Tag Archive for: Passion

Clicking Our Heels – Writing: Passion or Work?

Clicking Our Heels –
Writing: Passion or Work?

Stiletto Gang members all
write, but the question is why? Read on to find out whether we consider writing
a job, a passion or a hobby and whether our emotional reaction to it has
changed.

Kay Kendall – I consider
writing to be my calling. I have always written, even in my previous job. I
just never wrote fiction before I took it up ca. 1999. I didn’t think I had any
stories to tell. Now I do have them. I just needed more confidence, and a bit
of age, in order to feel comfortable in telling my stories. 

Linda Rodriguez – To me,
writing is my vocation, which means it’s my job, but it’s also a passion.

If I
never needed to earn another dollar again, I would still write.

Sparkle Abbey – It’s
always been a passion and for both of us simply a part of who we are. Like many
others we’ve always written and have had a love for words. Since signing a
contract for our first four books in 2010, it’s had to become more of a job
because we have deadlines to deal with. That’s been an adjustment but one we’re
okay with. We just signed a contract for more books, so we’re excited to
continue writing the Pampered Pets mystery series. 

Cathy Perkins – Writing is
both a (second) job and a passion. Being time constrained takes a toll on me,
especially when my creative side has to take a back seat to the part of my life
that comes with a paycheck. Fortunately, my husband sleeps through me turning
on the light at 3 A> to scribble down scene ideas and snippets of dialogue. What,
your subconscious doesn’t keep right on writing at night? 

Kimberly Jayne – Writing
is definitely not a hobby for me. It’s a job that I’m passionate about,
although I dislike referring to it as a “job,” which for me carries a negative
connotation. It reminds me too much of the day jobs I’ve had over my lifetime
that I didn’t want to go to each day but, of course, had to. Writing has become
more important to me over the years because I feel, like many, that time is
running out to achieve the many writing goals I had set for myself when I was
in my twenties. If fulfills me in a way it didn’t previously as well, which I
think comes from acquiring the confidence and competence in my skills and
talents that I didn’t have when I was young. 

Debra H. Goldstein
Passion. I walked away from a lifetime judicial appointment to pursue writing,
at whatever level I am capable of, because of the joy it gives. 

Paffi S. Flood – As a job.
I have a routine to where I’m at my laptop every morning at 9:00 to do
something. It isn’t always writing. It could be something as simple as plotting
out a scene for clarity,

but I do it. That’s the only way I can make progress
on my manuscript.

Jennae Phillippe – All of
the above. Sometimes it feels like more work than other times. I am at my best
when I can tap into writing as a passion, and at my worse when it feels like a
chore. I think when I start to think like a publisher and imagine what sort of
stories are marketable, it feels the most like a job, and when I think like
that 14-year-old kid who just wanted to write fantastical stories, I enjoy it
the most. I just need to think like a marketing savvy 14-year-old and I’ll
crack the writing code. 

Bethany Maines – With my
day job as a graphic designer, I’ve learned that having a passion IS work. But
writing has evolved over time to be something that was just for me, into
something that is more outward facing and shaped for an exterior audience. 

Paula Gail Benson – Yes.
Since 2013, when I seriously began making submissions, it has been a job. It
remains a passion. It’s no longer just a hobby, because even if I’m writing to
help a group with which I’m affiliated, I have to take credit for my prose and
know it will be judged with professional standards.

Fulfilling a Passion by Debra H. Goldstein

Fulfilling a Passion by Debra H. Goldstein

Passion.  Aging.  Wanting to fulfill my passion to be a writer (even a mid-list writer) before my arms go beyond their present flabby state.  These are things I’ve been thinking about a lot lately because of a wonderful award I received on July 31.  Positive Maturity, a United Way agency in Birmingham that addresses issues associated with senior citizens, in partnership with the city of Birmingham and B-Metro Magazine, honored an inaugural class of fifty individuals based upon their achievements in business, personal life and civic engagement.

Besides being 50 or older at the time of the event, the honorees must have demonstrated success in one of the following areas:  current career (including encore careers), civic engagement, personal goals such as training for a marathon later in life, or beginning and succeeding at a new career based upon a lifelong passion.  When I learned the 2014 winners would include University of Alabama Coach Nick Saban and 2011 James Beard Who’s Who of Outstanding Chef Frank Stitt, I was appreciative and a little unbelieving that I was included in their company.

In other words, someone goofed.  True, I have been active in the community and there were some pretty high highs in my legal career, but I’ve always tried, and for the most part succeeded, in flying under the radar. I thought about saying “no,” but three things made me agree to be an honoree:  1) to be a part of a fundraising event for an agency that does so much good; 2) that my son informed me that he would fly in from Chicago to attend the event – “oh, and do you think you could arrange for me to get a picture with Coach Saban?” and 3) when I was told I had been selected as the poster child for my success as an individual who walked away from a well-paying cushy judgeship to follow a lifelong passion – my dream to be a writer.

It didn’t matter to the nominating committee that my first book, Maze in Blue, failed to make the New York Times best-seller list.  They thought the weeks it spent on Birmingham’s best-seller list, how it engaged members of the public, and the support various community groups received from my book signings and talks was more important.  The selection committee didn’t look to see how the book was published by now defunct Chalet Publishers, LLC, kept alive through a Creative Space edition, and then purchased and published as a May 2014 Harlequin Worldwide Mystery book of the month.  Instead, the committee looked at the pure joy I have had being a writer of short stories, essays and what I hope will soon be two novels.  They chose to recognize the passion that consumes me.

Writing isn’t an easy path.  I marvel more and more at the writers I meet and their personal stories.  One thing those at the top of the pinnacle, the mid-list writers, and the wannabes like me have in common is our passion.  There are many other things we could do with our time – perhaps performing those things far better than we write – but we can’t help ourselves.  We have to write.  Our writings aren’t always pretty or perfect, but they are expressions of thoughts we must share.  It hurts when others reject our writings, but we simply put our efforts into a new project.  We can’t turn off the passion.

I was proud and humbled to be a 50 Over 50 award recipient. I am prouder to be part of the passionate group who make up the writing community.