Short answer: Sometimes. Long answer:
Recently someone asked me how I felt about the idea of having total freedom to write or do whatever creative work I wanted—and whether that much freedom would be overwhelming.
The question took me back to the last time I had a lot of freedom with my time, after I left my job where my boss was crooked and before I started my current job in Japan. I was editing the fourth or so draft of MFA Thesis Novel during the day, editing the first New Hampshire Writers Project Anthology in the afternoons, and in between that I was brushing up my Japanese, doing editing side gigs, and trying to read a lot of books. I also had to find time to move all my stuff into storage and vacate my apartment.
In short, I was pretty busy.
All of the things I was busy with, though, with things I had control over—while some of them had deadlines, all of them were things I felt self-motivated to finish. Because there were a lot of these things, I felt self-imposed pressure to make progress and finish all of them to prevent myself from getting royally screwed. That pressure was never overwhelming, but it kept me moving, productive, and getting shit done.
However, I can easily imagine a world where I had less shit to do and less motivation to do it. In that kind of world, having total freedom with my time would lead to crippling bouts of ennui, hopelessness, and lethargy.
I know this because it happened waaaaaaaaaaaay back after I finished college, when my job at a lake association had been cut to two days a week and I was haphazardly trying to write while figuring out my next step. I had a lot of time back then, but not a lot of focus or structure, so I often spent whole mornings in bed, whole afternoons thinking about what I wanted to do, and whole evenings watching DVR-ed episodes of Degrassi The Next Generation.
This was also a time where I didn’t have my goals planned out and thus didn’t know where my life was going, so this led to a lot of worry and anxiety.
As I got older, though, I started forming my own structure, my own projects, and my own work schedule, so I was able to organize my days on my own terms without falling into mindless bouts of ennui. Eventually that structure became mostly self-imposed, not forced on me through school or a Day Job.
When I was in grad school a lot of the PhD students I talked to had a similar problem. They were done taking classes and maybe had a few classes of their own to teach, but for the most part they were working solo on their dissertations with nearly total freedom. Unfortunately, that freedom led many of them them to get distracted, procrastinate, and overall use their time less efficiently. (Of course, it usually took a few beers to get them to admit this…)
Now, to return to the question my friend was asking: Is too much freedom a bad thing?
If you’re someone who’s self-motivated enough to seek out your own projects and carry them out by keeping yourself motivated, then having total freedom is awesome, and an incredible dream that’s worth shooting for.
But if you’re not as confident in your workflow, haven’t set up your own structure, and aren’t sure where your life is going, it’s probably better to have some outside structure like a Day Job, school, an internship, or part-time work to keep you on track and give your life some direction.
The grad school program I went to was more or less set up like this—first-year grad students started out taking classes while teaching or doing a research job, and they were encouraged to seek out other opportunities around the program. If all went well, after a year or two they’d have built their own structures and could manage their own time and goals. (And if they were REALLY lucky they could get a fellowship that paid their living expenses while they pursued those goals!)
Final Thoughts: Know How Well You Can Handle Freedom
The secret to handling freedom is being able to build your own structure, so if you find yourself with a chance to take time off from work or school and are wondering whether to take it, ask yourself a few questions: Do you have a project (or projects!) that you’re dying to spend more time on, and that you feel personally motivated to work on? Can you build your own structure without it being imposed on you? Can you keep yourself on track to work on those projects and adhere to that structure?
And most importantly: Do you feel confident enough about where your life is going that you won’t fall victim to anxiety, panic attacks, or existential angst about your place in the world?
A big part of my creative journey has been about building up my own structure and finding the confidence I need to make my way in the world—not to mention the savings and income sources to achieve more freedom. If you’re on a similar journey, knowing how well you handle freedom is an important part of determining what steps you’re ready to take, whether now, or in the future.