The Advice Articles Never Tell You the Soul-Crushing Side of Writing for A Living

The truth is, there will be days when being a writer can make you feel a bit like you’ve lost your mind

You can find endless amounts of cheerful articles online about how easy it is to earn money through your writing.

Writing coaches sell courses and books to teach you how to do exactly what is that they are happily doing. But what you don’t often find in most of these optimistic articles is any talk of the mental challenge that comes with a career in which you have no guaranteed income. And in which the success of your work is often judged subjectively.

Unlike a full-time job with a set salary, writing online means big ups and big downs. You will have days where you feel on top of the world. Days where you feel utterly confident you can indeed make it in this freelancing wild world.

But then there will be the days where everything you do feels like a failure. Maybe a client wants endless revisions or the latest article you published got only a handful of reads, or a harsh editor ripped apart a story you carefully crafted. Or worse, your writing was simply rejected with no explanation.

Even top writers that seemingly have it all figured out experience these stumbles. Even they have months where earnings they grew accustomed to may fall off a cliff.

Freelancing is hard. You’re on your own, and you have no guarantees. You may find one day the platform you think you had all figured out suddenly doesn’t push your stories any longer, and your views plummet. Or the pay rates change, and the same amount of traffic that used to bring you a certain amount of money no longer does.

These are the times if you decide not to quit, you’ve got to be flexible. You’ve got to adapt to whatever the new algorithm is, find a new place to share your writing, start a blog, or hustle up some clients.

The price to pay to be your own boss, make your own schedule, and live by your own rules can be simultaneously life-changing and soul-crushing.

When you’re stuck down in the valley, it can be a struggle to see your way out and back up to the next peak.

What do you do during the tough times? Do you keep on trying or give up?

There is that famous quote generally attributed to Einstein, (I’m sorry to bring it up because it’s way overused,) but still, it often runs through my head when things are going wrong, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

Writing online certainly can make you feel insane some days.

So do you continue to persevere and expect a new outcome? Or are you crazy for thinking things will turn out better this next time?

Perhaps this quote shouldn’t discourage us, but help us see, maybe there is a slightly different way we could go about doing things. Maybe there is something to be changed when we run up against a wall.

Writers are often introspective with a lot of imposter syndrome going around. We’ve got to find to way to work past it. Instead of feeling defeat, we can use it to our advantage, work harder, and tell that negative voice in our heads to shut the hell up.

It helps to remember past successes when you’re in a rut. And remind yourself, if you’re in a downturn it won’t last forever. They seldom do.

It also helps to think when you read that next cheerful article from some successful writer, remember, that writer has bad times too.