Photo by Lenny Miles on Unsplash
When I was 13 years old, I knew I wanted to be a writer. Between then and now, I tried to be a Biochemist, a Medical Laboratory Scientist, a Journalist ( that was fun) and an English Major. I also had a stint as an Event Planner, Copywriter, and Translator.
My journey is not very different from yours in that you’ve had twists and turns, and often you’ve wondered if you’re still on the path— or if there was a path in the first place. The idea that we were sent on this earth to find our purpose fascinates me. That we’re born and somehow, we will find something to do with our limited time and then do it.
How hard can that be?
The real world and the image that we have of it are not the same. Once you think you’ve found something you love to do, something else happens. Maybe you’ve crossed that phase where someone else(parents) paid for your life now you have to put the dreams on hold to simply exist in this world. Maybe you’re born in a place where what you really want to do is not possible. Or, the world in which you inhabit actively fights what you believe is your purpose.
Purpose is such a huge word, I would not even attempt to talk about it. At least, in my case, from 13-year-old to now, I have sort of always felt that my purpose was to tell stories. I really loved books. I still cry when I watch movies. I rewind awesome scenes in movies—action or dialogue—even when by myself. My wife hates it. My soul lights when stories flow. It thus makes sense that on my path, I have found poetry, writing, videos, podcasts—even made many friends doing similar idea work.
The question of whether I want to create for a living was met with a lot of doubt because of where and how I grew up. I’ve always been told—protectively—that I should be realistic. To create for a living ( for something that requires us to leave the world of the realistic) seems to require such… practicality.
Stripped bare of the nuance of what it means to create, the need for bills easily becomes the reason to abandon the path of the artist. Many have failed, why would you be the first to succeed?
Where? Here? Psh. Never.
Take any 13-year-old and keep telling them that they cannot tell stories for a living— when you start telling them they can, they might not believe you. There’s something about the narratives we hold—whether it is with career, work, life, religion, love—something powerful that takes over when we say something over and over. I suppose that’s how mantras work: you repeat to yourself that you’re not good enough, you start believing it. Eventually, you start to convince everyone else.
It makes perfect sense that for a Cameroonian child who shows interest in words and the like, such a life is deemed unfruitful: there aren’t many examples, living and dead, to count. Those who did had lives we could better describe as unnatural. They made their way through sheer stubbornness, or were ‘lucky’.
Why would any well-meaning parent want this for their offspring?
(Un)fortunately, at some point, every 13-year-old grows and cannot use the excuse that their parents convinced them to—or not to —do something. That’s where the narratives come into play—the things we’ve ingested; the things we now uphold. It’s those things that we then tell our own children. It’s the things we reinforce. The things that come out as excuses coated as compliments to those on their own journeys.
“Wow. You are so smart. I could never do that.”
You could. I could. We could. We most-definitely-ultimately-absolutely can pursue the path to making a living as creative. Like me, you know it won’t be easy. But maybe you haven’t fully accepted it either. You see, as a 13-year-old, everything is joy and bliss. Days too short to read, all the stories you write don’t need to be compared to any list except yours. The things we pick as we grow—those narratives—require rewiring. The beautiful thing about this rewiring task is that like hair, you only notice when it’s grown and powerful. You only notice when you’ve switched from:
I don’t know if I can do this.
To:
I know this will be hard. I will do it anyway.
It will take everything you’ve ever had, and more that you’re left to discover. When you look back from when you were 13 and now, you’ve learned a lot. Obvious one for me is that in the past 6 months only, I learned how to drive. Something so mundane to others, yet, I had never in my life had the skill. So, when it comes to earning a living as a writer—or artist of any kind— when we take the journey for what it is —a series of skills to be acquired—it becomes practical.
When we remove the question and make a statement—I can make a living as a creative— we see both the answers and the next step. On this path or any human paths— all that matters is the next step. Then the next.
Then, the next.
You will never figure out everything at once. You didn’t learn how to run before walking. You babbled before you spoke. Whether it’s your first blog post or you the last video that got terrible comments, when you rewire yourself to just focus on the next step, everything becomes possible.
So, yes, you can make a living as a creative. You can make a living with nearly everything under the sun.
However, you have to: become a master at your craft, provide value people are willing to exchange value for, and keep growing.
You can do this. You know it. Now, go.
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