Mixing Things up for a Sweater

Today I’m extremely delighted to be able to feature a guest post from the one and only Abby Franquemont. (Yes, THAT Abby Franquemont. Can you hear our fan-girl squeals from all over the world?). We thought this was a super timely post considering we just decided on PLY Away teachers and subsequently had to send out over 40 “We’re so sorry…” emails to fantastic spinners and teachers from all over the world. It was tough. I mean, it’s super hard to say no to great people anyway but when you couple that with a I-wanna-please-everyone personality, it’s rough. Abby’s words helped me understand that people do understand. Maybe they’ll help you with something too. And for all those teachers that won’t be teaching at PLY Away this year, you totally could be! – Jacey    

Now here’s Abby!

I’ve been a pro fiber artist for ten years and it’s time to talk about something tough.

When I first left my career in tech to be a full-time fiber professional, I wasn’t sure I wanted to teach classes. In fact, “but I’d have to teach” had been something I said for years to talk myself out of making the leap into self-employment in the fiber sphere. I knew I would have to, but I didn’t think I’d enjoy it.

It wasn’t so much the teaching itself that worried me, as everything that surrounds it. I was confident I could get in a classroom and present the information people needed. I wasn’t sure about the emotional load. You see, I had watched my father teach on this same circuit, and had even assisted with some of his workshops. And before that, those workshops were taught by my father and my mother. And she quit doing it — not because she wasn’t great at it, but because she hated the emotional space it put her in.

One day my friend Beth called me up. She ran a fiber shop in Michigan, and she wanted me to come teach something. I tried to talk her out of that, but she was pretty insistent and so before too long, there I was, and it went fine. I had friends and colleagues and people who’d known my father, all over the place, telling me I just had to teach — submit a proposal here, talk to that person over there, and so on. So I started doing that, and lo and behold, I started getting tons of work teaching. It quickly became the core thing I did for work, pushing into the time I’d allotted for production or writing and taking over almost completely.

I thought I had it nailed, man. I really did. Invitations to teach, or submit proposals, were rolling in fast and furious and I was turning down work because I couldn’t fit it into my schedule. I was proposing to the big name festivals and events and my proposals were being accepted. My articles were being accepted all over the place.  I proposed a book, and while my first proposal was not accepted, my second one was. So I figured I’d made it — that I had arrived at a point where now, all I had to do was keep doing the job.

That’s how it was, for a couple of years. What I didn’t really understand was that there is no such point. I should have; it was what my parents had experienced, and it was true for musicians when I worked as a road manager for a veteran artist and performer. Yes, sometimes there’s a hot year or a hot season, like right after you release some new piece of work and everyone wants a little bit of that. But that’s all it is: a hot time, and a good run.

For two years running, I was accepted to teach at a major event. It was one where my father had taught, and one where I’d been well-received, where my classes had filled early and fully, where students stayed engaged when they went home and were e-mailing me about their successes and all kinds of things, and which was run by the folks who had just published my book. So the third year I proposed, I figured I was a shoo-in. The weekend when everyone expected to hear yes or no, I went up to my friend Beth’s shop to take a class from our mutual friend — a longstanding teacher who had mentored me, encouraged me, and pushed me plenty. She had welcomed me to the grownup table, so to speak.

“Well?” she asked when I got there, “Have you heard?” I hadn’t. Her face fell, as did mine, I’m sure. We knew the deal: if she, and a few other friends, had heard, and I hadn’t, it meant I wasn’t picked that year.

Here’s the other thing about the world of fiber arts instructors: it’s tiny. I mean it’s really, really tiny. And over time, you end up friends with lots of your colleagues. I mean real friends, not just acquaintances — the kind of friends where you know each other’s extended families and there’s a chance you’ve shared a queen bed at a B&B. Over even more time, you end up that kind of friends with not only your colleagues, but other long-timers who are vendors, event planners, farmers, editors of magazines, equipment makers, you name it. The fiber arts community really is different from many other niche communities. With pun intended, I’m afraid, it really is that tightly knit.

I was devastated not to get that gig. I was mortified not to have been good enough. I rehashed every single thing I had ever done wrong, every possible misstep I’d made, and — as is my natural tendency — turned that into the club with which I beat myself up for not being good enough. Privately, and to my closest friends, I cried. I raged. I feared. I took it all personally. I rationalized why it was not. I worried what it would mean. I feared what everyone would think. The whole world would know I hadn’t been good enough. Nobody would want me for anything anymore because they would all know I hadn’t been good enough. Everyone would ask me why I wasn’t good enough and I wouldn’t know what to say.

Well, time passed. And probably there was nothing but time passing that could have shown me concretely that what my mentors and friends had always said was the simple truth: sometimes you just don’t get the gig.

That’s hard. It’s hard to explain it to people who don’t do this crazy thing for a living, too. Every proposal is like a job application and interview. What’s more, all your friends are going for the same job. Everyone can’t get every job. No matter how much we all wish there were a way that could be, there just isn’t one. So it’s this emotional roller coaster, all the time. If I teach at 6 events in a year, that’s 6 times I applied and got the job; there are always at least as many — usually more — times where I applied and didn’t get the gig.

I’m not going to talk right now about how it feels when you do get the gig, and you know you have to step up to the plate and do it. I’m just going to share a few things I do to deal with the emotional load of not getting the gig.

1. When I apply, I try to assume I won’t get it. This means I don’t experience the deep lows on the emotional roller coaster when I’m not selected, and if I’m selected, it’s a pleasant surprise and it never becomes routine.
2. When I don’t hear back and someone else has, I try to wait a week before assuming it means anything at all for me. There have been times when I didn’t get the gig, went through the emotional turmoil and self-loathing over it, and then… got the gig after all.
3. I try hard to cheer for my friends as hard as I cheer for myself. Sometimes I don’t nail that and I totally am jealous or hurt. The times when I’ve been able to applaud someone else for their success are the times when the hurt goes away the fastest.
4. I go back and look at what classes do end up getting announced. 9 times out of 10, there are reasons those classes beat mine. Sometimes they’re a better fit for the specific audience or theme. Sometimes they’re fresh and new and mine are a little bit stale. Sometimes the teacher is just whoever is the new star on the scene or has the newest hot album out, if you will. Sometimes my pricing wasn’t a fit. Sometimes someone else’s proposal was a better fit for reasons beyond anybody’s control. But where I can find reasons someone else’s pitch edged mine out, it gives me something concrete to do with my feelings of disappointment: work on improving my own proposals. And this helps me remember it’s not about the person, so much as it is about what we’re all out here trying to do: teach people stuff about yarn.
5. Admit I’m bummed out. There have been times when my close friends have gotten gigs I didn’t, and they’ve been super excited about it. Sometimes, that’s been tense and uncomfortable. The times when we’ve been able to move past that the fastest have been the ones where I’ve been able to say “I’m bummed I didn’t get the gig.” What’s hard is that sometimes the only people who really understand are my colleagues, who also did, or didn’t, get the same gig themselves.
6. Don’t detach. Except for detaching as far as I have to. I know, this sounds internally conflicted, but I mean it. I try to detach far enough to remember it’s not personal, but no more than that. It’s the emotional investment that makes something worth doing. If I detach too far, then it might as well be working a temp job as a typist. In which case, that’s probably a better career choice for me right then because it pays more and the position is more secure.

“Fiber Arts Teacher” is the hardest job I’ve ever done, and a lot of that is because of the emotional roller coaster. But I’d have to say it’s also the most rewarding, and the one where I’ve grown the most as a human being from doing it. And a lot of that comes from the fact that even for me, a well-known teacher with an international following, I still only get the gig about one time in four. Which is about where my father was when he was a big name. It’s where we all are, here at the grownup table.

So don’t take a rejection from one gig as a rejection of your place as a teacher sitting at the grownup table. It doesn’t mean that. It really only means one thing:

Sometimes, you just don’t get the gig. And dealing with that is part of the job, whether this is the first time you’ve proposed something, or the thousandth. Don’t let it get you down. It may be the first time, but it won’t be the last — unless you stop proposing. And don’t do that. Because we really need all the fiber teachers we can get. The more there are, the more seats we need at the table, and that is the way we all win in the long run.