a recipe for a time bomb

The healthiest, sanest advice I've received: Don't put pressure on your art to make you money. Also: Doing what you love while thinking you deserve nice things is a recipe for a time bomb. (The latter from Austin Kleon.) I have these wisdoms written in a little notebook every writer is supposed to carry around with them wherever they go. I genuinely believe in this advice, and, most of the time, I live it. I haggle with bank clerks over the tiniest fees, buy whatever I can second-hand, forage in parks and forests, use syringes to inject my printer cartridges with bulk ink. One Texan morning, when an inch-long roach crawled out of my pajama sleeve, I was almost elated. What purer symbol of low-budget living? I felt cleansed in that moment, like I'd at last let go of my material desires. My little notebook approved. In that moment, I though I was a true artist.

- Maria Reva, from her "Notes on Writing" essay for Event Magazine (Winter 2020/21), as collected in 50 Years of Event Magazine: Collected Notes on Writing.