Author Elizabeth Gilbert’s memoir ‘Eat Pray Love’ sold 10 million copies. But what many people don’t know, is that she was a ‘successful’, paid writer before that book. Maybe not to the degree that she is now, but still relatively successful.

But even so, as Gilbert shares in her recent book ‘Big Magic’, she only gave up her day job once ‘Eat Pray Love’ went huge. She had been freelance paid writer before then, but had kept a day job the whole time.

Because she saw – and still sees – writing as her calling, her vocation – whether it’s her day job or not.

Which highlights one of the biggest and most dangerous myths around calling:

That to pursue a vocation or calling means it has to become our day job, our primary source of income – otherwise we’ve failed in our calling.

And it’s a total lie.