Monetizing One’s Hobbies
I’ve been debating making a coloring book for a while now. It seems simple enough: make line art and publish. I don’t have to write text, I don’t have to think up a complicated plot, I don’t have to even render anything. Simply make line art and publish. There are plenty of online resources that offer to assist with self publishing a book, many of them free to make, only taking a small percentage of the sales themselves. I wouldn’t have to find a publisher or convince someone that my art is good enough for a coloring book. Sure, I would have to self promote, come up with a catchy title and/or tag line, and design both a front and back cover, but that can’t be too difficult, right?
If you’ve followed the Instagram account and read some of the blog, you know that I dabble in art. I’ve thought about monetizing this and other hobbies in the past, but I have complicated feelings about doing so.
I used to bake quite a bit, and found it very enjoyable. I’d make cookies, cakes, scones, cupcakes, brownies, lemon bars…so many different sweet treats. I got a lot of satisfaction from making desserts for people and seeing someone’s face light up as they bit into sugary scrumptiousness. It was suggested many times that I open a bakery or a catering business where I could peddle my desserts for money, but I knew in my heart of hearts that if I did I would hate baking. It would suck all the fun out of it. This was proven to a degree when I agreed to make all the birthday desserts for my work. Each month I would ask the birthday person what dessert they’d like. I felt strongly that as adults, many of us don’t get to ask for fun things like specific birthday treats. We get a store bought cake, which is nice enough, and everyone says pleasant things, and it’s forgotten immediately afterward. I wanted to make each person feel special, seen, and valued by offering them exactly what they wished for in a dessert. The first year was fun, it was like taking tiny, free commissions. Eventually I started getting actual commissions and was paid for several cakes and cheesecakes. At that point, I lost interest. It became a chore. I couldn’t get out of it. I couldn’t have a baking slump, it wasn’t allowed. I couldn’t take a break because my creativity was waning, it wasn’t allowed. I had to measure up to expectations, and I despise expectations when it comes to my personal time. And hence - my feelings about monetizing something I used to enjoy.
I don’t bake very much anymore.
I’ve dabbled in this with my art. I’ve played around with commissions in a very small way; one of my dear friends needed a logo for her business and I agreed to do my very first commission. I was nervous since I wanted to make sure she was satisfied, and I didn’t want to say no as she’s a very important person to us. She was patient and lovely and ended up liking what I came up with, a success on all counts. Afterward, I opened up commissions on Kofi and, to my delayed delight, received no commissions whatsoever. In retrospect, I’m so glad no one asked me to make anything custom. I’d lose my mind. I just got out of an art slump that lasted months. Can you imagine being pressured into making things when feeling uninspired? Why should I do that to myself?
This takes us back to the coloring book idea. I feel like I’m treading a dangerous path. No one is asking me for this, so it’s not a commission. No one is expecting anything, so there’s no external pressure. There is the threat of internal pressure, judging myself for how easy the pictures are to color and making calls about the so called “quality” of my work. This is an easy trap to fall into. I’m already quite hard on myself to make work of a certain “standard.” I’ve found over the last couple days, since breaking my art block, that if I change up the style then I do not feel nearly as much pressure to make things bigger and better, but the coloring book is going to be in a pretty consistent style, as you can see with the images I’ve placed in this blog. Can I make enough drawings to create a whole-ass coloring book???
Lastly, monetizing one’s hobby requires self promotion. Even if I come up with “enough” (whatever the means) pages that are satisfactory to myself, I’ll need to tweet about the book, I’ll need to blast it on IG, I’ll need to promote on Facebook. I could consider a TikTok. That seems like a lot of work that I don’t really want to put in. I enjoy the blog because it’s an easy place to put my thoughts. We don’t have a lot of readers right now and that’s ok. We’ve created an intimate, small, comfortable corner of the internet where we can throw our voices to the wind and expect nothing in return. If I have to start promoting, that brings expectation. That brings pressure. That brings the potential for disappointment. Do I want to bring that into my life? I really don’t know.
For now, I’m going to keep doodling. Maybe I’ll make enough for a coloring book, but maybe I’ll abandon the idea completely and just enjoy making art for art’s sake.