Thursday, January 8, 2009

A Quote To Sicken and Inspire

"Since I was unwilling to devote myself to the finer points of photography, I put down my camera and picked up a pen. I had read enough poorly written newspaper columns to believe that I could beat the average. I whipped up a sample essay; one month later my name and photo were on the front page of my town's weekly paper. Just like that, I was a "columnist": $50 per column, two columns a month."

(Written by Kelly Corrigan in Oprah Magazine, January 2009)

2 comments:

ACW said...

I read this article in its entirety last evening. What I found interesting was her observations about the fear of failure - that she enjoyed early success in the first few phases of trying something new, then wanted to go on to something different so it could be new and fresh. She realized this may be triggered by a fear of failure - or success as you earlier described in a post?
Anne

Colleen said...

Great observations! What struck me was her pure nerve. She just jumped into whatever it was that seemed interesting - wrote a letter & sample piece, and voila: she's a columnist.

I'd never had considered cold-mailing an article, especially when I was just starting out. I'd have worried it wasn't good enough, that I didn't have any credits or connections, etc., etc.

But that just goes to prove that sometimes, all you need is guts! (and a bit of talent helps too) :)