How to not be a “sellout”
Working in a creative industry can be tough. There is a competitive market, difficult clients, and people who will go to any means necessary to not pay you. Above all else, however, I’ve found that the hardest thing is other creatives. More accurately, creatives who don’t want to actually work.
The starving artist
I ended up finishing my time at a university with a degree in creative writing. Naturally, the program attracted aspiring novelists, screen writers, playwrights, and even people who wanted to work in video games. While I wanted to work in TV myself, my ambitions always deviated from everyone else’s. I wanted to make money.
Not that my entire driving ambition was to be rich. I just had no intention of living paycheck-to-paycheck, hoping things would work out. I wanted security. I wanted to know that if anything happened, I could support myself without going into debt, (my degree already helped enough with that). So, even before I graduated, I looked for any kind of work I could get.
The results were interesting. Going on 4 years later, I’ve written for podcasts, researchers, newspapers and magazines, startups, hair transplantation clinics and gyms, and most recently content for a series of drug addiction websites. This doesn’t even include the editing and consultation work I’ve done.
However, what I never realized — and all of my fellow students were happy to point out — was that all those jobs were actually bad things. Apparently, me taking in all of those variety of clients has permanently stained my talent and I will never be one of the greats. No one will ever read the novel I’m writing. I won’t make it as a TV writer. I will never inspire anyone with my words. I suck. Which brings me to the crux of the issue —
There is a toxic misunderstanding between creatives who want to work and creatives who only want to work for themselves.
On one hand, you have the idyllic writing career. The dream. Spending long hours looking for inspiration in a coffee shop, while your agent pitches you and cuts you checks for working, diligently, on your next novel. On the other, that doesn’t really exist for young writers anymore. Despite this, many who are starting out think this is an attainable goal. They honestly believe that if they dedicate enough of their time to this, that they will never have to compromise.
Please don’t get me wrong, I admire anyone with the dedication to finish a novel — it is a Herculean task in today’s world of dwindling attention spans — but it isn’t the only way.
The problem? When many of these writers see colleague after colleague leave this dream by the wayside and pursue the corporate way of life, it seems harder and harder. In turn, this threatens their dream and makes it seem less-and-less possible.
I believe that it is out of this developing insecurity that the term “sellout” was born.
My experience as a “sellout”
I was first called a sellout when I happily announced to some of my fellow writing students that I got an internship with a local newspaper. It was a great opportunity to get some experience under my belt while still in school. I learned a lot and walked away a better writer. Still, despite a noticeable improvement in my writing, it seemed there was something inherently wrong with what I did.
From then on out, our workshops went differently. What used to be a circle of support and positive feedback became unfounded criticism and blatant insults.
It sucked — until it didn’t.
Their goal of tearing me down only built me stronger. The “feedback” that had been going around before was airy. It didn’t add anything to the work, it was just support for the sake of support. Now, I had to either defend my point or admit that it was wrong. Something that many of my fellow students didn’t seem to grasp. More so, it pushed me further and further from the “creative” side of my brain to the analytical. The irony was that they were reinforcing the very traits they sought to admonish.
To be totally honest, the criticism was still harsh. A lot of it wasn’t constructive. I can’t tell you how many times I heard someone say “I don’t like it. I don’t know why, I just don’t.” While this is less common to hear now, I think it is mostly because I’m less involved with toxic individuals and am at a point in my career where I can be more picky about the writers I surround myself with. (A lot of them write for the Writing Cooperative). Still, there will always be people, writers, and artists like this. Why?
Others will always hate your success
What it came down to was that I was having a modicum of success, while many of them worked jobs they hated so that they could throw all of their time into their writing. For the record, I do not consider myself a success. I’m young and I’ve gotten decent traction, but I have a long way to go. I think anyone reading this story or some of my other opinions should be aware of that. I don’t have all the answers, I just have the ones I’ve learned in an incredibly short amount of time. Still, I strongly believe in what I write and hope others can find something helpful in it.
Despite this, I still come across the occasional writer who will make similar comments. That I’m not a real writer because I work in marketing. That I’m wasting my time working a 9-to-5 job. That they could never sacrifice their freedom for the sake of their art. That I’ve given up. None of these are true.
Despite my 40+ hours a week, I still put in time to write on Medium, work on my novel, and read others’ work. I am doing everything in my power to stay on my path and, one day, only write for myself. I’m just enjoying a decent pay check while I do it. Which brings me off this tangent and back to my original point.
Sellouts don’t exist
This all comes down to the simple notion that “sellouts” don’t exist. I firmly believe the term was born out of creatives wanting to tear each other down. In truth, who doesn’t want to sell their work? What is the purpose of writing, drawing, and creating if not to be recognized for it? Maybe I’m totally off base. Maybe this is just me. But it seems I’m meeting more and more writers who feel the same way. I don’t want this to be a rant. I don’t want to create negativity on this platform. What I do want is an open dialogue. I want writers who are considering a corporate job to feel comfortable asking me questions about what I do. The same way I want to be able to speak with writers about their projects without being admonished for putting my book second and my livelihood first.
We live in a world of unprecedented creative freedom. Every year, people are creating new forms of media and professions that never existed before. Technology is allowing us to create constantly, from podcasts to webcomics and feature-length films. Creatives don’t need the same support network that they’ve had in the past. But that isn’t all good. Now, instead of working, many writers I’ve met are more interested in the idea of self-publishing. Skipping all of the bureaucracy that was forced on us in the past. This isn’t a bad thing. I have no gripes against writers who choose to self-publish, but no writer should look down on another for any reason. Those who choose to throw all of their time into their creative work shouldn’t look down on the corporate world and vice versa. In the end, we should all just write and be happy to read another writer’s work when they need it.
If you have any comment or questions about what I’ve written here, or what I do, please feel free to leave a comment. Like I said above, I want to create an open dialogue and not just rant about negativity.