I’m back to thinking about Career Goals, for some reason. (There is a reason, but it’s not a particularly exciting one; I had a meeting at work that got me thinking about such matters, a thought process both compounded and extended by reading a particularly well-written story at an outlet I’d once wanted to write for, reminding me of that aspiration for the first time in some years.) These days, for the most part, I find myself buried in the day-to-day of it all, giving little thought for the most part about the bigger things. There’ll be time for that later, I think to myself, although that’s not really the case.
And yet, here I am. I’m a remarkably lucky person, when I think of my career to date, and how I’ve managed to survive as a writer for the past nearly two decades at this point. I think it’s… 17 years now that I’ve just been a writer, as opposed to moonlighting from another job? Something like that; maybe 16. I’ve written for all kinds of places, some far better than I deserve, and I currently have an actual staff position doing what I love to do. That’s rare, and very much appreciated on a daily basis.
That doesn’t mean there aren’t still some goals remaining, because there are: outlets I’d still like my name to appear as a byline, or stories that I’d very much want to write once I can make sense of the best way to do that. Of course I have those; if I didn’t, I’m not sure I’d keep going with the excitement and hunger that I somehow still have. Better yet, my current position gives me new goals when and where I least expect them, and challenges me to come up with things that I’d never thought of on my own. As tiring as it can be, it’s also a trip, in the best way.
I was thinking to myself yesterday, about how lucky I am to be able to write for a living, and then my thoughts turned to that phrase itself: that I write for a living in the sense of, “it’s what pays my bills and pays my rent, so that I can stay alive,” but also in that other sense, at the same time: that I write to make sense of the world, to find a space and way to live and navigate everything that comes my way.
My career goal is one that I’ve already achieved, ultimately: to make a career out of the thing I not only know how to do, but can’t not do. I write.