Hm, very very personal opinion, but I'm in the camp that having a job, especially one that pays well, outside of your arts to feed you is more beneficial in both short and long term. Sure, you can say it removes your psychological safety net, but you can attribute that to lack of discipline IMO. Life experience can happen outside of roaming without a job. If anything, more things happen at jobs and the misery or joy that comes within that confine than roaming without a job. I am speaking from my personal experience where I've done both. Short bursts of not having a job, when it's appropriate, e.g. right after you graduate college, are pivotal moments sure, but after those "sanctioned periods of unemployment", I believe you're just missing out. Comfort breeds entitlement and complacency, but comfort also breeds... comfort. It gives you the space, the ennui, the boredom to truly reflect. Not everything seems to be a 100M sprint anymore, things seem to have broader horizon. You can strategize more long term, and more effectively. I always wanted to create a site like this, since I was very very little. Probably since I was 17. At one point I wanted to drop out of college and work for a creative agency in NYC. At one point I wanted to drop out to work as a software engineer at a startup I was passionate about. But I did the practical thing, and I got a job at a big company. It didn't take long to get really, really bored of it. I started my first full time job less than 2 years ago, and I'm so bored. It didn't help that I am a foreigner in the US, who needs a job to even stay in the country. But I'm glad I did that. Because it lets me pay the server bills which are reaching almost $500 comfortably. It lets me think about this site, my baby, my creation, arguably the most intense creative output in my life, in a long term manner. I don't need funding, I don't need to answer to anyone, and I work on my own pace (fast). This luxury is awesome.

I made this exact decision, had that same concern, and — in my experience — it’s a very valid one. No one loves working alone more than me, but it’s been surprisingly hard to keep the same edge.

firesideangel

3 months ago

Did you end up leaving your job to focus on writing then? If so how’s it going? I’m also in the middle of the same predicament.

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