How to use your professional jealousy to advance your career

I wrote about how I overcome professional jealousy and why it's so alluring over at Medium. If you like it, please consider holding down the clap button at the left of the piece for 1-50 claps, which helps more people see the essay and helps me get paid. It's also an examination of the new memoir Well, That Escalated Quickly: Memoirs and Mistakes of an Accidental Activist by Franchesca Ramsey, which I highly recommend.



Specifically, I focus on a chapter Ramsey wrote (I'm 99.99% sure) about Julia Allison. If you know who she is, I think you'll enjoy the essay, and if you don't, the below Wired cover is a clue, and you can find out more in the essay.



I discuss the folly of professional jealousy and the damage it can do to career advancement, so I'll add a little context. I'm typing this at 3:20 a.m. when I should be sleeping. I'm proud of what I've accomplished, especially in the years since October 2011 when I got laid off from my magazine job and have been forced to learn how to be self-employed. My business has grossed six figures the last two years (emphasis on grossed because I invest tens of thousands of dollars back into it and am investing even more this year), but I work hard for every dollar.

There's a lot of trial and error, usually more misses than hits, and, for me, the sense that I can never relax or let go. I'm starting retirement savings in my forties and have zero guarantee of future income. So while it may look like I'm a version of "successful," and I would say I feel somewhat successful, it's an ephemeral feeling. It's why I gobble up NPR's How I Built This with Guy Raz podcast and am reading books by the likes of Barbara Corcoran. Professional jealousy is really a time waster when you consider how many tasks go into building a business (yes, even "passive income" like book royalties). I spent part of Memorial Day making lists of which photos I have handy to post on the Best Women's Erotica Instagram account and drafting a so-long-they-may-not-read-it-all email to the authors in the next volume in the series (speaking of which, the deadline for the Volume 5 call for submissions is August 1, 2018, which will be here very soon). Most days my first waking thought is about my to-do list. So the idea that anyone would be jealous of my career seems laughable to me most days, because "success" doesn't always feel incredible and amazing. It's nice when I get a big (for me) royalty check, but I'm always aware that the next one could be half or a third or a tenth of that, or nothing. That keeps me in check and buckled down focusing on the next task or project or pitch (while also, of course, taking the time to promote the books and articles that are already out so that more people can hear about them, because that's part of this job too).

You can also follow me on Medium for essays several times a week, sometimes about books, sometimes about writing and publishing, sometimes on technology or travel or whatever I'm thinking about at the moment.