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Jojo from England says:
I just don’t know what I should be focused on. I have successfully worked in marketing communications for many years and could easily go freelance doing what I do, but it doesn’t totally inspire me – it’s more a means to an end.
I would love to do something that I am really passionate about but the only thing that truly does that is writing and my literary interests are very niche and extremely unlikely to be a potential revenue stream.
I think my middle ground would be an online business of some kind that is relatively low-maintenance to generate revenue and the occasional freelance project – hopefully giving me time to write for pleasure. But I am worried that I would lose focus. I can’t see the wood for the trees!
My priority is to be able to work flexibly as and when I choose. I am not afraid of hard work and am prepared to make the effort to reap the reward. I need to generate enough revenue to pay my rent and while I accept some compromise in my lifestyle, I don’t want to have more free time and no cash to enjoy it!
The Coach’s Answer
Welcome to the problem of most artists! We love what we do and would do it whether we get paid for it or not. Unfortunately that pesky need to eat and integrate ourselves into society keeps us from living without money.
It’s no wonder that much of English literature was written by the nobility – they had passive income and no need to work if they wanted to eat. And those artists who weren’t so lucky, worked hard to find themselves a post as an in-house artist to some noble house.
But for some strange reason our modern-day equivalents of the nobility – CEOs of multinational companies – just don’t seem to have that same sense of responsibility to promote the arts.
So we have to support ourselves.
Let’s take a look first at what I see as your Somedays…
- Someday you will live a life full of passion for what you do on a daily basis.
- Someday you will have a good balance of free time and cash flow.
- Someday you will figure out what it is that you want to do to achieve the first two.
This list of Somedays is pretty common across the board. Your specific skills, passions and possible solutions to challenges will differ from everyone else, but what you’re looking for is what most people are looking for.
The order you go about getting rid of these Somedays depends entirely on which one has the highest priority for you. None of these is better than any other. Everyone has their own idea of what’s a priority and before you start you need to toss out any judgments of what’s right or wrong in terms of priorities or you might end up choosing a path that’s based on expectations and “should” rather than on desire.
Living A Life of Passion…
This is the route the typical starving artist takes. It’s the route I took. After years of suppressing my dreams, I went for a radical change, selling up everything and moving across the Atlantic.
I needed to be a writer and nothing else mattered. Only after I’d settled into my new life did I consider what I wanted to do to make money to pay the bills while building my fiction career.
From what you say above, this is not the route you’re predisposed to take. There’s no need to make any dramatic or radical changes in your life. Achieving your Somedays will come bit by bit without disrupting your life too much.
While you are passionate about writing and you would love to live off your writing, you’re not willing to lose the lifestyle you currently enjoy.
Balancing Free Time & Cash Flow…
Highly practical people take this approach. My sister, of Urban Panther’s Lair and Silver and Grace, is taking this approach. She has a full time job that doesn’t thrill her, but it gives her the things she wants. Meanwhile she’s developing a few business ideas that range from middling interest to high passion.
The thing is, she’s not diving into anything right away. She’s carefully allotting time to the new projects and checking in with her boyfriend about how they are doing while she basically works two jobs. She’s also already decided at what point she will take an unpaid leave from work to give the new business ideas a full try.
From what I see in your question, I think this approach fits you better.
The work involved in getting there requires having a lot of patience. It also means planning out step-by-step what you will do to lay the foundation for a successful location independent business.
However before you do that you need to know what you want to do, which brings us to the third Someday…
Knowing What You Want Out of Life…
For many people their Someday Syndrome centers on this issue. Not only do you want to find your dream and pursue it, but you want to find a way to support the dream financially, because we have to live in the real world even though we might not want to.
There are any number of ways to figure this out – and my blog spends a lot of time on this issue, especially in the Lab Rat series for this year.
Based upon what you’ve written, I have one major bit of advice…
Don’t compromise on a middle ground that kind of, sort of mixes what you love doing with your current marketable skills. You’ll just end up tainting your passion with the same lack of interest you feel for the marketing work.
Not everyone has to have a job that includes their passions. Perhaps you could find something that doesn’t disgust or bore you while giving you the time to pursue your true passions.
Homework
Yes, that’s right – curing Someday Syndrome is all about taking action, so here are your actions…
I Can Do Stuff!
Pull out your CV and make a list of all the things you’ve accomplished as well as all your skills, right from your very first job.
Mix and Match!
On a separate piece of paper, write down various combinations of accomplishments and skills that relate to each other somehow. Don’t divide everything based on the divisions of your present and past jobs – get creative and come up with a large variety of possible combinations that stretch the imagination.
Name that Job!
Take a look around the Internet and determine how you could earn money using each combination of accomplishments and skills. From that research create yourself a list of possible income streams.
Ooh! Pretty! Shiny!
Finally pick the job that gives you the goosebumps thinking about it. If there aren’t any that do that for you then pick the one that most appeals to you, the one that you feel you could spend as much as several hours a day working on.
Once you’ve gotten rid of this Someday, work your way back through the list figuring out how to create the income that will then allow you to follow your true passion of writing.
If you’d like help overcoming a specific challenge in your life, submit your “Ask The Coach” question here >>>
Awesome advice, Alex! I find that the "practical," tweak your life route is a very powerful way to manage fear, manage risk and build momentum as you move towards the life you want. It also gives you lost of space for creative "mulling" and for finding depth as you get clear on things like your brand, your values, who your people are, and so on (which can take a long time to evolve). It's an approach I use on a day-to-day basis. But I still find that every so often I love a big change and really feel ready for a big leap. If someone is stuck, the best place to start is with the little steps and changes, but often at some point, they get to the point where the morsels of joy aren't enough and they're ready to spring for the full feast like you did.
Cath
Jojo, your dilemma of not knowing what you want to do reminds me of a nagging feeling I have. I can't get rid of the idea that I've never heard my favorite band. It really disturbs me that there are bound to be amazing things out there in the world that I haven't found yet. Even worse, the thought that there are amazing things out there that I'll never find… ever.
While that kind of sounds cynical, I don't feel cynical when thinking it. I try to use it as motivation to do something random when I'm in an inspirational drought. I've had good results with this. Though it was totally accidental, my favorite class at university was a class I never would have chosen. I was studying computer science at the time and the only thing that met a certain requirement in time-slot I had available was and introductory Linguistics class. That class changed the way I think about the world and totally altered the trajectory of my life.
Long story longer… I have a feeling that there are other things out there that you'd be passionate about if you stumbled upon them. Try something random. I'm also going to diverge from the recommendations in the homework section above and recommend forgetting about thinking about jobs when trying to figure out what gives you goosebumps. Find out what gives you goosebumps, you'll be able to figure out a way to monetize it.
Also, there's no substitute for clearing your mind and doing absolutely nothing for an extended period of time. That may not be an option, but what may seem lazy to the outside observer may lead you somewhere unexpected.
You've given a lot of good advice here especially in not compromising your passions. I think you're dead on that if person compromises their passions they will only end up dissatisfied once again. One thing I do with my coaching clients is to try to get to the root value that is being reflected in what they love. So, Jojo, I would want to ask you, "what do you get from writing in the particular niche that you love so much?" "What value is being reflected for you when you write?" Find out what inner energy is coming up for you when you do this thing that you love and then think about all the ways you can fill your life with activities that reflect this core value. It may be there is some way to get paid and fulfill this love at the same time.
Some great advice here!
I agree that some people at certain times in their lives need huge changes to make progress, while sometimes small and gradual is a better course of action.
I personally need the big all or nothing changes. Incremental, part-time effort just doesn't motivate me enough. I really need to shock my system every once in a while to grow as a person.
I have a small issue with the idea of passion. "Passion" means different things to different people. I believe in doing things you love, but I also think that even things you love have boring and tedious components. Chocolate once a day is great, but you'd get sick of it if you ate it for every meal.
I think there is a danger in constantly searching for something that is 100% exciting and interesting. Nothing is perfect. More might be accomplished by putting all your efforts into the thing you are "most passionate" about rather than waiting for the "perfect passion."
Also, not everything you are passionate about has the potential to provide an income.
Your advice about keeping a satisfactory day job, and pursuing your passion on the side is spot on.
@Cath
I too love the big change – for me that usually happens after a bunch of small things to give me confidence and to be sure that it's what I actually want, then something goes "click" in my brain and the big change happens without any effort at all!
@Andrew
Great advice! When I was feeling stuck before I left Canada for Spain, my coach suggested doing some totally spontaneous random things and when I did they sparked other random thoughts in completely different areas of my life. (I too randomly took a linguistics class in my final year of University and wished I had discovered it earlier!)
@NuNomad
I like that technique too. In Spanish there's two ways of asking why: 1) what reasons and 2) what for – the first looks back and the second looks forward. Ask why in these two different ways really helps discover that core value.
@John
Good caution! As a fiction writer, while parts of it are super-duper exciting, there are other parts that are deadly boring and annoyingly frustrating, but my passion carries me through those parts.
Great post, Alex! I think you've laid out a great framework that Jojo or anyone else can use. When I decided to take the leap, and go for Passion, I found that the answers seem to present themselves when I'm ready. I had tried to "go by the books" and strategically plan everything and it just wasn't working for me. By cutting my ties and going head first, I found that I needed to have it all figured out. Once you begin the journey, the answers will find you!! Best of luck, Jojo and I commend you on discovering a life of Passion!