In my former life just a short year ago, I was a video editor. I worked on a few great films, some corporate videos, and on a lot of commercials. And I mean a lot. If I had to guess, I'd say upwards of 500. During this time, I enjoyed the seduction of technology. Of digitizing in footage, getting my hands dirty, and picking apart a story; or even better, creating one that wasn't even there through the manipulation of images and dialogue. I realized at some point that I was truly a workaholic and never said no to a job, outrageous client requests, abusive bosses, or overtime. A year and a half later, I went freelance and started working non-stop, fearing I wouldn't land that next job.
Video editing commercials is hard work. Advertising agencies don't just shoot a commercial and send it to air. It generally takes 2 weeks to 2 months to edit 1 commercial, get the audio mixed, color correct the footage, and make revisions. While it's true there are creative directors and copy writers to storyboard the commercial and come up with a genius plan of how it should look, paper rarely translates to video the way anyone hopes. Not to mention the client, say Sprint or Citibank, will often have a very specific agenda and want their spot to look a certain way, regardless of if their vision is practical or will fit into the :30 seconds allowed. In turn, the editor spends painful hours trying to make something out of nothing. Politics abound in advertising and you spend much of your time putting out fires and rushing to make deadlines. More often than not, your ego takes a tremendous blow on a weekly basis.
During my tenure, I regularly worked 9:30am to about 8:30pm nearly every night. This was a short day and meant I would get home before 10pm. I would work overtime at least once a week, but usually more. I would usually find myself in the edit suite at 12am or even 2am. I also pulled a few 32 hour shifts and 14 straight days in a row. I got paid tons of money during this time and rarely enjoyed any of it. Luckily (or unluckily) the editing companies would feed us breakfast, lunch, and dinner for free, but it also meant we never saw the light of day for 12 or more hours a day. I couldn't schedule anything with friends or my husband because I never knew when I'd be working. And when big accounts and deadlines for air are involved, you don't say no. I wound up stressed out, messing up on the job, sleep deprived, and abused myself by gorging on large lunches, desserts, and evening cocktails. I lived to go on abbreviated vacations in between jobs, only to start the cycle over again.
I became a video editor because I enjoyed telling a story and despite the fact that I had been writing stories since I was in the 4th grade, I didn't see how it would ever become a viable career and was rejected at every corner. However, by my 6th year in video editing, I couldn't deny that I was miserable, depressed, stressed-out, exhausted, and longing to write. I could never get my foot into the publishing world and started believing my talent was useless and that it wasn't in my cards.
I had hit upon a few small projects over the years. I had written 2 segments for a show on The Discovery Channel that I was also video editing and managed to land a few tedious copy writing jobs. One night, while my husband and I were watching television, I saw a commercial for kayak.com. I'm not sure why, but I got up from the couch, went to our computer and began writing an email. I let the PR person for kayak know why I should write newsletters for them and all the brilliance I could offer their company. My words were passionate and direct.
The next day, I got an email back letting me know they didn't use freelance writers. My heart sank. Briefly. However, this person happened to be going on maternity leave and wondered if I would pitch 20 ideas, of which 10 she would assign. I feverishly wrote in the late night hours after video editing and was assigned 10 more. Over the years, I've probably written over 100 for their company.
Writing for both kayak.com and The Discovery Channel led to writing for a kids' website and then ultimately freelance writing and editing at a family travel site. I eagerly abandoned the last of my video editing jobs, dove in and began the tedious process of updating thousands of articles. Every day I was afraid they'd no longer need my services and would let me go, only to return to advertising. I worked hard, and with passion, gradually working my way into writing news and deals pieces.Four months after I started, the editor sent me on my first press trip.
Since then, I let the preconceived notions of what having a good work ethic really means (not being a work-a-holic) and allowed my self-worth issues of being a writer fade away. I took control of my true goals and happiness and currently refuse to settle for a life of insincerity. Of ingenuineness. Of accepting that my spirit is troubled and ignoring it anyway.
Curiously, I now find that travel happens easily and naturally in my life, with or without money. If I'm longing for a break, a press trip comes my way. If my husband and I are feeling burned out, we find a way to finance a vacation by stumbling upon an amazing deal or thinking outside the box. If we're worried about him getting time off, a creative way to do so reveals itself.
Travel in and of itself is an evolution. You go somewhere else where your life seems to instantly transform for a short period of time. You become someone else, or a better version of yourself, and maneuver your days with renewed confidence. You come back with stories and knowledge and insight you didn't have before you left. And that experience tends to kick-start a desire to explore those transformations further in your real life. It's worth slowing down in life and giving yourself a chance to see the world from a new perspective.
Take it from someone who once spent 3 hours trying to edit a commercial while a client sobbed herself to sleep over a bad conference call, then asked my advice on how to get fired. I looked out the window to the bustling work-a-holics in Manhattan below, and wondered where I'd get to travel next.
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