I understand that for some of you, combining your dream with your job has been very rewarding. In no way am I discouraging you from continuing. But if you are like me and had the opportunity to combine your love of something with making a living, you may have found the combination to not work out the way you imagined. That is exactly what happened to me.
My first job as a journalist was in 1998 when a professor at University of La Verne (my alma matter) was able to get me work as a sports stringer at a local newspaper. I would go on freelancing for this same newspaper for eight years until I stepped into my first full-time reporting job in 2006. The cool part about freelancing was that because it was not a full-time gig, I always had enough energy left over to work on my own writing projects on my own time. Once I was a full-time journalist, this all changed. This isn't the fault of the newspaper I worked for because they are some of the best people I have ever worked with at any job. But because of the energy and time I had to put in being a full-time journalist, I literally stopped cold turkey working on my own ideas. Over time, all writing became to me was a job and when I had free time, writing was the last thing I wanted to do. I no longer had a love for writing. It had simply become what I did for a living to get the bills paid.
It wasn't until after I was diagnosed with my kidney disease in March 2012 and I left the newspaper in July of the same year that I really began to realize how much writing for a living affected me. While I had a lot of flexibility in my job, the fact of the matter was that I was fulfilling somebody else's vision with my writing and not my own. It took a toll on me. These past two years have given me time for a lot of reflection that I never had the time for before. The honest truth is that one of the reasons why I started this very blog is because I am just starting to find my love for writing again. There are other writing projects that I have been working on, but I found myself starting and stopping each one of them. I asked myself what had happened to me because in my 20s, I wrote as if there was no tomorrow. My writing was a lot less polished than it is now but back then, I wrote like my life depended on it. The issue was that I didn't love writing the way I once did. In order to get that back, I had to do something involving writing that was completely my vision, my baby. This blog has been that for me. I'm not looking to earn a dime from this and don't care how many people visit or don't. Everything that is posted here is from my heart and for the love of doing it. And you know what, I'm slowly starting to get back to that place I once was.
Going forward, I have writing aspirations but I wonder whether I should even do it in order to earn money or not. I just know that I am enjoying where I am at right now with this blog and from there, I will start picking back up my other projects in the near future. One thing is for sure though. Whatever job I work next, I will make sure that I don't write away my love for this tool of expression again just to pay the bills. It isn't worth it. There are other ways to make a living.
So for those of you who found yourselves in a similar predicament as me, a great option to consider is to keep your dream separate from your job. The very purpose of having a job is to make money, plain and simple. For some of us, that is all a job needs to be--the means that allow us to be able to fulfill our true dreams. For me, I want to write for the sheer enjoyment of it. I don't need to make it my living. If that is also how you feel, then don't make your dream your job. It can simply be what you do when you're not working. That sounds a whole lot better to me.
Once again, I'm just sharing my thoughts for the day. In conclusion, do what works for you. Life is too short to be unhappy.
Loving to write again,
LandoRigs
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