Is there ever a “right” time to start a creative career? Our goal has always been help people pursuing their passion. Helping those people often means helping them think through important decisions such as when to start, when to take the leap. Below, you’ll find our conversations with successful creatives reflecting back on when they had to decide whether to start or wait.

Phillip Lynch

I’ve asked myself this question many a time. In some ways I wish that I had trusted myself and listened to myself a lot sooner than I did. Read more>>

Eshani Surya

Though I started writing in elementary school, I’ve always considered the start of my career to be in my early twenties. Around this time, I moved from New York City to Tucson to pursue an MFA in Creative Writing. Read more>>

The Manny & Shawn Experience

Amidst the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, the notion of launching our podcast, the Manny and Shawn Experience, emerged as a promising endeavor. Read more>>

Kaylah “True” Burris

I wish I would have started much sooner. I feel like being successful in a creative industry, especially music, seems so out of reach and grandeur when you are young. Read more>>

Nygel Sejismundo

I’ve actually thought about this topic for quite some time. In some ways, I do wish I started my creative career sooner. I wish I started dancing when I was younger, but whenever I get these thoughts I always remind myself that everyone is on their own timeline. Read more>>

Nita Patel

I wish I had started my creative career sooner. I wish that someone has told me that it was ok to have a job that pays the bills, but to pursue your passion to find fulfillment and life purpose. Read more>>

Lois DeHart

We (Lois and Marcus) would have loved to have started our creative career sooner, but it’s been a process that we’ve had to work through over the 33 years of our marriage. Read more>>

Markus Rutz

As a young person I always believed that an early career was my path. This belief became a subconscious from reading about young lions with the Art Blakey band and watching friends ascend in that manner. Read more>>

Belinda Betker

I wish I’d had a belief in myself as a writer and poet in my early adult years, and I wish I’d found strong mentors decades earlier to encourage and support me in my dream of ‘a writing life’, That said, I’m happy to be an example of ‘it’s never too late!’ Read more>>

Denise Nomura

Yes, I wish I had started sooner. Creation takes time, especially in painting. Yet, without my experience working, raising children, and ultimately finding this new passion, I may not have been as fulfilled as I feel now. Read more>>

Jen Woodrum

Looking back at my timeline of creative writing compared to publishing is interesting: I started taking writing seriously in 2003. I started drafting my first novel in 2005. Read more>>

Zakia Wells

I wish I started taking myself more seriously sooner. I say this because when youre in the ages of childhood til the age of 25 there are way more opportunities and resources for you to be apart of. Read more>>

Zephaniah Jones

In some ways, I think that starting my creative career sooner would have been better, but then I also processed that I don’t know what better really is when it comes to creativity. Read more>>

Ashley Wong

I think the timing of everything happens for a reason. 2021 was the year I really started to take my art more seriously. During this time, I had just graduated college and was trying to figure out what it was I wanted to do. Read more>>

Ariana Fox

Sooner, for sure. I didn’t truly connect with my creative side until my late twenties. I think up until then I really believed that you needed to have innate talent to enjoy creative endeavors. Read more>>

Mariken Van Heugten

Sometimes I wish I had started my career earlier. I would have liked to have attended an art school right from the start, to have been among other creative people, to have lived this life with its deadlines, criticism, pressure and the presentation of my work. Read more>>

Kaori Takamura

I am a visual artist with almost 20 years of experience. I moved from Japan and now live and work in Arizona and California. I retired from graphic design to pursue art, and apart from some basic classes at a local community college, I am mostly self-taught. Read more>>

Mark Lorenzo

I always knew I was going to be doing something creative be it in art or music. I was one of 2 people in my senior class that got an exemption from taking a math in college prep High School so I think that says something. Read more>>

Annie Sloan

I waited a long time to start an independent creative career. My job as an advertising copywriter and video editor was always creative, but it was in service to corporations. Read more>>

Philip McCollum

I do. I believe like most, having a passion that drives you, keeps you on the path. As teens, we are driven by influence since birth. Peer pressure. Read more>>

Benjamin LaDieu

This question is one I ponder about. I look back on my mindset at a younger age and all that it entailed with how I was back then. Read more>>