: Re: Advice for a "Gift of Words" So we have a friend, having a milestone birthday, and his wife requested that we provide a gift of words. This friend is about the age of my children, and

@Nickens642

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John, you’re in a room of creative types here. Many of us have given up very lucrative careers to be impoverished writers. Money is not the bee all and end all, it doesn’t make you happy — haven’t you heard? And although your friends want to save for a house, they are allowed to do that while pursuing creative dreams, even if it means that saving for the house will take a lot longer. A smart person realises where happiness lies and while it’s nice to own a house, if you trade your dreams for bricks and mortar, you are destined to a life of unhappiness (trust me, I did it).

You are judging their choices from your own perspective rather than trying to see it from theirs. You have said yourself that you and your wife aren’t creative people so you can’t understand and are not in position to judge the dreams and choices of someone who is. For a creative person the ultimate dream often isn’t to be rich, but just to be able to make a living doing something you love.

So, if you want to write something for them, you need to step out of your own shoes and walk around in theirs for a while. Stop looking at and judging this from your own technical and logical perspective and imagine yourself as a creative person. Imagine yourself dreaming of being the next Denzel Washington or Robert De Niro and write as if the dream is yours.

The best gift you can give this person in words is an understanding of what’s important to them, not what’s important to you.

Good luck!

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