I remember listening to one of Mur's "I Should Be Writing" a year or so ago. In the episode, she said something to the effect of "Don't quit your day job."
Scott just told us: "Your odds of turning this into a living are next to nothing. It's goddamn near impossible, and the industry is currently imploding."
I'm a member of SFWA and I've heard from my colleagues there of the challenges that they're facing. I'm 38 years old. Do I want to roll the dice for 30 plus years by quitting a day job? There's a quality of life that I want my kids to have and just as I wouldn't be getting into the big three American car builders these days so I am not putting all of my eggs into the publishing basket. Thirty years (or more) is a long, long time.
I would highly recommend Malcolm Gladwell's "Outliers: The Story of Success" if you would like another perspective on what it takes for success. In a nutshell, many of the world's greatest success stories have come about because of a combination of talent, access (practicing 10,000 plus hours) and economic/industrial conditions being right. One of the examples is Bill Gates in that he was born at the right time, had access to computers through a local university library.
We were not born during the golden era of science fiction (I know that many of us don't write sci-fi but go with me here) in which an author could make a good living off of writing stories/books. Now Sigler has shown us that people can break through, but he's also given us the insight scoop and how difficult it is. Fast forward 30 years. Will any of us be able to make a living wage soley from writing?
My point is that I believe it's important to have realistic expectations. Shooting for the moon is wonderful and good. Some of us may make it. Many of us will fail. But I am not a writer because I want to only "make it." I think defining myself in such terms is self-defeating. Are all the mid-list writers who had book deals and have now all been dropped failures because they're not now able to get another book published? I don't think so. We all write for our own personal reasons and I produce my content and stay up late and get up early to work hard. I've two books, 19 audio book episodes, published essays, gaming articles published and 165 episodes for the last 3 1/2 years of my gaming podcast. I know what it means to work hard. From hearing all of our stories, we've all sacrificed to keep pushing forward. I'm not questioning anyone's work ethic and there is no secret to making it. But at the end of the day, I keep going back to what my Freshman in college English Prof told me when I explained to her that I wanted to be a fiction novelist. She weighed what I said and said, "Is there anything else you want to do? You might want to consider other options too." And I did. And I'm really glad I did. Because if I hadn't picked up my full-time job I wouldn't have been working on the web, wouldn't have learned all that I know now. To me, the goal is to find a healthy balance between the day job and writing fiction.
I think Mur's comments about "dont' quit your day job" are spot on. Now, maybe she's changed her mind on this, but I believe it's sound advice.
I am totally feeling you, Ron. After leaving my "full-time" job last year, I have been taking a round about way of getting to the place of doing my heart's desire. Nonetheless, I am here and am taking the plunge. Fortunately, I was able to quit my job b/c of support from my husband.
Nonetheless, I think that whatever your situation is, it's important to make the best of it by doing your best to do what you want to do. Cheers to you for your successes....
Posted by: Jamila | April 03, 2009 at 11:34 AM