You might find you like your Day Job more than you like writing

Perhaps the scariest realization writing books might give you is that you like your Day Job more than you like Writing

Let’s consider the different aspects of your work which give you satisfaction and make for a good living

What Good Things can Your Work do For You?

Your work can help you get what you want out of life. This includes

1. Self Actualization
   1. A Sense of Purpose
   2. Developing your Skills and Abilities
   3. Having Goals and Achieving Them
   4. A Sense of Achievement
2. Contribution
   1. To Humanity
   2. To the World
   3. To other People
3. Happiness
   1. Fulfillment
   2. Work Life Balance
   3. Pleasure in Little Things
4. Financial Benefits
   1. Money
   2. Benefits
5. Social Belonging
   1. Good People to Work With
   2. Good Boss
   3. Part of a Company/Clique/Tribe
6. Self Esteem
   1. Validation of yourself as a productive person
   2. General Self Esteem
7. Creative Satisfaction
   1. Satisfaction of creating something

There are, of course, additional things. For the purposes of this post, we will cover the above ones

Is Writing really better than your Day Job for these areas?

Let’s look at each area in detail and see if Writing can really fulfill these needs better than your day job (we will assume a ‘general’ day job)

1. Self Actualization
   1. A Sense of Purpose
      1. Will writing give you a better sense of purpose than your day job?
         1. If you are working in a job that is structured and has a clear purpose, then No
            1. Writing is very unstructured and it is hard to create a clear sense of purpose
            2. What makes things tougher is that everything is dictated by whether you succeed in selling your books or not
               1. In most jobs there is someone else to take care of the sales and marketing part, and someone else to handle finances and management
               2. As an author, you have to do all those things yourself
            3. It’s hard to say you are fulfilling your purpose if you are not selling any books
         2. If you are working in a job that has no sense of purpose, or no clear sense of purpose, then Yes
            1. One good thing about writing books is that you can pick what to write
            2. You can also pick what outcome you are looking for, and write according to that purpose
            3. Basically, writing is a profession where you can set your purpose first, and then write according to that purpose
   2. Developing your Skills and Abilities
      1. Will writing help you develop new skills and abilities?
         1. Yes
      2.  Will writing help you learn skills and abilities better than your day job
         1. Perhaps not
      3. Will writing allow you to achieve mastery of skills and abilities?
         1. Unlikely
         2. If you derive a lot of satisfaction from being very good, it is much easier to be very good in something you have been doing for a long time i.e. your day job
         3. Jumping into writing and then expecting to suddenly develop very strong skills is unrealistic
   3. Having Goals and Achieving Them
      1. Your Day Job has a much higher chance of helping you achieve goals related to work
      2. Being a writer is very tough. You are unlikely to find a lot of success
      3. If you derive a lot of satisfaction from hitting your goals, writing is not a good line of work unless you can set small and incremental goals
   4. A Sense of Achievement
      1. Being a writer can be very rewarding. There are a lot of different achievements – finishing books, getting book sales, getting reviews, and so forth
      2. Most day jobs will have fewer chances of feeling a sense of ‘achievement’
      3. Most day jobs will also have fewer chances of experiencing ‘individual achievement’
2. Contribution
   1. To Humanity
      1. Contribution to humanity is a really tough area to measure, so we will not discuss this
   2. To the World
      1. Contribution to the world is somewhat easier to measure. With a book you are sharing a story, which in some ways shares a message or a lesson or some fundamental truth
      2. If you write well and become popular, your books do have a good chance of contributing to society and to the world
      3. The written word has a lot of power and most professions can not compare in terms of impact
      4. We will add a word of caution. First, entertain and satisfy readers. Only then, and very carefully, introduce insights and lessons
      5. We see a lot of new authors make the mistake of writing a sermon instead of a book. Those books never sell. The message should be so well hidden, that there should be no message on the surface
         1. Remember, readers run away if you start preaching to them
   3. To other People
      1. If you write good, powerful books you can have a massive impact on people
      2. There are quite a few people whose lives have been changed after reading a book
      3. There are entire religions built around one powerful book
         1. Think of the importance of the Bible in Christianity, of the Quran in Islam, of the Talmud in the Jewish religion
         2. That shows the incredible power of the written word
         3. It also shows how impactful words can be to people
      4. Writing Books is a very powerful thing. It gives you the sort of ability to influence and lead that nothing else does
      5. Be very careful as it requires a very high level of skill to make a positive contribution as an author
         1. Ideally you want to have some very powerful life experience
         2. And also a high level of skill
3. Happiness
   1. Fulfillment
      1. When things are going well, writing books can be very fulfilling
      2. You get so much direct feedback from your customers
      3. You get so many direct data points of how things are going
      4. The downside is that there are also tough times
      5. Being an author is a roller coaster of emotions. Make sure you have strong control over your emotions before becoming a writer, or it will overwhelm you
   2. Work Life Balance
      1. Successful authors have close to zero work life balance
      2. Unsuccessful authors also have close to zero work life balance
      3. This is definitely not the profession to be in, if you are looking for balance
   3. Pleasure in Little Things
      1. Being an author affords you the opportunity to get a lot of ‘little wins’ and take pleasure in little things you find on your journey
4. Financial Benefits
   1. Money
      1. If you are looking to get rich, being an author is one of the very worst professions you can pick
      2. If you are looking to be well off, being an author is one of the very worst professions you can pick
      3. Be prepared to have a lot of financial challenges if you become an author
         1. Do not quit your day job
   2. Benefits
      1. Being an author comes with close to zero benefits
      2. There are no health benefits, no perks, no labor unions
5. Social Belonging
   1. Good People to Work With
      1. Being an author is quite a solitary occupation
      2. Most of your interaction will be in non face to face situations
      3. You will have very few strong relationships with the people you work with
         1. Exceptions would be your Literary Agent and your Editor
   2. Good Boss
      1. Your boss is you
      2. A large part of your work satisfaction is how good your boss is
      3. Unfortunately, you are likely to find that your new boss is mercurial, temperamental, prone to fits of madness, and not fit to motivate and lead another human being
   3. Part of a Company/Clique/Tribe
      1. On the one hand, you are part of the ‘authors collective’, and will form a lot of friendships with other authors
      2. On the other hand, you are not part of a ‘company’ or a ‘tribe’
6. Self Esteem
   1. Validation of yourself as a productive person
      1. Writing books is very dangerous for your self esteem because you have a shockingly low level of control over the outcome
      2. Books you write are sent out into the world
      3. Readers may buy them or not
      4. Readers may review them or not
      5. They may or may not be a financial success
      6. There will always be some bad reviews
      7. There will always be tough times with low sales
   2. General Self Esteem
      1. Same as the previous section
7. Creative Satisfaction
   1. Satisfaction of creating something
      1. Writing Books is very high in creative satisfaction
      2. You create your own story world
      3. You bring readers into your story world
      4. As you get better and better you can create an amazing level of immersion
      5. The better the experience for the reader, the better the rewards for you in terms of sales and reviews and earnings
      6. As you get better and better, your creative satisfaction increases
      7. Writing is similar to most other professions – the very best writers get rewards (including financial rewards and satisfaction) of a far greater amount than merely good writers

Please consider this list carefully

If you think writing is a panacea and whatever plagues your happiness in your current job, will disappear the minute you start writing books, you are mistaken

If you are a good fit for it, then the writing profession can be very rewarding. You must keep in mind that a very small percentage of authors (2% to 4%) have financial stability. Also that an incredibly small percentage of authors become wealthy (0.1% to 0.5%)

If you are not a good fit for the writing profession, it can be very painful and overwhelming. Much better to try and figure out if it will suit you or not, before you jump into writing. Do not quit your day job until you have enough money for 10 years