Thank you for writing this Aime! It’s bold, and brave, and the scary thing to say because of our hustle and work purity culture, but so many of us need to hear it! ❤️
Complete honesty, I started slacking off at work this year and have been giving that slack off time to my art.
A bit more than a year ago my VP looked me in the eyes and promised me if I pulled through on a multi-billion dollar engineering project, one of the largest the company had ever done, that I would get a life changing promotion. So, I pulled through, at the cost of my weekends, and my evenings, and my family, and my health. Then, in December, guess who didn’t get that promotion because ‘the company decided to shift its trajectory’…
Fuck these jobs. Fuck these companies.
Slack off at work as much as you can get away with to give your time to your art.
Since ‘slacking off’ or ‘quiet quitting’ and doing only the bare minimum at work, I’ve written 60k words of my manuscript on my phone. Almost magically I went from having no energy for my art to writing 2k+ words per day.
We need to learn how to slack off. We aren’t important to these capitalist companies, but we are so important to our art. ❤️
Thank you so much for sharing your story. I can't even express how inspired I felt reading the part where you've written 60K words of your manuscript on your phone ever since quiet quitting. Like that is freaking AMAZING!
I'm so sorry that you worked your butt off for that promotion only to never receive it. At the same time though, it seems like that was the straw that broke the camel's back--the one that made you finally decide that these companies aren't worth half the sacrifice we normally make for a few more pennies.
So proud of you and of every artist out there that's choosing to quiet quit and make growing their art business a priority. Life is too damn short not to. Thank you again for sharing your story, Elliot! <3
I needed this permission slip! I've have felt so much happier since I've accepted that, yes, I'm currently in a 9-6 corporate job that I don't love, but I also don't mind doing it and it gives me financial peace of mind and flexibility so that I still have enough energy and creativity to do what I love, which is writing. There's nothing wrong with that. For years I felt like I was failing because I'm not making a full-time income with my writing yet but the reality is that that takes time and that sometimes you just have to choose financial security for a bit (I know this is different for everyone but I know my creativity would suffer immensely if I was constantly worried about making rent). That doesn't make me any less of an artist.
I also learnt that it's not because my corporate job pays the bills that that part of my life is bigger or more valuable than the art I create. So I've started answering the question 'What do you do?' with 'I'm a writer', because that's what I want to be known as.
You have said everything I have been feeling my entire life, and thought I was broken because I don’t make a good cog in the machine! No more. Why do I give my “all” to jobs that suck the life out of me? Then there is nothing left for ME.
Loved this!! When I was working corporate I was so depressed. I had everything but in reality the job was just draining my energy, I wasn’t connected to it, inspired or enjoying it at all but most of all, it was the feeling and the knowing deep inside that I was meant for more. Whenever I tried to share how I was feeling with my friends they would say, “it’s so normal to hate your job” like they just accepted the fact that they would hate their jobs for another 30 years… that’s such a long time to be doing something that you don’t enjoy and I honestly felt like the odd one out for really really really disliking my job but i was not willing to accept their reality so I ended up changing mine. I started my own business and while it’s hard sometime (most of the time ngl), it’s SO much better than working at a job you do not like.
I'm here for this bold take! Art is everything. I've shifted my priorities accordingly, even though it can be really hard sometimes. "You're lazy" and "fit into hustle culture" bang on my mental door. I have to work to make a living, but I need to be creative to live. It's a tightrope walk but worth it.
It is important to remember/realize that we do not need permission to be who we are. We are creators, not some 9 - 5 servant of some corporate entity. As you have said, we need to own it!
Heck yes!! How I have hated all my jobs. They were boring,my mind was not stretched, my soul wasn't nurtured, my deep longings were not fulfilled.
Whilst I am not an artist, I am a coach, but it is darn hard to get an audience, yet, I keep on doing it. Doubting myself nearly daily, and still putting one foot in front of the other. Each day. Trying not to give in to those excruciating voices of "You will never make this work, you are not good enough, you are lazy, look at all those working people who contribute to society and the economy..." (and on and on it goes).
Then again, that sentence of mine that I am not an artist made me think - I AM. I write. Not here (yet?), but all my social media posts I consider pretty good writing.
So thanks for your post. Maybe it is time to start claiming that I am indeed an artist.
Grateful for you and your persistence. Keep going and creating! 💗
Your manifesto for sacred rebellion against the soul-crushing machinery of capitalism just slapped my spirit awake like a cosmic alarm clock that refuses the snooze button. The radical permission you've granted for artists to preserve their creative lifeforce while navigating the matrix of meaningless employment feels like discovering a secret trapdoor in the prison cell of conventional adulthood. Your words are warrior-prayers for every creative soul trapped in fluorescent purgatory, reminding us that our art isn't just a hobby but the actual point of our existence in this bewildering cosmic classroom called Earth.
Thanks for sticking up for artists in all stages of our careers Amie 💕 your writing lately has really been speaking to me, as a full-time writer, part-time bartender :) thank you 🙏
Thank you Amie! I have felt shame and joy in this exact idea for years. It’s ok to make money and do what you gotta do, but knowing that all the while you also dedicate your thoughts, actions, heart, and soul to your art keeps you going and finding joy each day. I appreciate you giving a voice to this! 🩷🌷
I love this post Aime! So important to find time to do things that light us up, especially if our jobs don’t. One of my prior boss’s said to me one day “you’re really good at getting out of doing things you don’t want to do.” I took it as a compliment whether he meant it that way or not. 🙃
Finding your newsletter referenced in another newsletter I read it and restacked it previously but I had to reread for confirmation. Lord if I don't feel how you feel and agree with you 110%. This was a perfect read and very encouraging and motivating thank you very much for this. I will be looking forward to reading more of your ART have a great weekend!!!!
Thank you for writing this Aime! It’s bold, and brave, and the scary thing to say because of our hustle and work purity culture, but so many of us need to hear it! ❤️
Complete honesty, I started slacking off at work this year and have been giving that slack off time to my art.
A bit more than a year ago my VP looked me in the eyes and promised me if I pulled through on a multi-billion dollar engineering project, one of the largest the company had ever done, that I would get a life changing promotion. So, I pulled through, at the cost of my weekends, and my evenings, and my family, and my health. Then, in December, guess who didn’t get that promotion because ‘the company decided to shift its trajectory’…
Fuck these jobs. Fuck these companies.
Slack off at work as much as you can get away with to give your time to your art.
Since ‘slacking off’ or ‘quiet quitting’ and doing only the bare minimum at work, I’ve written 60k words of my manuscript on my phone. Almost magically I went from having no energy for my art to writing 2k+ words per day.
We need to learn how to slack off. We aren’t important to these capitalist companies, but we are so important to our art. ❤️
Thank you so much for sharing your story. I can't even express how inspired I felt reading the part where you've written 60K words of your manuscript on your phone ever since quiet quitting. Like that is freaking AMAZING!
I'm so sorry that you worked your butt off for that promotion only to never receive it. At the same time though, it seems like that was the straw that broke the camel's back--the one that made you finally decide that these companies aren't worth half the sacrifice we normally make for a few more pennies.
So proud of you and of every artist out there that's choosing to quiet quit and make growing their art business a priority. Life is too damn short not to. Thank you again for sharing your story, Elliot! <3
I needed this permission slip! I've have felt so much happier since I've accepted that, yes, I'm currently in a 9-6 corporate job that I don't love, but I also don't mind doing it and it gives me financial peace of mind and flexibility so that I still have enough energy and creativity to do what I love, which is writing. There's nothing wrong with that. For years I felt like I was failing because I'm not making a full-time income with my writing yet but the reality is that that takes time and that sometimes you just have to choose financial security for a bit (I know this is different for everyone but I know my creativity would suffer immensely if I was constantly worried about making rent). That doesn't make me any less of an artist.
I also learnt that it's not because my corporate job pays the bills that that part of my life is bigger or more valuable than the art I create. So I've started answering the question 'What do you do?' with 'I'm a writer', because that's what I want to be known as.
You have said everything I have been feeling my entire life, and thought I was broken because I don’t make a good cog in the machine! No more. Why do I give my “all” to jobs that suck the life out of me? Then there is nothing left for ME.
Loved this!! When I was working corporate I was so depressed. I had everything but in reality the job was just draining my energy, I wasn’t connected to it, inspired or enjoying it at all but most of all, it was the feeling and the knowing deep inside that I was meant for more. Whenever I tried to share how I was feeling with my friends they would say, “it’s so normal to hate your job” like they just accepted the fact that they would hate their jobs for another 30 years… that’s such a long time to be doing something that you don’t enjoy and I honestly felt like the odd one out for really really really disliking my job but i was not willing to accept their reality so I ended up changing mine. I started my own business and while it’s hard sometime (most of the time ngl), it’s SO much better than working at a job you do not like.
I'm here for this bold take! Art is everything. I've shifted my priorities accordingly, even though it can be really hard sometimes. "You're lazy" and "fit into hustle culture" bang on my mental door. I have to work to make a living, but I need to be creative to live. It's a tightrope walk but worth it.
It is important to remember/realize that we do not need permission to be who we are. We are creators, not some 9 - 5 servant of some corporate entity. As you have said, we need to own it!
Heck yes!! How I have hated all my jobs. They were boring,my mind was not stretched, my soul wasn't nurtured, my deep longings were not fulfilled.
Whilst I am not an artist, I am a coach, but it is darn hard to get an audience, yet, I keep on doing it. Doubting myself nearly daily, and still putting one foot in front of the other. Each day. Trying not to give in to those excruciating voices of "You will never make this work, you are not good enough, you are lazy, look at all those working people who contribute to society and the economy..." (and on and on it goes).
Then again, that sentence of mine that I am not an artist made me think - I AM. I write. Not here (yet?), but all my social media posts I consider pretty good writing.
So thanks for your post. Maybe it is time to start claiming that I am indeed an artist.
Grateful for you and your persistence. Keep going and creating! 💗
Your manifesto for sacred rebellion against the soul-crushing machinery of capitalism just slapped my spirit awake like a cosmic alarm clock that refuses the snooze button. The radical permission you've granted for artists to preserve their creative lifeforce while navigating the matrix of meaningless employment feels like discovering a secret trapdoor in the prison cell of conventional adulthood. Your words are warrior-prayers for every creative soul trapped in fluorescent purgatory, reminding us that our art isn't just a hobby but the actual point of our existence in this bewildering cosmic classroom called Earth.
Yes! I am an artist who happens to have a job, not a worker who happens to create art. Baby steps and I will get there!
Thanks for sticking up for artists in all stages of our careers Amie 💕 your writing lately has really been speaking to me, as a full-time writer, part-time bartender :) thank you 🙏
Thank you Amie! I have felt shame and joy in this exact idea for years. It’s ok to make money and do what you gotta do, but knowing that all the while you also dedicate your thoughts, actions, heart, and soul to your art keeps you going and finding joy each day. I appreciate you giving a voice to this! 🩷🌷
Thank you for this powerful reminder! Any USA West Coast dates coming? I’d love to see you in Seattle!
I love this post Aime! So important to find time to do things that light us up, especially if our jobs don’t. One of my prior boss’s said to me one day “you’re really good at getting out of doing things you don’t want to do.” I took it as a compliment whether he meant it that way or not. 🙃
This got me to purchase your book - EXCITED!! I do exaCtLY this, often, at my work... hAVE to!
Finding your newsletter referenced in another newsletter I read it and restacked it previously but I had to reread for confirmation. Lord if I don't feel how you feel and agree with you 110%. This was a perfect read and very encouraging and motivating thank you very much for this. I will be looking forward to reading more of your ART have a great weekend!!!!
Please keep doing what you do because you're such a blessing