So here’s a funny thing: years ago, before I was a Renaissance Woman Multi-Passionate Creative Entrepreneur, before I even knew there was such a thing, back when I was lost and casting about desperately for something to be when I grew up, I decided to be a writer.
The only problem was I didn’t spend much time actually writing.
I thought a lot about writing. I read a lot about writing. But I didn’t actually write much.
Except in my journal (where I actually wrote a ton), and that didn’t “count.”
I was stuck in a box that said that writers either write fiction (my goal at the time) or magazine or newspaper articles. Personal essays, or sales copy, or blog posts? The first two just weren’t on my radar, and the last didn’t exist yet!
So I tried, half-heartedly to write fiction, but couldn’t seem to come up with any worthy ideas. And because I was young and impatient, it didn’t occur to me that writing might be a skill that could be developed over time.
As a result, I felt like an untalented loser who would never amount to anything.
Meh.
It shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that I started putting my energies elsewhere, “procrastinating” by doing art projects, in fact. Apparently, I wasn’t meant to be a writer (I thought); clearly I was supposed to be an artist. A calligrapher, in fact, which seemed especially fitting: I started out wanting to write beautifully, and instead learned how to do beautiful writing. Or something like that.
Fifteen years later, it’s all come full circle. I’ve been writing for my businesses for the past decade and a half, I’ve penned articles here and there, and I never stopped writing in my journal (which does “count,” of course).
And now, thanks to my blogs, I write (and publish!) on an almost daily basis. Plus I actually make money as a writer from my copywriting business.
Go figure.
The lesson here? (Because of course there is one!) Don’t let anyone, especially yourself, put you in a box or tell you what you can or cannot do or be!
If you write, you’re a writer, by golly.
If you make art, you’re an artist.
If you make music, you’re a musician.
If you do a whole bunch of stuff (like me), maybe you’re a Multi-Passionate Creative Artrepreneur! Or whatever.
You get to figure out your own title. I don’t care if you make money from it or not (though making money is always nice). You get to own it, and refine it over time, and polish up your multi-faceted self identity until it sparkles and shines!
Of course there’s one catch: you can’t just think about it, you’ve got to actually do the thing in order to call yourself a thing-doer.
It doesn’t matter if you do it in public or in private. It doesn’t matter if nobody ever sees the fruits of your labors. You still get to own it. You still get to call yourself whatever title you want.
So don’t just think about the thing you want to do or be (and I know you want it!) Get out there (or in there) and do it!
You owe it to yourself.
Me, I’m going to go write another blog post.
