|
In this first installment, Gina takes the leap from a non-writing job into freelancing. Subsequent
episodes will find her laying a strategic foundation for success, finding payoffs and pitfalls, learning hard lessons,
and…well, you'll just have to read them one at a time.
The Leap
Part 1: Into Thin Air
I've known since 1965 that I wanted to write. But it was not until 1999 that I actually did anything
about it. Over the years, my research on the profession had left me dubious about my talent, overwhelmed by the odds of
penetrating the elite class of "author" and demoralized by experts' predictions of a meager living.
What's a would-be writer to do? Shore up her intestinal fortitude and plow forward, right? In this
case, wrong. Instead, I earned a graduate degree and spent the next 12 years in corporate America.
During that time I wrote sporadically. What few psychic reserves I had at the end of each day,
financed decompression from the stress of my career, not my writing. I'm in awe of writers who have demanding full-time
jobs, care for children and also manage to freelance prolifically or crank out a novel each year. I couldn't do it.
Though the prevailing wisdom for making the transition to full-time authorship is "Don't quit your day
job just yet," that's exactly what I did. During the 1990s I had enjoyed a large and steady paycheck but had also
witnessed enough corporate tumult to fully appreciate that tomorrow is promised to no one. Since the only constant I
could count on was change, why not catalyze it myself and invest the lion's share of my energy in my lifelong
passion?
Fifteen years before, I had invested time and money in graduate school with no guarantees that I would
secure a job in the profession for which I had trained, one I would like, or that met my salary requirements. I had
taken a calculated risk that paid off. Using the same blueprint, I would begin again.
Leveraging 12 years of business acumen acquired inside health care companies, I obtained a business
position with The Hartford Courant. My responsibilities at the paper required me to interact with every business and
editorial function within the organization. In less than a year, I was on a first-name basis with nearly 400 employees,
many of them editors and reporters.
Shortly thereafter, while still employed full-time, I began freelancing. Buoyed by my expanding
comfort with risk taking, 15 months after beginning at the paper and three months after I started to freelance, I
pursued another long-term dream: I quit my job and took a trip around the world.
Before I took off, I offered to write a paid weekly column from each destination for The Courant's
website, ctnow.com. My employer-turned-client agreed, and loaned me a laptop and digital camera. For the next five
months I lived a triple dream - traveling the globe, writing about my adventures and getting paid to do it. My
no-guarantee investment in my passion had already begun to yield returns.
The next episode: "Transition," in which Gina figures out how to write and pay
the bills…and discovers The National Writers Union
|
