If you finish a paying assignment and feel, instead of relief, a kind of dull resentment — this episode is for you. Or if you sit down to the work that's been pulling at you for years, and the dishes suddenly need doing, the bills suddenly need paying — this is for you, too.
Episode 4 of The Difficulty starts the Field Guide series with the foundational difficulty: the work that pays and the work that matters. They're not usually the same work, and most of us pretend they are.
In this one I get into the years I spent writing trade journalism in freight and logistics — the compromises that taught me a lot but weren't the calling — and the friends who got the holy-grail book deal and discovered that "making it" was the start of a different grind, not the end of one. Plus Mark Fitten's $10K-publicist-and-NYT-ad story. The Norman origins of the word "courage." And why being 53 doesn't mean you've missed your window. At least I hope not.
The challenge at the end: this week, make one move that matters. Even 90 minutes. Notice the resistance. Notice the breaking through.
—
CHAPTERS
00:00 Resentment and Avoidance
00:46 Show Format and Big Question
02:45 Work That Pays vs Matters
04:11 Compromises and Day Jobs
06:03 What Is Your True Calling
08:37 Renew Commitment and Habits
12:10 The Hidden Work After Creating
17:31 Choose Courage Over Ambivalence
22:54 Time Is Longer Than You Think
26:05 Your Work Matters Closing
—
FREE — THE DIFFICULTY FIELD GUIDE
Eight difficulties every working writer faces, and what to ask when each one shows up.
→ crossroadspublishing.group/assets/pdfs/The_Difficulty_Field_Guide.pdf
—
WHERE TO FIND ME
Substack — new essays Wednesdays, the Working Publisher news digest Fridays, weekend essay readings Saturdays
→ chadprevost.substack.com
The Difficulty — Monday (the why), Thursday (the how), Saturday (essay readings) — wherever you listen to podcasts
→ chadprevost.com/the-difficulty
Crossroads Publishing Group — publishing services, IF/THEN Books, the Iris Blackwood mystery series
→ crossroadspublishing.group
—
Thursday: three things that happened in publishing this week and what they mean if you're building toward a direct audience.
The difficulty in life is the choice.
The Difficulty: Creativity, Meaning & the Hard Work of a Life
Resentment, Avoidance, and the Work That Matters
Resentment, Avoidance, and the Work That Matters
A Challenge and an Inspiration
The Difficulty: Creativity, Meaning & the Hard Work of a Life
The Difficulty is a podcast about creativity, meaning, and the hard choices that shape a life. Each week, writer and publisher Chad Prevost works through the questions underneath the creative process and the examined life—how we make work that matters, sit with life's difficulties instead of rushing past them, and keep going. Expect arguments, reflections, and the occasional witness to something worth seeing. Slower, more contemplative episodes land on Saturdays.
It's also the voice of Crossroads Publishing Group, a press built on a single idea: books are occasions for community. If you're a creative, a thinker, a maker, or anyone navigating the difficulty of doing meaningful work—pull up a chair.
The Difficulty is a podcast about creativity, meaning, and the hard choices that shape a life. Each week, writer and publisher Chad Prevost works through the questions underneath the creative process and the examined life—how we make work that matters, sit with life's difficulties instead of rushing past them, and keep going. Expect arguments, reflections, and the occasional witness to something worth seeing. Slower, more contemplative episodes land on Saturdays.
It's also the voice of Crossroads Publishing Group, a press built on a single idea: books are occasions for community. If you're a creative, a thinker, a maker, or anyone navigating the difficulty of doing meaningful work—pull up a chair.Appears in episode
