How can one "treat writing as a job" even though it doesn't pay?
I hear this advice a lot: "Treat your writing as a job." But it seems to me that this is easier said/done when it is actually paying off and, thus, one is encouraged to do it. But what if one is being discouraged by painful (even bewildering) rejections? How then does one 'treat it as a job' when it isn't even paying in any sense?
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Some people are volunteers, and they never get paid (except with a verbal or written thank you).
Some people get paid as soon as they do something (e.g. a waiter paid almost entirely in tips).
Some people get paid at the end of the day.
Some people get paid at the end of the week.
Some people get paid at the end of the month.
You are working a job where you'll get paid next year, or maybe the one after, or maybe not at all.
It's not the length of time, it's the uncertainty of "maybe not at all" that makes your situation so much different from the others.
The advice to "treat it like a job" means that you have to ignore that "maybe". As long as you're thinking that you might not get paid, you might be wasting your time, etc. you are going to find yourself not working as diligently as you should, working shorter hours, being careless, and even giving up too soon.
If you don't have the mindset that you are working at a permanent job, and that you are a responsible and hardworking employee, you simply won't be productive and what you do produce won't be as good as it could be.
If it helps, think of yourself as working at a volunteer job. You will work hard, be productive, care enough to do it right, and enjoy yourself in the meantime.
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Stephen King, in a live interview, was asked "What advice do you have for people that want to write?"
His answer (I am repeating from memory) was: "They should write. But I have to tell you, most of the people that say they want to write for a living, do not really want that. They want to HAVE WRITTEN, they want to have a best selling novel that is always generating income, they want to come on talk shows like this, they want some fame."
He has elsewhere talked about his own path, many years of writing stories without selling any, or making a few hundred dollars on them and that's it. But the bottom line is, he loves to write, and writes on his current story every day of the week, regardless of holidays or weekends or whatever.
Now you could say that is approaching writing "like a job"; because like a job you have to put in the hours every day, and like a job there will be some stuff you dislike but have to do, or that you struggle with. There may be disappointments, you submit a year's worth of work and it gets rejected everywhere, without any explanation. (just "Not right for us at this time.")
But that is the only relationship it really has to a job.
I agree with King, if you don't love to write, for the sake of writing, then you will probably not become a professional author. There really is an ART to writing, and like all art it takes some natural talent, and for most people that aren't like musical prodigies, natural talent must be turned into professional talent by many years of practice and discovery and often explicit training in the form of tutorials, books or classes.
Do not treat writing like a job.
Treat it like a hobby you love doing, and do not HAVE to be paid to justify doing it, but like any hobby you want to become better at it, and you HOPE one day you will be good enough to turn pro, and lots of people will be happy to pay for your work.
You should devote some regular hours to this hobby, but if the only reason you write is for the money, and you believe that if you never get paid then all of your writing was a tragic waste of time, then you should quit now. You almost certainly do not have the interest and drive in crafting stories to become good enough to sell them.
But if you DO love writing stories, and enjoy pushing your imagination and coming up with new stuff, then you aren't wasting your time. People can enjoy painting without any intention to sell. My nephew plays pool every Saturday, he's really good; he's run two tables in a row. He doesn't intend to go pro, he's got a job he likes, a wife and four kids, and pool is just fun with friends. A friend of mine plays the piano a few times a week, learning songs and practicing songs, but she doesn't plan to become a song writer, or a professional pianist, she just likes to play.
Are people wasting their time and money pursuing their hobbies? Is it a waste of time and money to be entertained, by TV or going to a play or by, say, reading fiction?
I would find that a disconcerting attitude for an author, to believe that reading something just for entertainment is a total waste of time and money. It's like they think of their potential audience as suckers.
If you want to be a writer, start writing. Write for the fun of it. Study technique and crafting, see how the pros deal with issues, so you can have more fun by writing better. Dream of going pro, but if that's the only reason you write, find another hobby, like investing, or playing poker, or gambling on sports, where your chances of success are (seriously) far better.
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To me, treat it like a job means two things, principally:
First, set a regular work schedule and/or production target. Write from 9am to noon, or from 8pm to 11. Or else set yourself a word count target for the day. 1000 words, 1200 words, 2000 words: what ever is a reasonable goal for a work day.
Do this and you will inevitably get more done. A professional working writer does not hang around waiting for the muse. The professional working writer makes the muse get her butt out of bed and go to work every morning. Writing is a craft and, like any craft, it improves with practice. And, like any craft, it can be performed on demand. And, if you are serious about it, you will have to perform on demand regularly or you will never get anything done.
Second, write for an audience. Work produces stuff of value to other people. Hobbies produce stuff of value only to yourself. This does not mean that you have to slavishly write for the lowest common denominator of the market. Not every chef has to works for McDonalds.
But, to continue the analogy, when I make a meal for my wife, I put a lot of time and effort into making something good. When I cook for myself, I generally heat soup. You will do better work when you are working to create something for someone else to enjoy.
If you treat writing like a job, you will do more work, and it will be better work. And if you produce more work and better work, you might even end up making money from it. And if not, unpaid work is still work, as long as you are keeping a schedule, hitting a target, and working to create value for someone other than yourself.
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Do not come to any art for the profit. When the profit fails to come, you'll be discouraged. Do it for the love of it first then other things, money too shall follow.
Ernest Hemingway advised: "Work every day no matter what has happened the day or night before, get up and bite the nail".
That's the spirit of the advice.
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