I'm Back: Motivation, Money & Marriage (Not what you're thinking)
How to sustainably live out a "professional" creative vocation
My Dear Readers,
About a month ago I took an unplanned break from my weekly newsletters. No specific reason just an intuitive transition from one creative season to another.
I have mentioned often the importance of more tactical and actionable approaches to the creative and entrepreneurial lifestyle, but I have recently found that if we can make room for it there is a much better compass for our lives and our projects than just a step by step guide to getting things done.
Life will never be easy, but it can be enjoyable. Discipline does bring freedom and consistency does get results. But these things should always be secondary to the more human side of all our pursuits whether artistic, relational, or monetary. Simply put the tactics and the tools should always bolster the interest and curiosity in, and overall value of the project, business, or endeavor.
One thing that has been hitting me over the head in recent weeks and which probably led to my unplanned break in writing was this idea that usually the moment we start forcing something is the moment we start losing “the magic” and stop bearing “the fruit”.
There are lots of ways to think about this and context is of course key, but I want to frame this thing as the tactical approach versus the curious approach to creative commitment and how maybe putting them together might give us the key to long-term success as well as enjoyment.
I have undertaken many and probably most of my creative and money-making projects with both of the above pieces at play but often found that the tactical took over and then drowned out the curious.
It was always curiosity that would birth an idea but then the tactical would swoop in and take the wheel so to speak.
For example, I once started an online Shopify store selling pet accessories and started growing an Instagram page to promote it (doggydaize.com if you must know). The project was born from curiosity and excitement about website creation, branding, and eCommerce but it then became dominated by the tactical side of how the whole thing should function in order to be a “success”.
This would have been fine if my curiosity in pets and pet owners was genuine but because it was not (don’t get me wrong I love animals and pets but it really grinds my gears how obsessed people are these days so maybe this project was just escaped repression of my frustration with this phenomenon and thing was just a way for me to “make them pay” but I will spare you the full psychoanalytical speculations) anyhow the initial curiosity soon became dominated by tactics that I perceived would make the whole project “successful”. The result was an unsustainable project the soul of which withered and then died.
In talking to other creators, writers, and entrepreneurs I have come to realize that this struggle is a common one and that many if not most creators struggle with it. In a blurred mix of outcomes, integrity, authenticity, and monetization the creator finds themselves pushed and pulled as they navigate back and forth between tactics and creative curiosity. The result of this struggle is usually one of two things.
The first thing we typically see in the land of creators is the unfinished project, the abandoned blog, or lone pilot episode podcast. The idea struck, the curiosity caught fire but then alas the fire burned out and another personal brand went to the preverbal graveyard of good intentions.
The second thing we see is the tactical tyranny, a stiff sort of Frankenstein of a dream pieced together in an unnatural and ungodly way sometimes profitable but sometimes not, surviving off of a sort of high energy corporate mentality where incense is burned to statistics and bottom lines but also where curiosity has long since been consumed in the fire of growth, status, outcomes, or financial incentives. In this second scenario profitability and/or power are usually the dominant drivers, and the result is something like a sort of slavery to a status where the individual can’t go back and won’t get out, so he keeps going forward.
There is however a third option, a scenario where tactics and curiosity still contend yet all the while working together toward a common unity and a shared goal. Simply put this third scenario is a marriage. Not between people in this case but between the two counterparts mentioned above.
A marriage between the tactical and the curious. A binding commitment that ensures the life and sustainability of both distinct pieces which together can bring new and continual life to the soul and work of the creative individual while ultimately helping them fulfill their creative mission, vocation, and career.
The reason I say marriage and not “balance” between the two is for the simple fact that there is nothing balanced about it, it is an all-encompassing sort of thing, the life of one depends on the life of the other and in order to flourish they must “become one”.
The tactics must serve the curiosity and the curiosity must in turn sustain the tactics. It is not a 50/50 sort of thing it is more of a symbiotic relationship where both pieces are respected and maintained as utterly crucial to the continued existence of the creative mission. Without this “marriage”, the curiosity will wain and wander and the tactics will turn tyrannical. Without this marriage, the curiosity will fade and fall to futility, and the tactical with turn bitter, cold and utilitarian.
Turns out the unitive and creative ends of marriage have more to do with a practical approach to creativity than we might have thought. You don’t need a marriage to make a kid, but you do need marriage to make a family. In the same way, you don’t always need tactics and curiosity to start a project but you do need them both to keep it going and to keep it alive and healthy.
If one of the parties ceases to respect or revere the other then things start to unwind. If one starts to dominate or dictate to them other then the magic is lost, and the “love” is broken.
People can sense the intention and strategy behind creative endeavors just like they can sense dynamics and relational issues in families and couples. It just sort of comes through.
No one is perfect and marriage is no walk in the park from what I hear but it does in fact “work”. It does sustain and it does bring life and joy.
This has gone on long enough and I don’t really feel qualified to comment any further on marriage and may have already overstepped my bounds. But from where I stand, I think this does bring some guidance to those of you and me who may feel tossed between the curiosity and tactics of the creative life. This said I hope I have communicated that there is not only room for both but also a need for both.
It can take time to learn this lesson and I have by no means fully learned it, but I have started to frame creative projects within the context of this “marriage”. That is to say, if they matter that much, then they deserve this much commitment.
This doesn’t mean you have to know exactly where your podcast, or painting or online business or side hustle is headed but it does mean that you can keep it alive, keep it sustainable and with any luck keep it enjoyable as well.
There are reasons for the seasons, whether it be spiritual, relational, professional, or creative it is just the natural order. So, you don’t need to force things, but you do need to make and then honor your commitment to them. If you want to be an artist a writer or an entrepreneur, then be one. Make the commitment and marry the mission, for better for worse for richer or for poorer. It doesn’t mean this one idea will be “the one” but it does mean that you will continue to use and serve the world with your God-given gifts all the days of your life until death does you part.
It’s good to be back,
Ben