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The Dark Side of Client Work · The Daily Writer

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Hey my friend, welcome to the Daily Writer, where we help writers become authors of their own lives.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I will always be grateful for the work that I've gotten to do as a ghostwriter over the last decade.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: It has provided for my family, it's given me a great outlet for serving other people, and it's connected me with some truly amazing leaders.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: However, I confess that there's a dark side to ghostwriting.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, there's a dark side to having any client-based business.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: And it really comes down to this.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's very easy to hide behind clients and ignore your own creative work.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: For example, the easiest thing in the world to do as a ghostwriter is to put all your energy into writing for clients, yet ignore that book that you've always wanted to write for yourself.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: And you could say the same thing for designers, editors, book marketers, PR people, or anybody who is a part of the broader publishing ecosystem.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: And trust me, I totally get it.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: When you make your living serving authors and serving the broader publishing industry, it's a really big challenge to set aside part of your time and creativity to work on your own stuff.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: But if you do client work of any kind and you have the desire to write your own stuff, I implore you to carve out time for yourself.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: A great way to do this is by taking 30 or maybe 45 minutes, the first thing each day, to work on your own material.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: So that in effect you become your own first and most important client.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: Now it's a big challenge, sure, especially if you're swamped with client work, but that time working on your own material isn't going to just magically create itself.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: You've got to fight for it.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why the creative life is best described not as a pretty little dance with the butterflies and rainbows, but as a battle.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: The creative life is a bloody, violent, messy affair.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: So if you want to breathe life into that personal project you've been putting off for a long time, you're going to have to fight for it.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: You know, over the years I've noticed a really interesting pattern among almost all of my friends who are ghostwriters, editors, designers, or they do some kind of work with authors.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: And the universal theme among all those people that I'm friends with, and I know a lot of them, is that they all have their own passion projects, but almost none of them are actively working on them.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: And it's tragic.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's the tragic dark side of doing client work.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't want you to fall prey to it.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's very, very easy to do.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: And most people who do the kind of work that we do, if you do client work, have fallen prey to it at one time or another.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't want that to happen to you.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: So it's time to gear up for battle and make that time to work on your own stuff if you've been putting it off.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, my friend, as always, thanks for listening.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: Keep writing, keep showing up, and I'll see you tomorrow.