In some ways, the day-job quitting question is a kind of
personal Rorschach ink blot for me, meaning, it reveals more about my mood, my
state of mind, and my feelings about life at a given time than anything. Here
is my jumble of thoughts:
1. Like so many writers, I dream rather lavishly of quitting my
day job. Extensively. Unwholesomely. My dream has me writing a monstrous
amount, and never having to stop and switch gears to marketing copy. I know,
intellectually, that getting what you want isn’t always a good thing, but I dream
of this anyway.
2. I have seen people talk about the figure $5000/month as the
day job quitting point. I would happily live on a fraction of that, but I’d
worry that it wouldn’t last, and I don’t exactly have a safety net, considering
my husband is a writer in the same self-employed boat as me. Even if people
were buying my books at that rate, there is no guarantee that would last. I
have known even fabulously wealthy people who worry they don’t have enough. I
think what is enough money is so subjective. I think this whole consideration
is subjective.
3. So in a way, day job quitting is, to me, about security and
faith in life. It is a bold thing that I would love to be equal to some day,
financially, but also on a larger level. One some level, I think quitting the
day job is a gesture of faith in your work that would maybe open doors. It would be a big risk, but I have
always admired people who take chances like that. Could quitting the day job
lead to more self-sustaining success? Is it me who has to change instead of my finances? I would sure have
more time to write. I live really cheaply. But it is SO risky. So I stay
working the day job.
4. An opposite thought: There is this ideal in the Chinese
martial arts culture where the martial arts master does not accept money for
his teaching, because if he relied on his teaching for his income, he might
water it down to please the students. So, the tradition, according to my martial arts-loving husband, at least, is that the master owns a little shop or is a woodworker or
something. The master has a dayjob. I kind of like this, because I sometimes
feel if I quit my day job, I’d have to focus too much on sales and I wouldn’t
be free to play and have fun in my work.
5. Reading some of this posts this week about quitting the day
job has made me feel lucky with my day job because it is so flexible – I’m a
freelance writer, so I write web copy and ads and promo articles and brochures,
etc. for businesses and ad agencies, working entirely for myself. And I can do that in part because I’m healthy enough to just buy cheap
insurance and only go to the dentist, never a doctor. And I actually do enjoy some of my work,
and most of my clients are awesome. It’s deadline work, so I can definitely
create a semblance of a writing routine if I manage things right. Often, I write in
the day and work on client stuff into the night.
6. If I got tons of money, there are one or two clients I would
actually keep because I like them and their jobs are not onerous. So, really, what is all this about quitting? I also learn
so much from my job. I talk to all kinds of people and I know something about
every kind of business, and these things are useful in fiction. Also, having a
job gives me a sense of control and self sufficiency that I enjoy. Yet, I know it erodes my writing time.
7. Do you watch Castle? The police procedural with a novelist character? I love the show Castle, I love the life they show for him, even though it is fake. I love the day job quitting dream and I will
keep dreaming it, and it is still my goal.
Images: public domain files from wikimedia.
Images: public domain files from wikimedia.
