Leverage & Creators
I was recently approached by a law start up who wanted to onboard me to handle their media operations - podcasts, video sessions and blogs. The founder had been following my work for some time and was kind enough to think that the team needed me. After at least two weeks of back and forth and at least one multi hour meeting - I turned down the offer. Why? The answer boils down to leverage.
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Understanding leverage as a creator
I have always felt uncomfortable calling myself a ‘creator’ and have often found myself cringing on the mention of the term ‘creator economy’. My projects - the podcast and the blog(s) have always been a hobby, something I do on the side simply because I like to do them. I have always felt that to be a creator, there needs to be some seriousness attached to the process, either in terms of monetary investment or singular pursuit of the project. Of which, I do/have neither.
However Amit Varma’s recent conversation with Roshan Abbas completely changed my perspective of the landscape and what it meant to be a creator in the first place. A key moment was Roshan asking the piercing question - ‘Are you a creator or just a hobbyist’. I still do not know what I am.
However the most impactful takeaway of the episode was Roshan’s tale of how he turned down a lucrative offer back in the 80s from All India Radio because he believed:
“When a creator becomes an employee - their creativity dies”.
Roshan valued his creative freedom more than what AIR was willing to pay him. In other words, he did not want to loose his leverage.
Having leverage means using something to maximum advantage by putting in minimum effort(s). It is not a hack, it is about understanding how the world works and which process compound. This blogpost is replete with examples of real world leverage. It is about creating possibilities and circumstances in which you can maximize whatever value it is that you want to optimize for.
For most individuals it is freedom - the ability to choose. The ability to control your life. When Roshan turned down the AIR job, he was preserving his leverage over his creative process and time. Similarly, the only reason why I turned down the opportunity was because I did not want to loose my leverage over my time and attention. Given that I can only dedicate a fix amount of time to creative pursuits, taking on the job would have meant letting go of a significant amount of that time to do very similar things I would have done with the time, except on someone else’s terms. As Morgan Housel says in his book ‘Psychology of money’ - doing something you love on someone else’s terms feels very much like doing something you don’t love. The idea of leverage is inherently tied with the idea of infinite possibilities, but on your terms. There can be many possibilities even when you are working for someone else, or in a regular job - but the catch is that the terms will be dictated by others. That’s how the world works. When you preserve you leverage on certain things, you dictate how and what happens.
Also, another condition of the engagement was that I could not work with similar legal brands. That again, would be letting go of my freedom of work, which I was not comfortable with. To me it was not about whether I have work with these other brands now, but about the possibility of work in the future. There is a very high premium I place on my freedom, and as far as I can preserve it, I will.
Leverage as a creator is to have freedom over your time and attention. Creativity, when tied with money tends to distort the creative process. Personally I want to isolate my creative passions from any active monetization for as long as I can. Which is to say that I do not want to shape my creativity so that I can earn money off off it. If it comes anyway or by sponsorships I am comfortable with, so be it. Money is and will never be the reason why I do any of this.
Freedom, that’s what matters.
woahh! great piece man.