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It’s Okay to Get Paid
Why artists should get over the fear of being compensated.
I travel in a creative circle. Even my favorite accountant-in-training is a crafty mama, but like me, she has a different understanding of the whole situation here than many of my more “but I’m an artist” friends. She loves crunching numbers and her predominant goal is to be an accountant, offering her skills to world-changers and people doing good works in the world (she’s the numbers to my words, basically); she also loves fiber arts and is highly talented there, too, so she combines her skills to create beautiful gift items that have a low labor and materials cost and everyone wins. She puts her numbers game to use in her craft business and feeds her family at the same time.
She and I are exceptions, however, in the truly creative realms. It seems, otherwise, that so many of the artists we know have serious issue with being compensated for their work — they have some sort of idea that money being anywhere near art is a bad thing, even while they lay out a merch table at shows. I hear this refrain over and over and over again, on a daily basis, but I’m here to tell you all this: It’s okay to get paid.
Times have changed, folks, for sure. Most of us who’ve been called to a creative life are driven by this; we go crazy (crazier) if most of our waking hours…
