I agree with all of this. I worked for 10 years as a technical writer (I wanted to be a novelist but bad luck and poor self-control and executive dysfunction prevented me from ever really publishing anything noteworthy). For one thing, actually working as a writer kinda killed the drive for me. I still write for myself, but I have no real aim to get published—in large part because I know very few would ever read anything I wrote, simply because very few people still read. I’m currently shifting careers to something that AI won’t be able to swipe from me, and I’ve honestly been enjoying it a lot more than I ever enjoyed writing, though I loved studying English in school. Working as a writer is just not the same thing as going to school for writing. Working as a writer is just being told to write assignments you don’t really have any interest in day in and day out.
I agree with all of this. I worked for 10 years as a technical writer (I wanted to be a novelist but bad luck and poor self-control and executive dysfunction prevented me from ever really publishing anything noteworthy). For one thing, actually working as a writer kinda killed the drive for me. I still write for myself, but I have no real aim to get published—in large part because I know very few would ever read anything I wrote, simply because very few people still read. I’m currently shifting careers to something that AI won’t be able to swipe from me, and I’ve honestly been enjoying it a lot more than I ever enjoyed writing, though I loved studying English in school. Working as a writer is just not the same thing as going to school for writing. Working as a writer is just being told to write assignments you don’t really have any interest in day in and day out.