Why I Don’t Talk To My Family or Friends About My Writing

I don’t talk to anyone about my writing or about all the processes, emotions, and hard work involved. The above image is exactly how I describe my writing to my family and friends. It’s mine and you’re not allowed in my territory. I built this baby from scratch and I’ll shoot you on-site if you get your feet on it!

If my friend has a side hustle or an extra way of moving money, they will announce the idea behind it and then just go about their business. I don’t really ask how, any business is usually the simple process of selling a product and having someone else buy it.

However, when it comes to my little side-hustle (writing) then I just get so many questions. How does it work? How do you make money? What do you write about? What’s your page? Is it something you want to do long-term? If I do end up explaining how Medium and Vocal Media work then I just get even more questions!

To put it frankly, my friends just don’t get it because it’s not something that’s done commonly. I don’t sell cakes, I’m not a hairdresser, I won’t clean your car for £30. My product is my writing and I sell it (and my soul) to Medium and Vocal Media for a price. Instead of a typical business establishing the products/services and price beforehand, writing platforms will let you know whether you’ve made good money or not in due time. Some people have articles go viral and make four figures months after they’ve been written — it’s all just a patient waiting game.

When I had announced to a few friends earlier in the week that I had been blessed with a $500 bonus from Medium, one of them said “I have a few stories to tell, sign me up!”

Are you serious? Do you honestly think it’s that easy?

Secondly, when I had won my third competition on Vocal Media, I shared the link to the winning piece. One of my friends said, “You really got $1000 for writing about Shakespeare?”

Yes, I got $1000 for writing about Shakespeare and it took me about an hour to submit it. Your point?

This is why I just publish and don’t share the links around anymore. At the start of my writing career, I used to send them to my friends all the time. At first, they did indeed read them or at least showed a speckle of interest, now that speckle is not even a half-speckle and I’ve taken the hint.

Additionally, my family doesn’t really get it either. Well, truth be told as my Grandma is a poet with her poems published in many, many books — she is the only one who understands. Yet again, she only understands the cognitive processes behind writing and not so much how I make money from it.

Actually, I lie about not speaking to my family about it. When something good happens such as a competition win or I receive a tip, then I’ll announce it to my family. Finally, they’ve clocked on that I have been gifted with the talent of writing which stems from both their grandparents. My dad doesn’t understand why I have to publish so regularly (3/4 times a week). Dad, if I only publish once a month I will be wasting so much fun and time with my work!

Writers are one community. Similarly, I consider my friends to be a community for me and my family a different community. All are kept segregated due to the good of my sanity.

Although, I consider my writing community to be rather lonely in comparison to the other two. Even though everyone understands the hard work you put in, how the platforms work, and can offer you good advice and feedback, you’re really on your own. It can get pretty nasty too, just yesterday I had published an article about how I disliked short stories on Medium, and when I had promoted the post on Facebook, the comments were beginning to upset me to an extent I didn’t know I was going to get to the point where I had to delete the post.

Who do I reach out to? My family wouldn’t understand why I wrote something fairly controversial and my friends would just tell me to attack them back in the comments.

As well as the rant above, I consider my writing to be my personal child, and sometimes I actually get embarrassed if I talk about it because some of the things I write about are personal accounts and then the questions really start rolling in!

I’ve learned to just be quiet and reach to my internet writing community. Some might find it quite a shame that I don’t feel in a position to talk to anyone close to me about it but I’ve done very well so far. Those who truly love me will support me regardless.