How to Be Both Creative & Strategic Without Losing Your Soul

I’ve always been a writer. But I’ve never been only a writer.

Creativity and practicality have shared a desk in my life for as long as I can remember.

When I made my initial visit to Ohio Northern University, where I went to college, I met the head of the English department. We sat at the long desk in his office, the same one I’d sit at four years later as I discussed graduation requirements with the faculty member who replaced him when he retired. I told him I aspired to major in creative writing and be a novelist.

He raised his eyebrows but still displayed a kindly expression behind his glasses. That was a fine goal, he told me. However, one of ONU’s values was career preparation, and the department was obliged to help students augment artistic ambitions with something, well . . . marketable.

That was how I ended up with a professional writing major too.

I wasn’t interested in doing this at first. Being a blogger or working in desktop publishing (this was 2003, and social media and internet marketing barely existed) was a distraction from the real work I wanted to do.

Fortunately, this changed. I liked the professional writing classes so much that I took all of them, not just my degree requirements.

Of course, I was still writing fiction. But I was also writing rhetorical analyses of media, learning about editing and publishing, and serving as the editor of the university web magazine.

After graduation, I went straight into my Master of Fine Arts program in creative writing. For three years, I would devote hours to improving my craft, attend workshops led by award-winning authors, and build relationships as I critiqued and received feedback on my colleagues’ work.

Oh, wait. There was one other thing too.

I had to teach classes.

There was a catch, you see. To afford my MFA, I had to take on an assistantship.