others. Being a full time employee never stopped me from writing though. I was willing to sacrifice an hour of sleep for my writing, if that was required.
I will admit, finding time to write when you have a full time job is difficult.
Over the years I have battled with this scenario and it took me sometime to figure out the right balance between my passion and job. A balance where I can keep my peace and write good content regularly.
Here’s what I have learned through years of experimentation.
Don’t be frustrated with your day job
Writers are artists.
Just like a painter brings his imagination live with a painting, we do the same with our writings.
For a long time I used to believe that art should be the primary source of income for every artist.
Day job is for losers. I was wrong.
I was putting unnecessary pressure on myself.
Your day job is not something to be ashamed of. In fact, it’s good you have one.
You can concentrate on your writing without worrying about paying your bills. Your job will support your writing. You can write without any pressure.
It’s all about the mindset.
Even if you are spending 9–5 hours on a day job, you can easily find out some time to work on your writings.
But writing requires undivided attention, Anurag!
I know. But writing isn’t the only thing you should be doing throughout the day.
Personally, I take time around my lunch hours to go through other Medium stories and connect with fellow writers. Or create drafts of topics I think I can write about, collect my thoughts in notes.
You can have the best of both worlds.
Reading a few blogs on the internet does not take hours. Just be aware of how you are spending your time in the office.
Keep Learning
Just because your college is over that doesn’t mean your learning should stop too. As a writer you should never stop your learning curve.
This is perhaps the most important lesson for any writer. To stay on top of your craft you should always read, write and study.
I read lots of articles from Medium and around the internet, listen to podcasts, read books on writing and write a lot.
My content consumption is almost 10 times my writing.
The more content I consume, better ideas I get for my writings.
I am stressing on the learning part here because if you don’t, you will lose out the inspiration to write soon. It happens, I have experienced it personally.
Reading fuels writing desire.
You may not get enough time everyday but on weekends you can reserve time for learning.
Write everyday
I will admit that writing everyday is tough.
Tougher when you are hustling 9–5 hours everyday at work. I know the pain and I also know that there are no shortcuts around it. You have to write everyday. There’s no escape from it.
Be brave and face it.
As adults when there is a constant source of income flowing, we tend to relax back. And you can easily drift apart.
Make it a habit of writing one line everyday. Write.
Once you have made a habit of writing everyday, you can increase your word count. Hold yourself accountable for this.
It hardly takes 10 minutes of effort to write a single line. I know because I do this myself. Through months of practice, today I can easily write around 500 words everyday.
The secret to any long lasting writing career is persistence.
This is how I have continued to write this long being a full time employee. These are just a few lessons from my side, feel free to tweak it according to your needs. Honestly you can easily find 1–2 hours ( if not more ) everyday for your writing, no matter how busy you are.
At the end of the day it is all about choices. I choose to keep writing, my passion, no matter what.
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