What Are You Willing To Give Up?

My grandmother always used to say, "With everything, there is something." (She also had many other colorful catchphrases too profane to repeat here.)

Grandma Wanda was right - there are tradeoffs inherent in everything. Sleeping in means you don't have time to read the morning paper. Eating too many McMuffins leads to increased odds of McMuffin Top spilling over your jeans. Going to law school means you don't get much fresh air for the better part of three years.

For the most part, life's tradeoffs are not unequivocally good or bad - they just are. But refusing to acknowledge this law of the universe can lead to a lot of frustration and wheel-spinning.

The only way to win the tradeoff game is to sit down and figure out what's really, really important to you - and what you're willing to give up to get it.

* Want to weigh less? You're going to have to come to terms with eating less and moving more.

* Want to earn more money? You may need to work more hours, charge more for your time, change jobs, or all of the above.

* Want to become a writer? You're going to have to find the time to write.

As far as that last one goes, finding the time to write is the absolute bare minimum of what you need to do. There's just no way around it. And that time is going to have to come from somewhere else - it could mean less TV time, less sleep time, or even less family time. If you have more specific writing goals, there are even more tradeoffs to contend with:

* Copywriting can be very lucrative, but it's a specific skill you're going to need to master through time and practice

* Magazine writing can be extremely competitive - you're going to need a thick skin and a willingness to keep submitting lots of queries in the face of repeated rejection

* If you want to be a novelist, you're going to need the stamina to finish the entire novel and get it as perfect as you can before you can even think about trying to get it published

* Essay writing can be very fulfilling, but few people are able to make a living solely from this sort of writing

My intention here is not at all to discourage you, but to simply impress upon you the importance of figuring out what you're really after - and what you're willing to give up to get it - before you set your writing goals for yourself. You're far more likely to achieve them if you do.