People always ask kids “What do you want to be when you grow up?” I was never interested in a particular profession. I wanted to be a mountain, firetruck, or even, for a brief spell, a lamppost. When I was just slightly older I modified my response. I started to say: “I want to be a writer.”

This carried me through college, and then I proceeded directly to a middle-of-nowhere, yet somewhat-well-known graduate school for such studies. I was filled with youthful confidence. I knew I would rise to the top. I knew I would have a book finished and published within the next few years, and beyond that I didn’t think at all about what
came next.

Fast-forward 7 years. The degree I was told was “terminal” (sounds like a disease, right?) may not be any more. I have several small publications and a finished collection, but no book published. I do meaningful work and tell people (legitimately) that I teach writing at a well-known university, but it’s hourly, and I have to live with two
people, in a small apartment, in a neighborhood where gunshots regularly punctuate nightfall in order to stay in Boston.

I took the GREs, did okay, and I’ve narrowed down possible PhD study to three fields, but lately it feels like they might as well be mountain, firetruck, and lamppost studies. I like what I’m doing now just fine, I don’t really want a change, I really just want more money for it.

I’m 28 years old and now that I took the GREs, my parents are pressuring me to apply to school (they themselves have higher degrees). Are my degree-laden parents right that it’s time for a PhD? Is this the lot in life for all “writers?” Should I just be glad I’m not an adjunct? Why didn’t I follow my dream of being a mountain? Now there’s job security.

Dear Ferdinand,

I think many readers of your letter will empathize with your position. I certainly do.

One of the hardest things about young adulthood is coming to terms with the fact that we can’t all be lampposts when we grow up.

Those of us who are dead-set on being mountains, or writers, feel this pressure acutely. For creative professionals, the question of what we do for work is especially tricky.

It sometimes seems to me that, as a writer, getting older doesn’t help settle the question of “what I want to be when I grow up;” it just confuses it further. By the time we are in our late twenties, we are fully aware that most people who want to be writers don’t make it, and they don’t make it for a variety of reasons. Some of those reasons are in the control of the putative writers: they never hack it because they lose interest, or in a cost/benefit analysis of the effort it takes to become a successful writer they decided it isn’t worth it. Some writers also fail because they simply do not have the skills to make it in such a ridiculously competitive profession (just as some potential neurosurgeons drop out of med school and some ad executives become office administrators –it’s not that being an administrator isn’t hard work, it’s that it’s just notquite so competitive). If what manifests as our talent is somewhat in our control, there are also the aspects of “becoming a writer” that are truly out of our control altogether. Statistically, most books don’t get published. Getting published takes a lot of skill and a lot of grit, but it also takes a lot of luck. And there’s the kicker. More than in most professions, writers and other creative professionals must confront the reality of the inequality of luck: even if you are a very, very good writer and you work very, very hard, it’s a statistical probability that you will never make your living as a writer. On the other hand,because writing takes so much perseverance and resilience and luck, there is always the possibility that one will become wildly successful at it some day. We hear stories all the time about blockbuster authors whose manuscripts were rejected dozens, even hundreds of times before they found a literary home. You never know, that could be you.

And it’s the not knowing that makes it so hard.

Not knowing means not knowing when it’s reasonable to keep at it and when it makes more sense to move on. But the thing is, there are elements of luck and uncertainty in any job.

Lots of things about our lives are uncertain. No matter who we are, what we do, and what we aspire to be.

That means that to a certain degree we need to accept that we are not solely in control of our success, or the trajectory of our lives in general. It also means that, if we find it helpful to do so in moments of great doubt, we can practice taking control of what we can. That’s why you’re considering a PhD program, right? Because you think it will give you more options and put you in better control of your career.

But here’s the flaw in your thinking: you think that trading one gamble for another with better odds will make you more likely to hit the jackpot. You’ve forgotten that when we bet, the house always wins. Smart people know this, and so they only play for fun.

Let me explain: trying to be a writer, or even attempting to finagle a way to make more money doing the meaningful teaching that you are currently engaged in is like playing craps –it’s a lot of fun, and sometimes we’re up by a lot, but in the end, each roll of the die is independent of the last roll, so even when we’ve steadily been getting better we can always start back at zero with a new appreciation for the capriciousness of fate. Going to some prestigious university PhD program is like switching to blackjack –it’s the best odds in the casino, and if a player is very good she can build a strategic advantage that might help her win, but luck, and the dealer, still plays a significant role. Since the odds are against you either way, my suggestion is that you walk into the casino with your fist full of quarters and just play what you love to play.

Personally, I think craps is a whole lot more amusing than 21. In other words, just like you, I write and teach, and I love it. I often lament how little I get paid, but I still love my work. If I thought I would enjoy going back to graduate school, I’d do it, because it wouldn’t be much of a financial loss in the short-term and in the long run there’s a small chance I might get paid more. The thing is, while it might or might not be fun to have a PhD, right now I don’t think it would be that much fun to be getting a PhD. And it takes a really long fucking time to get a PhD. Like, four to nine years.

So I’m going to tell you what I routinely tell my students who are about to get their BAs and come to me for advice about graduate school. Don’t go to law school (or med school, or for your PhD in rhetoric for god’s sake), I tell them, because you want to be a lawyer. Go to law school if you want to go to law school. Those of us who teach young people, and especially those of us who teach poor young people or those from historically marginalized groups, must help students fight every day against the enormous cultural pressure they face to think of their education in the most reductive possible terms: as a way to earn a few more dollars an hour. Because we teach, and value education so much, we know that going to school can be about much, much more than money. Education should be about empowerment and the excitement of learning for its own sake. So base your decision on whether or not that’s what you’ll get in the Gradate School of Firetruck Studies. Not on whether or not those letters after your name might score you a couple more bucks somewhere down the line.

And it sounds to me like you’re not really passionate about grad school in general or “firetruck studies” in particular.

And you have a lot of great stuff going for you in your current circumstances.

You are passionate (if anxiety-filled) about writing. You do meaningful work. Maybe you have fulfilling social life? My advice to you is to put your effort into those things –to really make a go of it– and to be grateful that, as a writer, you only have to balance writing with your job and your life, and not with those things and taking classes and writing a(nother) thesis.

Remember, you’ve already hit the jackpot. You have a meaningful job, and not everyone gets the chance to feel that way. Lots of folks never get to come home from work every day happy that they have created meaning in the world and helped others do the same. And, as the wise old grandpa inCharlie and Chocolate Factory says “There’s plenty of money out there. They print more of it every day. [...] Only a dummy would give this up for something as common as money.” And you’d have to be even dumber, in my opinion, to give it up for the possibility of the chance to work really hard to get a little more money four to nine years from now.

Look, we live in a society that encourages us to think that taking extraordinary measures will offer a more certain path to success. Call me old fashioned, but I think that’s bunk. Viral videos, betting it all on red, stunt memoirs, reality TV appearances, and PhD programs may be a way to try to take control of our careers, but there’s no shortcut to fulfillment. Just getting up every day and working hard still matters. So work hard at what you already like doing, and make sure others notice how hard you work and how good you are at your job. The success, and the money, you deserve, will likely follow. And whether it does or not, you should feel good about and have fun doing the work itself.

As I’ve said before, everyone deserves a chance to do meaningful, fulfilling work and be paid a living wage for doing so. So far you’re half-way there. And at twenty-eight, it’s not yet time to panic about not having it all. You’ll get there. Have patience, do the work, and don’t let your ambition interfere with your enjoyment of what you already have. Some day, you’ll make it as a writer, or you’ll at least get enough of a raise to move further out of gang territory and lose a roommate or two.

You cannot know the future, but you have every right to be hopeful about it.

Got a question? Or a conundrum? Or maybe you just want to complain about the modern world or my column? Email smartpeopleonbaddays (at) gmail.com! I can’t wait to hear from you.