April 20, 2002
This day last year, was my very last day in Corporate America.
I remember the feeling of euphoria I felt as I packed up my generic desk, said goodbye to my cubicle, relinquished my parking pass and walked home. I remember how good it felt to take off my business attire as soon as I got home and know that I’d never, ever have to fix another copier.
I was ready to leave to corporate world and anxious to embrace the creative one. Because I was making such a dramatic change in my life, I saw things as black and white. Corporate world bad, Writing Life good.
At the time, I didn’t have the experience, wisdom, or time to see that seeing things that way was just not fair. I hadn’t had the distance yet to appreciate my corporate job and instead, I used it as an argument.
The truth is, I needed the Corporate World.
My first corporate job gave us stability and money that was crucial at the time. My soon to be husband and I had and I had just driven across country to move to Seattle. All we owned was in our little beat up Toyota. We were also dealing with immigration and a wedding coming up. We had to find a place to live, buy groceries and get established. By landing a job in the corporate world, I was able to deal with all my financial responsibilities.
But that job was more than just financially beneficial. By working in three different corporate jobs I learned skills that have become essential now that I am running my own business. Things such as marketing, sales, communication, time management, multitasking, presentation, responsibility, organisation and yes, how to collate. I learned how to focus, be professional, pull all-nighters, how to ask for what I want and how to get it and most importantly, I learned that I am a fantastic, hard worker.
The other thing I learned, which is perhaps the most important, is that I will do what it takes to survive.
My second corporate job, though in an amazing company that paid me very well, was in fact, horrible. My boss, the Vice President, was extremely verbally abusive. During my 10 months there, 19 out of 23 people in his department had quit. I wanted to leave, badly, but at the time my husband wasn’t working and we had rent to pay and groceries to buy. I didn’t have the luxury of quitting a job I hated to become something less secure. I had to stay in that job so that my husband and I could survive. And we did.
At the time it seemed hard and unfair, but the truth is, it was reality. It was something I had to do to get me where I am today. Without the Corporate World I wouldn’t have grown up and learned certain business and people skills that I needed. Without the Corporate World I wouldn’t have been able to pay rent or help my family survive. Without the Corporate World being a writer wouldn’t mean so much to me.
People often ask me if I could go back, would I have skipped the corporate world altogether? When I answer no they’re often surprised. I did what I had to do, and a person can always learn from that. The only thing I would do differently is to not let the corporate world take over me as it did. I would have tried to find a way to let the writer in me come out, even if only during lunch breaks.
April 18, 2002
The past several days have been completely useless. Despite the heavy workload and deadlines that are fast approaching, I’ve done nothing. Literally nothing.
I’ve made bogus attempts, sitting at the computer, forcing out garb, but none of it’s been worth anything. I haven’t made any progress because I just haven’t wanted to deal with writing. I’ve been making excuses left and right and sadly, I was happy when the cat threw up all over the carpet so that I would have an excuse to stop trying to focus on writing and instead on cleaning up.
Part of my funk is my still lingering fear of failing. While I’ve made peace with the fact that despite any and all efforts, fear will always been around, I think it’s been more prominent lately. I’ve stepped up, making more demands on myself and writing and going to new levels. I think because it’s uncharted territory I’m scared of it. I’m no longer in my comfort zone. I keep reminding myself that I felt the same way a year ago when I began and look at how far I’ve come now. Still, it’s scary to move forward.
Part of it could also be the weather, having not seen sun since August. Or maybe it’s partly due to my cold or something simpler such as brain rot. Whatever it is, it’s here, blocking me.
At least I know I’m not alone in feeling this way. It looks like over at Loobylu she’s understanding exactly where I’m at. I know this mood will pass, I know I’ll get back to kicking some ass sometime soon and I know that for as long as I’m writing there will be dry spells such as this. I’m learning to deal with them better instead of beating myself up over them, but still, it’s a royal pain in the arse when I have work to do and I just can’t do it.
April 08, 2002
One year ago I made the biggest, hardest and best decision of my life – to quit my corporate job and become a full time freelance writer.
The day I decided to be a writer full-time, I was filled was with mixed feelings. I was both terribly excited and afraid beyond belief. I knew that by working on my own terms things would be different but I had never done that before and was unsure of the correct way to do it.
I read every book on how to be a writer, because my fear of doing it wrong was my biggest concern. I felt because I had declared so loudly that I was going to be a writer, failing at it terrified me to death. It wasn’t until eight months later I began to get over most of my fears while learning how to just accept the others.
When I started, being published meant everything to me. I thought if my name was in print that every fear or concern I had would vanish – I would be a bonafied writer if I were to appear in a magazine. When it happened, nothing changed. I realised that outside validation doesn’t count if you don’t give it to yourself first.
I also thought in the beginning that because writing was my passion, work would be easy and blissful. The truth is, is that it’s the most work I’ve ever done in my life. Instead of clocking exactly 40 hours a week, I was putting in 60, 70 and sometimes 80. I enjoyed working so much that I would forget to tell myself to take a break. It took me a very long time to learn how to take guilt free time off and realise that I’m only human.
At first, I thought it was just about me becoming a writer, but looking back over the past year I realise that’s the farthest thing. It has been about becoming me.
Now, I’m creative and able to use the word creative without cringing. After being a scared and quiet artist for years who thought everyone was better than her, I am now selling art and working at an Art Museum. I’m excited about the possibility of each day, because I get to decide what I want to do.
Despite struggles and frustrations, I have continued to move forward. I have overcome fears, self-doubt and roadblocks to carve a niche for myself that does something. I have made some amazing friends and contacts. I have published words that have affected people deeply. I have earned respect from those I admire. I have finally been able to define what success is, and it’s not the same definition I had a year ago. Being happy, liking who I am, doing what I want to do, and making a difference in other people’s lives makes me feel completely successful each and every day.
Feeling comfortable with who I am and what I’m doing didn’t happen over night but rather almost a year. In the beginning I was filled with so much self doubt that I often wondered if I was on the right track because I didn’t know how to trust myself enough to know that it was. I was insecure with my writing and didn’t attempt to get much published for fear of rejection when in fact, rejection is only how I learned. I used to try so hard to be an image that I continuously failed at being myself and it wasn’t until I stopped doing that did I begin to succeed both personally and professionally.
I expected to have it all figured out within a couple of months and when I didn’t, I panicked. I forgot to remember that it wasn’t just about writing, it was about trusting myself and sometimes it takes time to figure that all out. Looking back now, I don’t see how it could have taken less than a year, and feel comforted when I realise that most new business take three to five years to start making a profit.
I haven’t figured it all out yet by any means, and I’m not and never will be a finished project. That’s one thing I’ve learned is that there isn’t one place to get to or a levelling off place where you feel like you’ve done it all. My writing and I will always be a work in progress and although that sometimes still terrifies me, it’s also the most exciting part of my life. It’s also the most meaningful because I have made a conscious choice to do this.
A year ago I did the hardest thing imaginable – I acted for myself. I made myself responsible for my own happiness, my own lifestyle and my own dream. I took my passion and turned it into a profession that I wouldn’t want to quit.
April 03, 2002
I’ve been structuring myself a lot these past weeks. Not with regiments and routines that don’t work, but organising myself in a way that is proving vital.
I currently have so many projects happening that I was beginning to be swamped by them all. I have this website to update and keep fresh, and emails galore to respond to. I have the Another Girl at Play site where I also have emails to respond to, sites to review, PR to do, a newsletter to write and profiles to update. I also have my writing, which currently involves my book proposal, articles to write and some other small projects. On top there is my Docent Class for which I have to write a project and participate in the weekly classes and keep up with all that. That’s a lot for one person, one brain and only 24 hours each day.
So I created a plan to keep my sanity.
The first thing I did was set aside certain days for certain tasks.
Mondays are my email days where I respond to all personal emails, site feedbacks and site submissions on this day only. That way I don’t feel guilty if email stacks up during the week because I know I’ve set aside time each Monday to deal with it. It also saves me from having to worry about it during the week or catching up when I should be writing an article. I’ve also set up auto responders and numerous email addresses to distinguish between whose who.
Fridays are my marketing/promotional days and this is when I work on selling my work, marketing myself and my sites, catch up on business emails that weren’t urgent, update the sites and so on.
I’m also learning to prioritise which is something I didn’t think I had to learn since at my corporate job this was one skill I was constantly complimented on. But with so much going on, and so many things I truly believe are important, I have to really get honest with myself and say what I can do now, what I can do later, and what I can’t do at all. It’s sometimes boils down to me having to be rather harsh and forgoing things I’d like to do, because the reality is, I ain’t Superwoman.
By doing just those few things, I’ve been able to keep my head above water. I can take care of business while still creating and having minimum stress. That is crucial right now because I have the energy, the drive, the passion and the talent to make something of myself and the only thing that could stop me is my own disorganised self.
March 25, 2002
For the first time in over a year, I read a book for the pure joy of reading.
It had nothing with how to sell articles, grammar, writing structure, book proposals, marketing, design, inspiration, creativity or writing.
In fact, it was a book about whaling and it was read in less than a day.
I used to read extensively for enjoyment but since my official launch as a writer I instead began to use books as study and work tools. I thought if they didn’t benefit me by helping me learn how to be a better writer, than I wouldn’t read it. My once varied book collection became a whose who of creative self-help books and reading became a chore rather than a joy.
It came to the point where I started to actually loathe reading altogether. The self-help books on writing had become repetitive and rather than inspiring me, they bored me. That’s when I picked up a copy of In the Heart of the Sea and read it straight through, without even stopping for lunch.
My brain enjoyed the break, of being taken someplace different than a writer’s life. I was relaxed after, content and I think there was even a smile on my face. I had enjoyed reading! It was such a big deal because it had been so long since I had read a piece of non-fiction that I forgot how much I enjoyed it. Something I’ll remind myself often by reading more and more of it.
I’ve always wanted to be a varied writer, with no special area of interest. However, if I just kept reading on how to be a writer, I don’t think my writing would ever really improve. Instead, it would work itself into a pattern and would fall into one category – a self-help writer.
I don’t want that to happen so I’m going to get back into reading. It’s not only essential for my career, but for my own, selfish enjoyment.
March 24, 2002
During my stint in Corporate America, I frequently took vacations. As soon as I came home from one I’d start planning another. Sometimes they were just quick weekend get aways and sometimes they were two-week holidays somewhere warm. It seemed like every couple of months I was going somewhere.
However, since I’ve been working on my own, I haven’t even taken an overnight trip. Everything’s been work and taking time away from it would leave me feeling guilty – as though I hadn’t earned the right to take a holiday.
But I realised that everyone needs a break, especially me. Sometimes I tend to discard all my work because I haven’t been paid or there’s no exact way to monitor what I’m doing. However I have put so much effort into this, racking my brain day and night, making sacrifices, learning about myself and my business, that I figured it’s time to take a break.
I planned a five-day getaway to San Francisco. It had warmth, sun, art, relaxing streets and good friends. I planned the days so we’d be doing some things and sometimes doing nothing at all. And I promised myself that if we weren’t doing anything more than taking an afternoon nap in the hotel that I’d enjoy it, guilt free. I had earned time off and I had to make the best of it.
I began to make hotel reservations and after I did something clicked in my head. I’m a travel writer! So I emailed the sales and market department of the hotel, told them who I was and requested a media package. Four days later, I had one.
When I received this package I felt giddy. For the first time I honestly felt like a travel writer. I read through the information and became completely excited. Then I became confused. I had told myself it wouldn’t be a work trip, but now it was looking like that wouldn’t be the case. If I were a travel writer, wouldn’t I have to write about the hotel while I’m there? Wouldn’t I have to pay extra attention to all the details and carry a pocketbook around to note everything I saw?
I also began to worry that if I didn’t do that, the hotel would find me out. They would say, “Aha! You’re not a travel writer! We’d like our media package back please!”
Up until the day of travel I was nervous about how to combine the work with pleasure, unsure if it could be done. Especially since I’m still learning how to balance.
But once I hit the San Francisco sun, there were no worries. I relaxed, I smiled, I giggled and most of all, I enjoyed myself.
We spent the first few days driving around different places, staying with family and friends. I was able to relax so much and rest my brain, I actually noticed more than usual. And more importantly, what I noticed actually stuck in my brain.
When we arrived at our hotel in San Francisco, I became nervous. Did I look like a travel writer? Did I talk like a travel writer? Because although I’ve been working on my travel portfolio and have been writing articles that I will soon send out, I have to be officially published as a travel writer. I began to fear they’d think I was lying and ask me to leave the hotel.
But they didn’t. I even was upgraded.
I continued to relax and enjoy my trip. The more I relaxed the more I noticed and the more I actually remembered. Instead of stressing out over every detail, I enjoyed it. It was the first time in a long time that I had private thoughts and didn’t worry about putting them in an article.
I had new experiences that refreshed my mind and reenergised my creativity. I got to be Alex for five days instead of Alex the writer and that felt really good.
When I returned home, I was excited to get back to work. Instead of planning for the next vacation, I eagerly began to write about the one I just had. Even though I hadn’t taken one single note, I remembered even the smallest details of the room, the food and the whole city. I especially remembered how I felt, and that’s probably the best memory of all.
This trip helped me to realise that I do need a break every now and then, just like everyone else. It also helped me to realise that travel writing is really what I want to do, and will be good at. I love to travel, I love to notice things, and I love to encourage others to take time out and visit some place new – even if it’s just encouraging myself.
The old saying is to do what you love to do and figure out how to get paid for it. I figure I’ve spent enough of my years travelling for free that it’s now time to make some money at it. And I really believe that I can do that now, because I’m at the stage where I can enjoy the work side and the personal side. And that’s the trick I had to learn and finally did.
Elsewhere