PSA: Apply For The Damn Thing!

Yes, you. Pre-rejecting yourself is idiot behavior.

Please accept this profanity laden addendum to last week’s Making a Living post since it is that time of year again.

If you are trying to make your way as writer, artist, filmmaker, etc and do not happen to be independently wealthy, I implore you (yes, you) to go ahead and

APPLY FOR THAT DAMN FELLOWSHIP, GRANT, RESIDENCY, OR WHATEVER.

Please.

In fact, apply for every fucking thing you are eligible for every single year you are eligible for them until you no longer need any of the things or you’ve already gotten them all. (Here’s one place to start finding what you’re eligible for, you punk.)

From a Bruno Munari children’s book.

Oh, do you have some excuses? Ok, let’s see if any of them are legitimate.

If your reason for not applying for things is that you already know you’re not going to get it, here are several reasons why that is not a reason not to apply:

1. Are you on the fucking selection committee for the thing you might apply for? No you are not. So let them do the job of deciding who is going to be rejected.

2. You actually do not know who is going to be on the selection committee and usually such committees change from year to year and this might be the year someone who is extremely into whatever it is you’re doing is going to be making the call. You simply cannot know.

3. Actually you’re right and your odds for getting the fellowship or grant or whatever are not (technically) in your favor but that doesn’t fucking matter because you need to get used to getting rejected from things. (Personally, I’ve been applying for probably 4-6 things per year almost every year that I’ve needed to, for about a decade. That usually means between 4-6 rejections and sometimes one acceptance.) Suck it up and get used to it. These things are competitive and it’s not always your fucking year.

4. Getting rejected means you at least made an effort to describe what you’re working on and advocate for yourself. It will be that much easier next year when you apply for a lot of the same things yet again.

Here are some common complaints about applying for things and why you need to stop making such complaints:

1. “But I hate having to describe projects I haven’t written or made yet!”

   YES. We all hate it. We do it anyway. You can use the project proposal to write about a project you haven’t begun, but would begin if you could. You can use the project proposal to propose a project to yourself. You can use the project proposal to describe something you already wrote or made. You can use the project proposal to describe something you could theoretically make but haven’t yet.

2. “But it’s such a waste of time.”

   Then you’re doing it wrong. You have to find a way to psyche yourself up for this. You have to find a way to be honest with yourself about what you want to make, what your values as an artist are, who you’re trying to reach, what you want to say, what you’d ideally be working on if you had more time or money. Writing an application can be (if you let it) a time to think creatively and expansively about what kind of space you are trying to occupy on this fucking planet.

   ALSO! Another reason apply for grants is not a waste of time, even when you get rejected, is that someone on the selection committee might first come across your work in your application and even if you don’t make the cut for that grant this person or people may reach our and offer you some other kind of work or opportunity. (This will almost certainly happen if you apply for things, repeatedly, for at least a few years.)

3. “But I don’t know what I’m doing right now.”

   And why is that? Have you maybe not taken any time to ask yourself what you want to be working on? Have you maybe not had the resources to be able to let yourself imagine what you want to be working on? Schedule two hours in your day when you would have been doom-scrolling or watching some stupid series and look at your bookshelf or notebook or sketchbook or whatever and ask yourself what is going on.

4. “But by the time the fellowship or grant or residency actually happens I’ll probably be done with this thing or working on something else!”

   And that is totally fine. There is 100% nothing wrong with that at all. (Also, you are probably wrong because you will still be working on that thing you think you’ll be done with soon long after you think you’ll be done with it.)

5. “But I’m not as accomplished in my career as the other people who’ve gotten this thing in the past.”

   Again— you are not on the fucking selection committee and these things are not as formulaic as they might seem from the outside and pre-rejecting yourself is for idiots and I do not want you to be an idiot.

The only legitimate reason for not applying for support of your creative practice is if you already have enough time and money to do whatever it is you do. That’s it. Everyone else, sharpen your fucking pencils and get to work.

Are you overwhelmed? Here’s a handy explainer for how to apply for things.

If vengeance is a good motivator for you, just imagine that if you don’t apply for this thing that guy from your MFA that was so rude to everyone will get your spot instead. Apply now—save yourself grief later.

I am leaving the comments open to all and will try to answer any lingering doubts you have about applying for things.

This Public Service Announcement was brought to you by the fact that I fucking hate seeing creative people suffer by not doing what they love to do and creative people become fucking unbearable when they’re creatively stunted and I am sick of your shit.

And I love you.

OK, really do that fucking application already. And put an alert in your calendar for every major annual deadline and set it to repeat, yearly, forever. You’ll be happy to delete that alert some day.