Pursuing multiple careers is as exciting as it sounds, but let’s get real here: It can be dreadful. Whenever I’m torn between making youtube videos and developing a film idea, I ask myself: Why am I doing this? Why don’t I just follow the standard route and focus on one thing, as most people? Why am I voluntarily splitting my time, energy, and attention between two or more things?
I guess that’s just the way I’m wired. And perhaps you are too. Maybe you’ve also tried to stick to one career but have constantly found yourself exploring other things.
If you are still considering pursuing another career on top of the one you already have, then re-think it. And then, do it. You can’t imagine how much joy it will bring you, but also be prepared for the pain.
Over the years, I have added new careers, which I pursue more or less intensely. Being a content creator is my latest career. I find making youtube videos addicting. Each video lets me explore a small topic, for 8-15 minutes. It takes me 5-20 hours to make one video end to end, after which I can instantly see the results. Youtube is a very dynamic space, and it’s so satisfying to see my channel grow over the months and the income stacking up in real time. The best thing is that I can control my time and decide what I want to make.
Making films is another level. Working with many talented people to get a story on screen is intoxicating. But I couldn’t do this continuously. Filmmaking, especially the coordination, is crazy work. During the pre-production of a film, you can easily work 60 hours per week or more. Working on set makes me feel like a 3-year-old on a playground, but it gets exhausting. I can work in high gear for a few weeks or months, but then I need long periods to recover. I couldn’t produce one film after the other without a long pause (at least, that’s what I think, after having produced 2 feature films in parallel). In fact, it’s been several years since I made my last feature film, and over a year since I made a short film.
And don’t get me started about acting. Acting makes me feel like I’m in a different universe. I’m living someone else’s life and can forget my own worries for a moment. If I ever had a dream, then this is it. But there are just too many things that I’m not willing to do. For starters, you have to audition like mad. If you get a casting call, you need to drop everything else. To get any of those awesome roles, you have to dedicate your life to it 100%. And in this industry, the odds are against you. I hate having to depend on other people to give me a job or not. And I don’t want to put everything else on hold while I focus on auditioning, drama classes, and waitressing. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this. The lifestyle is just not for me. That is why now I’ve turned acting into a long-term endeavor and am not pushing anything to happen in the short term. It just stresses me out too much.
Over these years, I have been pulling all strings at the same time, although I’m tugging stronger at the content creation end lately. Producing feature films is like running a marathon. You need endurance to bring a film to completion. To start producing one at all, you need a high appetite for risk. There are so many things that can go wrong. After a long phase of filmmaking it was very refreshing to work on youtube videos, which in a way are super short films that carry very little risk.
I am planning to double down on my youtube channels in the next year (as well as the book I’m desperately trying to finish!) but often find myself thinking of the plan for my next film or a potential acting role I might have missed out on. And this is where I get to the pain of pursuing multiple careers.
When you pursue two things or more at once, there is always a base level of anxiety.
The anxiety about missing out on progress in the other career. You are dealing with opportunity costs all the time. Every minute you work on career A, you are not working on career B. That trade-off can be painful at times.
Currently, as my priorities are my book and my youtube channels, I am intentionally leaving acting and filmmaking on the sidelines. And it hurts to neglect these. But there is no other way. You only have so much time, 24 hours per day, so much energy and attention.
When you pursue multiple careers, you will inevitably be splitting these precious resources among your different careers.
The psychotherapist who does her job full-time can rest assured that she’s put everything into it. But the psychotherapist who is also a freelance photographer has to live with the fact that she’ll always be sacrificing attention on one career for the other. She might cut down the number of her therapy sessions and feel bad about not helping more people. And when she spends less time on photography, she feels she’s missing out on something.
Now what to do with this realization? There’s a lot of joy in pursuing multiple careers, but also pain. The joy you get from doing this has to trump the pain to make it worthwhile. Also, you need good reasons for doing this.
One of my reasons is that I need variation in my work, or else I’ll go crazy (I hope this is convincing enough!). Another reason is that I get so excited about doing different things, and I just can’t leave it alone. Every time I watch a great movie, I feel challenged to make another one. Every time I see a captivating performance, I remember how much I enjoy performing. Each time I have an idea or important information that I want to share, I feel the need to get a youtube video out within the next 1-2 weeks.
When I get a break from doing one thing, I feel energized and ready to put in a lot of hard work into the other thing. When I alternate between 2 careers, I approach each one more enthusiastically.
It’s like when you like to snack on both chocolate and cheese. Even though you love chocolate, after 1 full month of snacking on chocolate, you might want to switch to cheese. At that point the thought of cheese will get you very excited. If you are a multiple careerist at heart, you’ll get what I mean!
If all I do is imagining doing something, e.g. thinking of making a film, but never act on it, it would just fill me with regret. I also believe that my different careers benefit from one another. As I use different skills in each career, and each has a different work rythm, it gives me the balance I need. After several years of filmmaking, I can take a long pause and work on short projects. Then perhaps act in a film. Then go back to producing, and so on.
What are your reasons for pursuing more than one career? Why do you think it would bring you more joy than pain, and why would it be worth all the trouble?
