Make It A Habit, Not An Income

Kate Smithson | Anon Gray
3 min readSep 12, 2021

If you knew you would die tomorrow, would you care about your Medium income today?

Photo by Visual Stories || Micheile on Unsplash

When did writing become something we did for money? When did it stop being enough to have a sympathetic ear? When did writing stop being an art form, and become a hustle? And why do we seem to think that this isn’t a problem?

Any time we turn something we love into something we rely on for an income, something is lost.

We can no longer be spontaneous, take risks, or be experimental. Instead we must make calculated decisions based on metrics that inevitably impact our output.

Some would say that this shift is positive. That we’re telling people what they want to hear, and by that very nature, we’re doing good. But what if giving people what they want to hear isn’t synonymous with good.

There’s a reason we say a child has been spoiled, you know.

Opinions have become currency, both literally and figuratively. And opinions in the form of writing, have become products. From influencers to political candidates, opinions are being cashed in all over the world.

This isn’t to say that every opinion is worth ignoring. I’m obviously standing on my soap box right now…

--

--

Kate Smithson | Anon Gray

Smithson is the author of “The Space Between.” She’s also the creator of Anon Gray | Print, a zine about living life on purpose. Learn more at anongray.com.