Dear friend,
When is it time to quit? I had to face this tough question very recently.
If you’ve been around for a while, you know I’ve been a part of an apprenticeship to become a professional writer for the past year and a half. If that’s the case, you also likely know that I have ADHD.
For the past seven months or so, I’ve been unable to keep up the pace I would need to graduate in August and be a writer full-time. My mentor let me try to figure it out on my own for a few months but one fall day, he sat me down and asked me what was going on.
I blamed the ADHD.
“Are you willing to do what it takes?” he asked.
So, we came up with a tentative strategy to work around what appeared to be the problem.
What actually happened
Let me tell you, sometimes trying your hardest, even with the best of strategies, doesn’t work.
I got to Christmas break, exhausted. I questioned if I really wanted to be a professional writer. I love storytelling. I really do, but I just couldn’t seem to keep up the pace I needed to succeed.
On the other hand, the projects that I flew through and really enjoyed, were ones for other people. Editing, book formatting, making graphics; in other words, the support jobs I did for my fellow writers.
When I got back from Christmas break, my mentor called me into his office and I told him about the decision I had made.
“I want to focus on learning support roles for authors,” I said. “I’ve always preferred doing behind-the-scenes work, so I think it makes sense.”
My mentor agreed, and with no disappointment in his voice or on his face he said, “You gave it a good run.”
It was about a week later that shame started whispering in my ear.
You’ve given up.
You let your ADHD ruin your chances of being an author. You should be ashamed to call yourself a writer.
While I knew none of those things were true, the sinister voice was persistent. Then I remembered what my mentor had said.
“You gave it a good run”
I knew I was supposed to be at The Company because that’s where God had brought me, so I had made the assumption I was supposed to be a professional writer. So I did my best.
Sometimes, your best isn’t good enough.
While I will keep pushing myself to be a better writer, I wasn’t built to write at the speed that it takes to be a professional author. Some things, no matter how hard you try and practice and learn, you simply weren’t built for.
Anything can be used as a hammer, but not anything will do it as well as a hammer.
God designed you with specific functions in mind. That doesn’t mean don’t try; it means you have limits and parameters for what you can do well.
My dad always says, “It’s not failure if you learned something.”
There’s no shame in quitting, as long as you gave it your best and learned something.
What is something you learned you weren’t built for? Tell me in the comments!
Sincerely,
R. J. Catlin
Proud of you for both giving it your best and also being ok with changing course. I can see the stress and exhaustion falling off of you!
Thanks Melissa!
Wow, that can’t have been an easy decision. I’m so glad you figured out what was holding you back though. It’s so easy in situations like that to look at the past as wasted time. . . . but like you said, it’s not wasted if you learned something!
Definitely! Thanks for reading!
Hey RJ, I appreciate your honesty. That would have been a tough call to make, but it was made maturely and with strength. I also admire the way you wrote about it; no histrionics, no “woe is me” attitude, which there is plenty of in Christian blog circles. It was honestly a breath of fresh air to read this!
Thanks for reading, May!
Well said and very inspiring!
Thanks, Gracie!