A Universal Law
This I know: If you’re in your twenties and you think nothing of spending a couple hours working on a few lines of a poem, if you do that consistently day after day, it’s bound to lead somewhere.
If you spend time developing whatever it is you’re compelled to do, it will eventually come to fruition, even if it takes thirty years.
We are self-regulating. If left alone, we will work; we will create; we will become more of who we were meant to be. Sometimes hiring ourselves out to nine-to-five jobs to do other people’s work and succumbing to the social pressure of comparing ourselves to others can become detours.
If you start from where you are and take the step right in front of you, the next one will not be a leap, and so will not feel so scary. Rather, it will make sense and be recognizable in the continuing path you’re already on.
Whenever I worry that writing is taking up time I could be using to earn a better income, I remind myself that my blog is my master’s degree program in creative writing. I think about how much I’m saving by not paying a university to further my education and the fossil fuels I’m not using because I work at home.
I marvel at how determined and self-motivated I’ve become. But let me tell you this: I’m also a slave driver who barely ever gets a day off.
The above came from some notes I jotted down after selling a piece of writing to a new venue, knowing that it was blogging that led me to freelancing stories to our local newspaper, and that my stories in the newspaper are what has led to this new connection. Unlike the trepidation I endured when I submitted work for a possible Roanoke Times columnist position, this feels more like a natural progressive step, and although I do feel a familiar twinge of self-doubt, I also know that it’s an opportunity being handed to me like a pen on a silver platter.
Photo: I know it looks like we’re playing cards, but it’s actually a photo of the Floyd Writer’s Circle at work on a Wednesday evening at the Jacksonville Center. From left to right, there is Katherine, mccabe making tea, Kathleen, Jayn, Rosemary, and Mara. I’m behind the lens.
July 17th, 2007 10:09 am
“We are self-regulating. If left alone, we will work; we will create; we will become more of who we were meant to be.”
Thanks, Colleen, this is inspiring!
Right now I am at this point – “hired out to nine-to-five jobs to do other people’s work.”
But there is hope in your post that there is life and creativity outside of working 9-5. Reminds me of the movie 9-5 with Dolly and Jane and Lily, now they were very creative!
Have a great day!
July 17th, 2007 10:22 am
I haven’t been able to hold a “real” outside-the-home 9-5 since I contracted Chronic Fatigue in the late 70’s, so I’ve had to be inventive in that area. And there have been times, I’ve envied those who could. Every situation seems to have it’s pros and cons and there is often a blessing in a burden, opportunity in adversity.
July 17th, 2007 11:29 am
Colleen, this post was very timely for me. I wish I had some of that advice when I was in my twenties.
Now, I just hit forty and I’m trying to build that path, stone by stone. Sometimes, I feel horribly guilty, because my writing and attention to my blog (and others!) can be a distraction from my paying job.
Perhaps, I should redirect that guilt in the other direction.
So it may take ten or fifteen years, but I do have a clear picture of what I want to do in “semi-retirement”.
I have one monthly column out there now. Next step, I suppose, should be to look for more.
Thank you for the encouragement!
July 17th, 2007 11:33 am
Great post, Colleen. My biggest problem is self discipline. When I work, it’s like the fury – I can churn out a full length manuscript in a month – but then the trouble is I malinger. I call it composting ideas but the “protestant work ethic” in me, tells me I should be using my time far more productively and earing a far better income. The trouble is, I know that a nine to five job is a detour and not my true path 🙂
July 17th, 2007 11:55 am
I understand the fury. And the more work we produce the more work we have editing and organizing it!
For me, my writer’s foundation was having the forum of our local community newsletter, The Museletter for the past 20 years. Then, when my brothers died in 2001, it seemed as if everything I had written before that was just preparation for writing about grief an loss: The Jim and Dan Stories.
In the end, my motto for writing and any creative pursuit is this: The more you do what you love, the more it grows in you.
Jeff, I’m semi-retired now. ( I provided full-time foster care for a man with disabilities for nine years after making jewelry and working in a bead shop before that.) So this is what it could look like. And don’t forget our “jobs” and “other life” besides writing gives us so much material.
More about my untraditional job record here http://www.looseleafnotes.com/notes/2006/06/a_cottage_industry.html and here http://www.looseleafnotes.com/notes/2006/10/from_dishwasher_to_night_watch.html
July 17th, 2007 12:57 pm
Yes, well put. If someone is just sitting or just writing, it doesn’t mean nothing is being done or learned. The time put in by driving oneself to understand and express and resolve is as much an exercise as manual labor, just outwardly different.
July 17th, 2007 1:17 pm
Well said, Pearl. Our calluses are ink stained, or these days carpal tunnel. But really, our whole bodies are involved in mining the words to go with our feelings.
July 17th, 2007 3:13 pm
I believe every word of what you’ve written, and yet have never been able to take the full body plunge into the (work)life I long to lead at the expense of the (work)life paycheck I now earn. It’s a sorry, sorry thing sometimes. But then again, the limits on time can often help the creative process ferment just a little bit quicker. Somehow, most days, it all gets fit in there.
July 17th, 2007 3:23 pm
I want to join the Floyd Writer’s Circle, so I guess I’ll have to move there?
July 17th, 2007 4:18 pm
I found this so well written. Concise, consistent and true. I followed you on your journey. But I chose the 9 to 5 route and have had some regrets, but perhaps no more than you have had in your separate journey. I hope when I retire (soon) that I will be able to return again to that creative girl I put on the shelf so long ago.
July 17th, 2007 4:36 pm
I hope so too, Tabor! Becoming unleashed has its own set of problems. Sometimes I feel like I’m only now just starting in the real work world (of a paper shuffler). No benefits or paid vacation time. I got out of debt before I started this phase but now I have to live simply to remain that way, to stretch one income (Joe’s) into two, because my writing income would be like living off tips.
Bonnie, come on down!
Jennifer, you’re doing something right. I can tell by your writing.
July 17th, 2007 5:26 pm
Sometimes I feel so guilty for all the time I spend writing and reading, especially blogs, but then I remember how it all feeds my soul.
I’m sorry I haven’t been around here for a while, though. I’m using Bloglines to keep me notified of updated blogs and for some reason yours doesn’t update. I’m missing out on too much good reading by relying on the service. I’ll make a point of checking in through my own links list.
July 17th, 2007 6:47 pm
Yes!
July 17th, 2007 7:39 pm
Anything that makes you happy and doesn’t seem like “work”, paid or unpaid, has got to be worth the time invested.
Blogging is a hobby for me that can take a lot of time, but I’m not working now and I do what makes me happy.
Hope you find doing this regular column very satisfying!
July 18th, 2007 3:34 am
Great words Colleen. Words to live by, really. It is wonderful to read this and be reminded that the path is there if you just keep putting one foot in front of the other….!
July 18th, 2007 11:59 am
Another great post. Very inspiring. And motivational. Thanks, XINE
July 19th, 2007 1:43 am
Thank you for this post. I feel sometimes I need to give myself permission to sit and think, brainstorm, create, and write. Why? We all need that time. My blog has helped give me purpose for my writing.
July 20th, 2007 4:24 pm
This post is priceless and so very encouraging. Thanks, I needed that!
March 14th, 2010 6:06 pm
[…] the café has been a Floyd hub and a beautiful downtown second home to many. For six years the writer’s group I belong to have been co-hosting monthly Spoken Word Open there with Sally. I don’t drink coffee […]
August 19th, 2014 11:26 pm
[…] that I can with it and I’ve worked as diligently as I can.” I relate to that plugging away, and I have said, “If you spend time developing whatever it is you’re compelled to do, it will eventually come […]
January 27th, 2016 10:09 pm
[…] Jayn and Katherine were also members of our seven year long Floyd Writer’s Circle and are the ones who I wrote the poem Book Signing for, which starts: One day we’ll all write […]