Reading · The Bright Side with Bri Nwosu

This page did not load. You can still read it on the original site — the toolbar below keeps your place in the directory.

It’s the end of the month and here’s the roll up of my writing time for February.

As I promised, I’m sharing the ups and downs of a writing life and this week ended up mixed.

🔼The Ups

I’m proud of my productivity and worked 61 hours this month on writing/book-related tasks.

I spent 31 hours working on the outline of a new manuscript and crossed the 20,000 word mark. (Again, I use the app Clockify to track time and this tracker to track my words)

All of this seems great and like my author adventure is clipping along.

Except . . . if you look at the graphic, you may notice that I don’t have any writing time recorded for this past week.

That’s because this author adventure took a detour as I spent the week interviewing for full and part-time work opportunities.

🤷🏽‍♀️The Realities of Writing

When my job ended in June 2024, I thought this would be the time to make the big leap to full-time authorship, continuing my journey on this author adventure.

My rationale at the time makes sense. I’ll have author news to share in the future, but based on that, I thought I could take the time, severance, and some savings to focus on my writing career. I’m blessed that my husband works full time and covers the household expenses, so I thought all I had to do was keep writing and my career would be established.

Simple enough, right?

Write full time and derive your income from your imagination—the literal author’s dream. But like all dreams, it seems great until you have to wake up and face reality.

MY reality is writing full time has been an adjustment and I’m not sure I’m ready for it.

I HAVE been productive over the past six months, going through two rounds of edits and starting to draft on two different projects. I also created an author website and have worked to build systems to support my writing life.

But full-time is A LOT of time to fill, and way more than I’m used to.

I’m great when I have external deadlines with editors, but when I’m working on my spec projects . . . all that time can be overwhelming.

I wrote all of my manuscripts while juggling a full-time role as a graduate advisor and liked the process of finding pockets of time to write.

I was productive as I ONLY had an hour to write and needed to make progress. Having all day to write often has me at loose ends and I found I’m not writing that much more than before, still about twenty hours a week in the manuscript and I don’t have the stamina yet, for more than four hours a day.

Along with all this time, comes pressure. As I write on my own projects, I notice a full case of the SHOULDs coming on, eventually hitting me full force.

Shouldn’t you be further along?

Shouldn’t you be working more hours?

Shouldn’t you be done yet?

All these shoulds lead to creating unrealistic deadlines and time tables to PROVE I’m using the time well, that I’m making progress.

When the process works, it’s great. I’m zooming along making a dent, getting words on the page and I can see the finish line.

When it’s not, well . . . it sucks spiral into existential crises on a random Wednesday afternoon, because instead of creating a story to share, I’m crafting something to sell, which is an entirely different intention. As I was digging into the draft, the pressure of making something great to sell started to strangle the draft, making me agonize every sentence and story line, adding to a tightness I don’t normally have around writing.

Writing full time also means that book money goes towards bills, when in my mind, book money was always for dreams, like the down payment of our forever house, college for the kids, and family trips and vacations.

Additionally, I’ve gotten perspective from other working authors and there aren’t many people who have the luxury or desire to write full time. I’m privileged work with two best-selling, award winning professional authors this spring in coaching and writing programs and BOTH have other income than just their writing (hence the writing and coaching programs 😉) and had multiple books sell before they could afford to rely on their writing for income.

I was working through all of these thoughts with lots of support from my coaches and accountability partners (I’m so blessed to have such great people in my life to give me perspective) and I think I would have bounced back and gotten deeper in the draft this week if I hadn’t turned on the news.

When a family member was impacted by the layoffs in Washington, I started tuning in more and what I saw made me nervous.

Firings. Dismissals. Terminations.

Seeing so many hardworking people unceremoniously lose their jobs and seeing it celebrated by others made me leery about living off savings and uuncertain about my plans for the future, allowing the WHAT IFs to creep in.

I write stories that feature Black characters living life. WHAT IF a publisher doesn’t want to take the risk?

As good as you feel about your premise and progress, WHAT IF you can’t sell it?

WHAT IF it takes longer than planned to finish the draft? Do you have enough savings to stretch?

Having a case of the SHOULDs and the WHAT IFs is a nasty combination for any writer and lead to me having a flight or fight response, or my version anyway.

Thankfully, one of my strengths is proactiveness. I can’t sit in fear for too long, because frankly it’s a sucky place to be. Whenever I’m faced with a challenge, I try to be pragmatic and approach a situation with clarity and intention.

So I started earnestly applying to different positions. If I were to delve into the motivation, it was fear/lack based and didn’t feel great. I had applied for positions before my job ended but mostly heard crickets and ghosting, which I took as a sign to focus on my author career.

The new round felt like it would be more of the same, allowing more WHAT IFs to creep in. WHAT IF the market is too crowded? WHAT IF your expertise is too narrow?

I was operating from a fearful place, applying to things that I COULD do, but in reality I wouldn’t WANT to.

I felt a shift on Thursday of last week, when I got three different interview invites on the same day. I decided to take the week off from writing to focus on the interviews and not give myself too much pressure on everything by adding writing to the mix.

The good news was that have already heard back from one with an offer, the fact freed me from fear, not because I am going to take it (9-6, all week, plus late nights and weekends, for $40000 😟) but because it reminded me that I don’t HAVE to be reactive.

In the midst of all the fear,

I lost sight of the big picture and the skills I have and looked for the easy, stable path, even though I knew these jobs were not the right thing for me.
I forgot that one of my core beliefs is that “I am lucky” and “Good things happen to me.” I went back to this YouTube video that I listen to sometimes to recenter myself in my goals and purpose.

That one yes and taking a step back, helped bring my goals back into focus.

If I’m working 9-6 every day with a commute through all kinds of weather with three elementary school kids, there will be nothing left. I’ll be too burnt out for creation—merely existing in the grind. And for what?

Getting that offer was freeing because if I got THAT opportunity, then I will get others.

With this new perspective, my job is to reassess and continue charting my path.

So, where do I go from here?

Forward.

I did what I could do in the interviews and have continued to apply to roles that are a fit to my life AND my ambition.

As I’m looking for opportunities, I have to balance income versus outputs. I am still a writer and some jobs simply take too much mental space no matter the outcome. I’m still on my author adventure after all and have to keep the true goal in mind, crafting stories and staying curious.

🎯 Goals/Growth

Next week, I’m going to get out of the house to make more progress on the draft and I’ll head to my local library for at least two days of dedicated drafting.
I’m also only going to dedicate one day a week to the job search so it doesn’t dominate everything as I look for the activity that fits my life and ambitions.

😍 Things I’m Loving

Just Finished: Nora Goes off Script by Annabel Manhgan. I really enjoyed her open and easy writing style that made Nora’s voice sparkle. I’ve got another one of her books Summer Romance on my nightstand now.
Currently Reading: After You by Jojo Moyes. This is a mentor text read. I’m loving her use of sound in descriptions, a skill im intentionally developing and besides, reading is always my go-to escape.

What are your thoughts?

How are you balancing your creative and financial life?
Is it your author dream to write full time? If you could, would you?
How are you balancing creativity in uncertain times?

The Bright Side: February Wrap Up