Are You a Creative Who’s Stuck in the Periphery of Your Dream?

Shifting priorities can put you on the path of achieving your creative dreams.

Here’s the logic that ruled my life up until just recently: I love writing novels, but I’ll never make money writing novels, so I’ll find a job that allows me to do something close to what I love and get paid, and write novels in my spare time.

I found some amazing jobs that allowed me to do research, play with ideas, and write, which is sort of what writing novels is. I worked for a policy think tank in Washington, DC and then went on to get my PhD. I picked up freelance editing work for USAID and foreign students writing dissertations in the US. I was being paid, and I was still managing to write novels in my spare time. My plan was working out perfectly.

Except something was wrong. I wasn’t finishing any of my novels. And I wasn’t progressing in my career. I was doing all these things, doing them in what I thought was the right way, but I was unhappy, burned out, and falling behind on all fronts. All along I knew deep inside what the problem was, but it took me years to admit it out loud.

I had betrayed myself.

What I really wanted to do all those years was write novels, but I expended the bulk of my energy on pursuing a living. I had fallen into the trap so many creatives do of establishing a parallel career, one that sort of lets them do what they love but not really. We hope that this will fulfill our creative itch, that we’ll at least enjoy this career, while still having time for our art. And sometimes it can work out that way. But often it doesn’t. And then we find we’re stuck in the periphery of our dreams. Our dreams stay dreams, never realized, and we feel like failures. Or worse, we feel that our lives lack meaning, fulfillment, and joy.

Sometimes I think I would have been better off just waiting tables for a living so as to better save my creative energies for my novels. But I don’t think I would have been happy that way either, because my focus would have still been earn a living first, then do art in my spare time. This is a matter of priorities. Whatever you prioritize, that’s where the bulk of your mental and emotional energy will go.

I decided to stop betraying myself. It was time to start living a life of creative fulfillment. But I didn’t do it by quitting my job (mostly freelance and commission work at that point) and throwing my life into chaos. I did it by making a mental shift to do my art first, earn a living in my spare time.

This is obviously easier said than done. I had to grapple with so much negative self-talk. I’m lazy. I’m just doing this because I don’t “feel” like having a “real” job. I’m taking advantage of my privilege. I’m so behind my peers in terms of earning power they will think I’m a loser. My family won’t respect me anymore. I’ll be poor, alone, and loveless when I’m old. I’m not a good enough writer to justify this choice. What if I never get published?!

And you know what? Although it does get easier, I still deal with all of those thoughts on a daily basis and probably always will. But at least I’m not betraying myself anymore. At least I wake up feeling like today is going to be another good day because it’s a day that I prioritize my creative work.

If you are a creative or artists stuck in the periphery, you may not have to change the circumstances of your life all that much to start living your dream instead of always gazing at it from the sidelines. At some point you may find you want to utterly change your life, but to start you only have to work on making that mental shift. Making a commitment to prioritize your creative work and your identity as a creative or artist doesn’t happen overnight, it can be a years-long process (it was for me), but you can do it.

What is your creative fulfillment worth? What is achieving your creative dreams worth? Are you willing to spend another year, month, or even day feeling like a creative failure? The new year 2022 is almost upon us. Don’t let it be another year slip by in the periphery. You’re worth more than that; you deserve better.

Looking to start? I can help you with that.