Just read this post from Chuck Wendig’s wonderfully NSFW blog, terribleminds. Chuck is an author and occasional giver of raw, unadulterated, and generally correct advice. The post discusses why you should follow your passion in writing, but I think it’s applicable to other areas of life as well. A few highlights:
BECAUSE IT’S WHAT YOU’RE GOOD AT
The things you write — that you choose to write, because you want to jolly well fucking write them — are likely things you’re better at writing because you chose to move in that direction. Writing things that don’t really speak to you? I can often feel it. It feels stilted, awkward, a story forced into an uncomfortable shape by an author wearing someone else’s skin. It’s itchy and weird.
BECAUSE LIFE ENDS IN DEATH
You’re gonna die.
Sorry!
But it’s true.
…
Do you really want someone to chisel the words MADE MEDIOCRE ART SHE DIDN’T MUCH LIKE BECAUSE SHE THOUGHT THAT’S WHAT SOMEONE ELSE WANTED HER TO DO on your gravestone? Or would you rather them carve in the words: ROCKED IT LIKE A MOTHERFUCKER, WROTE WHAT SHE DAMN WELL WANTED, BOO-YAH, MIC-DROP –?