Do you ever wonder what life would have been like had you chosen a more standard path? Does everyone have these doubts sometimes? We wanted to find out and so we asked as many talented artists and creatives as we could and have shared highlights below.

Lisa J Fasol

This feels like a relevant question to me currently since I’ve been recently looking into the possibility of going back to school to study medicine. My father is a doctor and although he never pressured me or my siblings to go into medicine, I have always wondered what would have happened if I had followed in his footsteps. I’ve been fortunate enough to have been creatively employed since graduating art school. While I’ve had some fun projects and am currently working on something really exciting, I still can’t help but feel stuck as well. I see friends and former classmates advancing their careers and doing great things and while I’m able to provide for myself I am also not sure what my artistic future looks like. Read more>>

Bren Holmes

For most of my life, I’’ve been a musician/creative and only when I was very young, in my late teens, did I have some type of normal steady paycheck… There is definitely something to be said about getting a steady paycheck every few weeks. It seems very secure and it’s way easier to plan things and knowing what you can afford and can’t afford. Little did I know, going into the music business, that it can be feast or famine on a lot of occasions…. what I found myself doing, was putting away money for a “rainy day” because there are plenty of those in our business. I feel a lot of musicians/artists fall into the trap of not planning ahead for the future and to have some funds saved up. That being said, I know a lot of artists, including myself that could not go back into a 9-to-5 job sitting at a desk… I think we’d all go crazy! Ha Read more>>

Daria Novoselia

As a rhythmic gymnastics coach, my life is a colorful dance of artistry and passion. Achieving the title of Master of Sports at just 17 was the culmination of years of hard work and dedication. Now, in a sports club in the United States, I have the joy of sharing my experience with young athletes. There are moments when I ponder the idea of a “regular job,” especially during long training days. I vividly recall a day when one of my young gymnasts struggled with a routine, and I briefly wondered if my path was too demanding.  Read more>>

Waverly

I’ve been thinking a lot about Balance recently. I’m in music, so maybe we’ll call it Harmony. Harmony between work and life; between work and creative; between business and art; between vision and time to execute; and most recently, the balance between the craft being life-giving and life-taking. It’s the end of the year so we’re very much in a reflection period, and this year was an insane step in all the right directions for myself, my art, and my business: finishing our first year as an Asian American music label, building a team of 15 all minority creatives, playing our first music festivals – so many highlights. With all the wins I’m also feeling a lot of the weight that it took to make it that far that fast settle in from the entire year, which is grounding in a way. Read more>>

Moeko Machida

I am genuinely content with my life as an artist. After graduating from art university in Japan, I worked part-time but never considered full-time employment in a conventional job. Working as an artist feels like the most natural and fulfilling way for me to live. Since childhood, I have carried within me a vision of a world I want to see and experience—an ephemeral yet vivid sense of something beyond the ordinary. This vision has always guided my creative journey. Through art, I strive to capture and share fragments of this world with others. During the process of creating, there are rare but deeply rewarding moments when the work begins to align with the image I hold in my mind. In those moments, I feel a profound connection to why I do what I do, bringing me a sense of purpose and fulfillment that words cannot fully capture. Read more>>

J. Gentile

My need to create is a constant for me and is not a choice. It’s apart of my existence. Without it I feel a cathartic constipation within me. However as of this past year I have been guided to pursue something higher than myself and my art. I have been lead to serve the community as a death worker. I will be taking on the role of a Funeral Director and grief counselor. I have had a near death experience as a teenager so I can really empathize with the spiritual process during death. I have also gone through a close call with my child in which was given 3 years to live. I can connect with that grief of letting go with others and especially with parents with that loss. Fortunately after a lot of genetic testing his diagnosis was found to be incorrect. Read more>>

Kira Takei

The thought of having a ‘regular’ job comes into my mind often – I wonder where I would be in life, and who I would be in this world. Having a creative job is very fulfilling; I am able to do what my heart loves to do most, express myself, and explore all different kinds of layers within my work. And, it’s very hard as well; having to create when I’m tired/not inspired, needing to meet deadlines with creativity, and above all the mental switch from seeing art as a hobby to a job. I feel one of the beautiful things about art is that it’s always there for you… if you need to cry, dance, laugh, smile, it’s always there to support you. And, when you feel inspired, motivated, or passionate about creating, you can make something out of the blue. So, when you begin to attach qualities of a ‘job’ to it, it becomes restricted, and sometimes less freeing, which makes creating less… creative. Read more>>

Olga Zhdanova

Art is my whole life. Doing visual media is like breathing. I just do it, I can’t not do art. Through art I can show all my feelings, my past, sublimate sadness and share happiness. Sometimes I think that I would like to master another profession, because the world is so diverse and big. But all my paths still merge into one road – art. Read more>>

David Klein

It’s a strange feeling knowing what you want to do with your life from an early age. It all started at this 2-week-long summer camp when I was four years old — I danced, sang, made crafts, played improv games, and even learned a few lines for the final night’s play, summer after summer — so I don’t really remember my first time being “on stage.” As long as I can remember, I’ve been a performer. It’s who I am, part of my identity. Read more>>

Darryl L Dillard

The last 2 times this came up was in 2008 and 2017. In 2008, I was living in Los Angeles, and bartending while working on my acting career. I remember that I had some friends I grew up with come into town and came to visit me at my bar. We got to talking, and they were telling me about their house and that they just purchased some ATVs for the family trip they were about to take. After my shift, I started to think about what my life would be if I had gotten a regular job and gave up on my acting career. It was definitely a depressing night thinking about all that I may have missed. Read more>>

Stephanie Bonnett

I’ve spent most of my life wondering if being an artist is the right decision. The concept of turning this hobby into a career was one that was pushed on me before I could really understand what it really meant to be an artist professionally. I grew up hearing, “To not pursue a career in arts would be such a waste of talent.” And as much of a contrarian as I was as a kid, I decided early on that I didn’t want to pursue a career in the arts. Read more>>

Aj Lovelace

I’m happiest when I’m creating, it puts air in my lungs. There have been many times when I’ve thought about what it would be like to travel a more traditional path, and I can’t picture it.  I can always envision my future where the clarity around pursuing my creative path is certain. Read more>>

James Aka Iampacifica

My soul is happier being an artist, its freeing in a creative sense. Monetarily speaking being FT artist in music lacks the stability of a job and there’s no guarantee of ROI. If you don’t find meaning in your career working a W2 kills the soul. The grass aint greener, it does provide more stability. Both are stressful. I’ve spent a good chunk of life grinding for the man and creatively, no shame in it. You have to endlessly believe in your craft and tune out the noise. The creative journey is for the brave, the highs are euphoric yet short-lived, lows are painful lessons that give you nuggets of wisdom to do better next time. Do what lights you up, never stop getting up. Read more>>

Daniela B. Reyna

Pursuing a creative career is something I knew was part of my path since I was little. I remember being about 8 or 9 years old and carrying around a journal filled with my drawings. By the time I was 10 or 11, I thought I wanted to be a fashion designer, so I started another journal to store all my ideas for outfits. I also loved writing—about everything. I wrote about the boys I liked, the existential dilemmas I was grappling with, and all the thoughts and feelings I didn’t quite know how to say out loud. Read more>>

Ryan Brisotti

The overwhelming majority of the time I’m very happy working in music, but there are definitely moments where I wonder what it would be like to do something a little more “normal”. Working in music means you really have to live your life a few weeks at a time because your schedule, amount of work, income, and even what city you’ll be in can vary so wildly from month to month. Personally, I get bored very easily so I usually tend to thrive off of that unpredictability. But I do occasionally wish my life could be a little more consistent. It took me a really long time to be able to fully support myself doing what I want to do, but now that I can, it always feels really fragile. As if at any moment it could all just disappear and drop me off exactly where I started. I think what has really made me think about this a lot recently is a lot of my friends with “normal’ jobs are hitting the “buy a house, have kids, take a yearly family vacation, etc” stage of life, which I’m not saying you can’t do as a creative, but it feels really foreign to me in this career at the moment. Read more>>

Larry Robinson

I am happy as an artist. It’s not all sunshine and rainbows , but through building a career using the talent , I’ve learned progress is through determination and also consistency. With getting customers I mostly rely on my skill, but I heavily rely on customer promotion. It’s true that building a career based on talent It’s customers that will bring other customers. With advertising your work to get certain projects only thing that board looks at is the quality of your work , that also determines prices and whether you got the project or they are going to choose a different creative / artist. A regular job wasn’t a focus of mine due to the fact that I’m not a person to punch a clock , when the job have to be done at a certain time I can’t leave it for someone else to do , nor do I want to come back to it at a later time. Being an artist I have inspired people that if you do what you love the right circle will come to you, the right energy you will embrace. I’m not saying if you have a regular job that you should just quit to become an artist , my advice would be to stick with the job and do your passion whether it be food , dancing, musician etc. Read more>>

Frances Li

I’m fortunate to have had the experience of working at a “regular job” in the beginning of my career and I can definitively say for myself that I am indeed happier pursuing the life of an artist. However, I don’t necessarily believe that working at a full time job means that you aren’t also an artist or creative. I think that for many people having the stability of a job might just be the thing that allows them the freedom to work on their art without worrying about how they’re going to pay rent. When I lost my full time job, I took it as an opportunity to recenter my life towards pursuing a career as an actor. I think happiness comes from feeling aligned with your purpose in life and that can be done with or without a regular job. Read more>>

Jamie Proper

Oh my gosh, yes I am 100x happier as a business owner than I was working for someone else. Some days I do wonder what it would be like to “turn off” at 5pm but who am I kidding? I would go crazy! Building a business can be exhausting some days but the only more rewarding thing Ive ever experienced, is being a mom. Running into rejection and people saying “no” can take a toll on you and some days I feel like it makes me a less patient mom but I know what I am doing is to build a life for us and give my son the best life possible. Read more>>