Earned vs. Unearned Status
Lock in
Recently I listened to a podcast with Sahil Bloom, mostly to hear him expand on the concept of the importance of saying no. I’ve been feeling some despair about really committing to my writing projects and really going deep. I let myself get interrupted. I interrupt myself. It's scary, to truly go all in. What if I spend years writing a book and then— nothing?
Bloom talks about how people who self-identify as being a nice person (hi!) have trouble setting boundaries in order to prioritize what they want to focus on. We say yes to everything people ask of us, because we feel like it would be mean to say no. And then we don’t get the things done that we want to.
I appreciate what Bloom says about saying no, but the part that really got my attention was about earned vs. unearned status.
Unearned status (he also calls it “bought status”) is a quick fix, for show. A painting you buy for your wall so you can post it on Instagram. A new pair of the hot sneakers you keep seeing around. An expensive vehicle because it’s what everyone else drives.
Earned status is something you get from hard work and time. The pizza dough recipe you perfected over a decade. Your ability to draw, which you’ve been working on your whole life, and which you continue to work on. An entire novel, which you write and revise.
You can’t buy earned status. Bloom kind of glosses over the fact that having money makes it easier to take the time to devote to the craft or physical feat or whatever you’re working on. For sure, having money makes it easier to be in good shape, or to write a book. But the point is, you still have to put in the time, no matter how much money you have. You have to do the work.
A shopping haul video is unearned status. A snarky takedown is unearned status.
Writing a book via AI is unearned status.
Talking about writing a book but not actually doing it is unearned status.
Buying fabric but not sewing with it is unearned status (talking to myself here – it’s easy to buy fabric but hard to take the time and build the skill to make something out of it).
And listen: sometimes you see the cute sneakers and you want them! That’s ok! But if you’re using that as a marker of status, if you’re posting about the sneakers and the purchases and the bought stuff as a way to signal your worthiness to others, you’re swimming in the waters of unearned status.
Earned status is:
Working steadfastly at a skill, a little bit at a time, and not telling anyone about it.
Learning to play an instrument.
Doing pushups every day, until you can do more pushups.
Learning, failing, growing.
Writing a book and revising it.
Bloom does talk about status as “a natural (and important!) human phenomenon,” and it has been interesting this past twenty years or so to see how that has gotten co-opted by being online. Status refers to how other people perceive us, and social media has harnessed our ability to be perceived by so many people, which has in turn caused a flourishing market for unearned status markers. Most advertising on social media is some form of this: buy this so you will be perceived as worthy by the other people on this site. The work of what ends up being earned status—years of working and failing and learning—is not particularly post-worthy.
Let’s go back to my original reason for seeking out Bloom — to think about the benefits of saying no and committing to my creative practice. I was talking about it with my 16-year-old, moaning about all of the books I have not yet finished, and she said, “You just need to lock in.”
“What’s that?” I said.
“You know. Block out everything else. Just get it done. Lock in.”
I guess this is something people are saying now (maybe they’ve been saying it for decades, I can be kind of out of it when it comes to hot new slang). Lock in. (The teens will save us all.)
I do love dreaming about a project, when I’m imagining everything it can be. But there is a sense, when I’m dreaming and imagining, that I’m writing a love letter to my creative self, from afar. When I actually start putting words on the page, no matter how good they are, I am actively dancing with Creativity. There is magic that can only come from actually writing the words, and that is never unearned or bought.
I’m not saying your life needs to be a constant drive for earned status, but if it’s a constant drive for unearned status, you might have a problem.
Lock in. Buckle up. Do the work. Take your time. Earn it.
Here is your Cosmo video for the week (excitement in the writing shed!) (sound on for maximum Cosmo-ness):
Fail Better Club will be back in ten days. You know what to do. (What’s that? You don’t? Let me tell you.)
Fail Better Club is a sub-project of this newsletter, where you send me your messy and tough manuscript, and I tell you what I’m seeing the problem is. Send me the book that feels flat. The one where the main character makes no sense. The one with twelve main characters. The one that was supposed to be funny and lighthearted but ended up being apocalyptic. I will read it and send you a message over Voxer about how to fix it.
Fail Better Club happens when Mercury is retrograde (you don’t have to care about this, but Mercury retrogrades are great times to revise, plus it helps me figure out how often to offer this. Mercury stations retrograde March 15, and Fail Better Club week is going to be the week of March 17.
Fail Better Club is for paying subscribers. Why not upgrade now?
Thoughts and Links
Jeanna Kadlec (who has a great astrology newsletter called astrology for writers) is offering readings on “Unsticking Your Creative Practice: A Mini Reading to Jumpstart Your 2025.” I got one and it was reassuring and validating and gave me actual helpful action points.
For some reason I avoided getting Julia Turshen’s new cookbook (What Goes with What), I think because I mistakenly thought it was entirely charts? And no recipes? Which makes no sense? Since it’s a cookbook? I was wrong. There are plenty of recipes, and everything I’ve made has been great. I don’t know what I was waiting for. This cookbook is holding hands with another I got in the last few months, Big Vegan Flavor by Nisha Vora. Both give you not only recipes but detailed information on how to construct meals that are satisfying (like, add something fatty and something crunchy and something bright, and then loads of recipes and suggestions for those things).
Books I read recently and loved
Disclosure: book links in this newsletter are affiliate links to Bookshop.org, a site which supports independent bookshops.
The Man Who Didn’t Like Animals by Deborah Underwood and LeUyen Pham is the delightful Old MacDonald origin story we didn’t know we needed. I love it.
A Day in the Life of Murphy by Alice Provensen has a great first line: “MURPHY-STOP-THAT IS MY NAME. I AM A TERRIER. I BARK.” (Yes, it’s all caps in the book.)
Worm Makes a Sandwich! The exclamation point isn’t in the title but I am feeling exclamatory about this new book from Brianne Farley. You have to love an informational book with a worm that is SO cute and SO funny. I love this so much.
Many years ago I worked in a job I hated with the power of a thousand suns. One source of solace was the long walk from the train station to my office. I would pass a second hand shop and there was often a big orange tabby cat sleeping in the display window. For some reason seeing that big cat made my heart happy. Maybe it was just seeing another creature enjoying the simple pleasures of life. I never quite understood this. The kitty is probably long gone but I still remember how happy I felt when I saw it.
Hahahaha, "Buying fabric but not sewing with it is unearned status" immediately took me back to emptying out my craft space before we moved cross-country, and I so deeply identify with the need for a reminder! Working in a middle/high school, I say "lock in" to teens a lot, but not enough to myself. And just like earned status and unearned status, I'm noticing that there's a real locking in (deep work, if you will?) and a faux locking in, which is maybe being busy at an adjacent task but not truly focusing on what you really want or need to do (the way Julia Cameron talks about over-reading rather than creating in The Artist's Way).