I received a bunch of messages in this vein, but yours didn’t have any political rants or racial epithets, so you get a response. Congrats.

When it comes to writing blog posts about making comics, I’ve always tried to make it clear that I am not a guru and don’t have anything close to all the answers.

Maybe that’s okay.

Survival bias is a state where people concentrate on only the most exemplary subjects and try to emulate them, not realizing that they’re the exception, not something typical.

If you try to figure out how to be a “huge successful writer” by only looking at superstars and big moneymakers, you’re almost certainly going to fail. Don’t get me wrong, every creative person has tremendous hardships and rejections in their careers at different points, but the level of success a J.K. Rowling, Stephen King or Robert Kirkman now have is highly unusual and not something you can reproduce.

Maybe it’s a good idea to get a bit of advice from someone currently in the trenches, someone slowly building their name bit by bit who’s honest about what worked and what didn’t as they go along.

I’ll admit, there’s still survival bias involved in my career (many people pitch their ideas to Image, many more want to work at Marvel), but I try to temper my optimistic advice with reality wherever I can. It may not be as impressive, but it’s certainly more realistic.

I’ve known friends and colleagues who wanted their creative careers to appear like Athena, a perfect armored warrior-goddess instantly striking awe and fear into all around her, who sprung fully formed from the forehead of Zeus. (Seriously, that’s the legend. Mythology is fucking weird and awesome).

It doesn’t happen that way. It never will. The people I’ve known who acted that way about creativity quickly burned out on top of a pile of half-baked concepts and unfinished work. They wanted blinding inspiration and success or nothing and nothing was what they got.

If you make things you will struggle, screw up, and hate the choices you’ve made at times, but if you stick with it you will also learn and grow. Sometimes it won’t be about money. Other times that, and keeping a roof over your head, might be your only concern. Everyone’s journey is different. You can learn a bit from other people but in the end you have to go out there and do it yourself.

If you’re spending your time staring at my little bar charts shaking your fist about my success or lack thereof, you’re using way too much energy in an unproductive way. Go make stuff or go looking for Athena and see where it gets you.