Mridu Khullar

Phew.

That was a long break from blogging. It was also a long break from pretty much everything that’s familiar in life. After almost fifteen deadlines in the past month, I would have felt drained and completely off work, if I hadn’t been looking forward to the next leg of my journey as a writer. The part where I leave behind what is known and familiar and tread into new waters. Waters that while scary, are what I’ve been searching for.

Like many of you who’re reading this, I started out by reading online writing newsletters and freelance writing books that focused solely on one thing—how to make a living as a writer. How to earn money with your words. How to make this new-found career pay for itself. How to make six figures a year. And for a while, they were what I needed. I had loans. I had installments to pay. And I needed as much money as I could get. So I focused on my goal. Pay off the debts. Make a good monthly income. Make so-and-so amount of money per week, per month, per year. And I did. I continued to think one-track and take on any and every assignment that came my way. It wasn’t important if it was technology or health or an insane topic I knew nothing about. My goal was to pay off the debts. But when earlier this year, the debts were paid off, the income was steady and my income goals not only were achieved but exceeded, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I was free again. I was free to choose what I wanted to do with my writing and my life. But I didn’t have a clue. After being how-to health & fitness, technology writer for so long, I’d lost track of why I’d wanted to write in the first place. What I did know was that this wasn’t it.

So I did what any smart, independent, sulf-sufficient woman would have done. I asked mom.

And mom did what every smart mom does when faced with a life question she doesn’t know the answer to. She told me to search within myself. So I did some soul-searching and started looking for things that were missing in my life and that I badly wanted—exploration, travel, more friends, more adventure. Being stuck in an office fifteen hours a day wasn’t doing anything for me. I asked other writers for advice on how to go about finding travel assignments, and then figured I didn’t quite agree with their methods, so went in search of my own. And that’s when things started falling into place on their own. All of a sudden I met people who helped me move forward and gave me new insights and perspectives, I found publications that would print the kind of material I wanted to write and I came across ideas. On topics I hadn’t even thought to look at before.

Almost six months later, I’m halfway there. Halfway, because I haven’t fully figured out what I want yet. I’m still in the process of discovering myself and my career, but I now know that I no longer want to be how-to health & fitness writer. I no longer want to write what I wouldn’t want to read. And while I’ve been discovering what I don’t want, I’ve also been working on getting assignments that I do.

So, in the past month, I’ve let go of things. I finished up all the pending how-to assignments that I had on my plate, I’ve refused work that was coming my way that no longer fits into my scheme of things, and I’ve accepted low-paying work that is bringing me to new and fascinating people, helping me pen words that make a difference and discovering and exploring the world. I don’t know where or how the next paycheck is coming from, but I haven’t felt so in love with writing in years. It’s new, it’s fun, it’s fresh. And it may not be bringing in the cash right now, but it’s bringing in something that means so much more—personal satisfaction. And in life, there’s really nothing more important than that.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 15th, 2005 at 11:41 pm and is filed under Writing, The Life of Me. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.