by Rachel Pedersen
As we navigate through an uncertain time that includes people losing work, losing jobs, and not knowing what the economy is going to look like anytime soon, you may be questioning your job situation or career choice right now.
Here are some things to take into consideration as you take time to reflect on what the next right job would be or if there will be a career shift in your future. Ask yourself, “What is right for me?”
As a creative, whether you are an artist, musician, or writer, you may have been asked this question a time or two, “how are you going to make money doing that?”
There is this cultural archetype that looms in the dark corners of our minds during college (and especially in our parents’ minds): that infamous ‘starving artist’ character. We tend to think we need to take on this identity if we want to be successful in our craft. We expect we will have to struggle and eat ramen often as a price to pay to become a respected creative.
Fortunately, that doesn’t have to be the narrative.
In Elizabeth Gilbert’s book, Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear, she squashes the ideas that we have to be a starving artist or it’s more noble to live that storyline. It was so refreshing for her to be transparent about her job and financial life before she hit it big so to say. She admitted to always having a day job while she was writing. She said that she had had three books published by big publishing houses and had even been reviewed by the New York Times, but still kept her day job.
It wasn’t until her hugely successful book, Eat, Pray, Love that she finally quit and became a full-time writer. She articulates the reason why she continued to have day jobs so well in her book. Here is an excerpt:
““I held on to those other sources of income for so long because I never wanted to burden my writing with the responsibility of paying for my life. I knew better than to ask this of my writing, because over the years, I have watched so many other people murder their creativity by demanding that their art pay the bills. I’ve seen artists drive themselves broke and crazy because of this insistence that they are not legitimate creators unless they can exclusively live off their creativity. And when their creativity fails them (meaning: doesn’t pay rent), they descend into resentment, anxiety, or even bankruptcy. Worst of all, they often quit creating at all.””
Lesson learned: it is okay to have a day job, especially when you are first starting out.
But what if you want to start a side hustle or take your creativity full-time?
It was reported in 2019 that nearly half of Americans have a side hustle. So, it is very common! A side-hustle could go a couple different ways. You could have a full-time or part-time job that “pays the bills” and then your side hustle is your creative work. For example, you could be a contract artist, play in a band on weeknights and weekends, or be a freelance writer. Or it could be that you do your creative work more as a main job and have a side hustle to help out financially, such as working part-time at a retail store, drive for Uber, or deliver food.
What if you want to take your creative gifts full-time? This is where you need to be strategic. I love when Dave Ramsey uses the metaphor of getting the boat (you) as close to the dock (your ideal financial situation) as possible before you hop off (go completely full-time on your own). Everybody is different, so you would need to establish what your dock is in this example. Is it that you want to completely replace your income with your own business before you quit your day job? Is it a specific savings goal such as six months of expenses in the bank and then you will quit? Is it a monthly income goal?
You need to figure out your dock and then you need to hit that goal before anything.
When you work for yourself, you may not have a steady paycheck coming every two weeks anymore. You probably won’t have the same sort of benefits a corporate job might offer like health insurance. You will want to research the costs to run your business and also your monthly living expenses.
I recommend having separate bank accounts for your business and personal life. You should have an emergency fund for both your business and your personal life as well. This will help keep your finances more organized and lower your chances at making money mistakes between business and personal.
Before you make the leap to a full-time business on your own, make sure you do the research, save the money, and have your systems in place. Do your creativity a favor by putting in the legwork and yourself a favor too so you aren’t stuck eating ramen every night.
Rachel Pedersen has a day job in the world of social media while building her business, Three Pennies, where she helps you learn money skills you were never taught. You can find her on Instagram at @rachelnpedersen and learn about money at three-pennies.com.