I've answered a lot of interview questions over the years (google interview and my name--links here would clutter the post) and I've been asked one thing again and again (whether in interviews and or writers, artists, etc.)...
How did you do it?
How does someone become an author? An artist? How does one make a go of a dream, really?
Here are some tips from me.
Don't go to the birthday party. Skip the picnic. Don't binge watch seven seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Forget cooking dinner tonight. Sleep? Not tonight. Don't answer the phone when it rings. Take a pass on that invitation to go shopping.
Sit your happy little tooshie down and work. Work when you're tired. Work when you're sick. Work when the sound of laughter and fun streams in your window on a beam of golden sunshine and every instinct begs you to go join in the fray. Work when you could be laughing. Work when you could be sleeping. Work. Work. Work. When you're tired of working, rub your eyes really hard and do five jumping jacks...then go back to work.
Eventually, you'll have something other people other people want to see. Celebrate at that point--go out and live life for a day or a weekend or an hour.
Then? Sit back down and go back to work.
You give up moments. You lose forever times in the real world in your dedication to the fictional characters or to the lines on the page or to the haze of imagination.
But you'll have a shot at the dream.
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