Last week I wrote that I wanted to share the challenges of writing fantasy fiction.
This week I'm finding the biggest challenge to be my work here at school. I guess that shouldn't be a surprise.
I'm administering two midterms this week. I'm normally not a huge fan of the in-class exam (nor are my students), but I do like devising tricky questions. And that's what's keeping me from the creative writing work.
I think I have to start keeping one of those crazy creative-person schedules where I get up extra early for my labor of love, and then spend the rest of the day here at school. I do enjoy the teaching, but if you've ever corrected 56 midterms, then you know why I hesitate to call it a labor of love.
Anyway, my question for people reading this today is as follows: How do you maintain a balance between 'the work you have to do in order to keep money in the bank' and 'the work you have to do to stay sane?'
Oh, and Brad, you are incorrect about BSG. Start over and try harder this time.
3 comments:
Before you even think about writing something sappy like: 'The key is to find something you love and make that your work,' remember two things:
1) I want to be a teacher. I find this work rewarding.
2) If that was the world we lived in, who would haul trash or install network cables?
I'm not asking for dime-store advice. I want practical examples of how people find time for all the things their lives demand.
http://www.amazon.de/Getting-Things-Done-Stress-Free-Productivity/dp/0142000280/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books-intl-de&qid=1238534862&sr=8-1
I think it's about balance, but now that I have a law practice, a literary agency, and three kids, there really is no balance anymore. Hannah Arendt talks about work, labor and art, and while such distinctions may be helpful, I've spent a whole lot more time doing the work and labor of society.
I think the key is to get the work done that you have to get done in order to put food on the table, before you're allowed to write. If you have kids, it gets more complicated. You have to put more food on the table, and worry about getting gallons of whole milk for the kids and a pint of skim milk for your own cereal. Then you can get to write.
Or you can be really wildly successful, or win the lottery, and then you can write all the time. It would obviously be better to make enough money from writing in order to not have to work, other than writing.
Teaching is actually one of the few professions that rewards writers. The other being journalism, of course, but now that newspapers are becoming as scarce as wild animals, it's difficult to imagine thinking of that as a safe alternative to teaching.
That said, the successful writers I've met have all struggled in one way or another, and some have profoundly struggled to make ends meet while creating their art, or have profoundly struggled to create art, while making ends meet.
Still, a few writers still teach or are attorneys or whatever, even when their at a point with the sales of their work where they might not "have to" work to do so. And that's when you have to admire their love of their occupation, in addition to writing, or their desire to be influenced by, be surrounded by, and possibly help other people.
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