Reflections

"Passive Income" and Other Epidemics of the Mind

No matter what you do, your work will never be over - and that's okay.

The biggest contagions that cause us harm are not biological in nature. They are psychological, behavioural and thought-based. There’s a reason why we say things like laughing, crying and yawning are all contagious. More importantly, we have belief systems and narratives that pass between us and between generations. Words and ideas, when delivered in a certain way, have a power to become ingrained in our minds, regardless of how objectively “correct” they are. Political slogans and movements (and their deliberately-engineered opposites!) are great examples of this.

Ancient societies and traditions have long recognised this. The native American concept of “wetiko” - a form of spiritual mind-virus that manifests through depressions, lack of self-worth and the constant self-sabotage of our ability to create, be healthy, and show up as people who have value and worth to bring to this world. Moreover, it has ramifications on a global scale too. Paul Levy is one of the leading writers on the phenomenon of wetiko, and I can highly recommend diving into his work:

And we continue to recognise this now, even if the language we use to highlight it changes. Orwell’s Animal Farm is a great demonstration of this phenomenon, where the vehicle of poetry, in the form of the Beasts of England anthem, is used to coddle the minds of the other farmyard animals in service of the greedy aspirations of the pigs. Orwell knew this phenomenon was very real - and perhaps more dangerous than most realised:

“If thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought. A bad usage can spread by tradition and imitation even among people who should and do know better. […] This invasion of one’s mind by ready-made phrases (lay the foundations, achieve a radical transformation) can only be prevented if one is constantly on guard against them, and every such phrase anaesthetizes a portion of one’s brain.”― George Orwell, Politics and the English Language

The manifestations can be obvious, such as big societal movements like the push for increasing control by centralised, technocratic governments. But they can be far less obvious, too.

This leads me to “passive income” - this gold-gilded grail in the world of online entrepreneurs, business influencers, coaches and beyond. The concept sounds simple: create a powerful guide, book or offering (and more recently, AI tools) that do not require you to actively update or manage the interactions they have with the people they’re intended to be used by. Release it, direct people to it, then have the money that comes in from these ventures to cover your baseline costs and generate some profit.

“Passive income” is a great case study in how bad ideas become contagious. Here’s why.

Money for Nothing

Of course the idea of working less and earning more is attractive - and even this concept of “passive income” has been attractive long before it acquired this moniker. In many ways the “passive income” model is no different from being an owner or director of any business. You build a team of individuals who are willing, able, and highly talented in doing the “busy work” of the business, so that you’re not having to step in to the minutiae of repetitive tasks. The best businesses can, in theory, run perfectly fine by themselves for days and weeks at a time without any involvement from the top-of-the-chain. All that “passive income” in the 21st century is doing is replacing the people with tech wizardry.

But what people don’t see is that this arrangement isn’t “passive income” for the CEO or Director. This is structuring a business in a way that allows for time to be made for long-term strategic planning - something that doesn’t reward any sort of payout initially regardless of the amount of time put into it. This work is vital because business and social contexts, along with the needs of the community a business serves, changes over time. Yet, it cannot take place without the initial “hard graft” of setting up the business, bringing in the right people, and creating the environment where the “work” is still happening. Should the CEO neglect his duties at any stage - whether the failure to care for employees adequately, or in adapting to changing pressures, and so forth - then the business crumbles, everyone leaves, and the CEO loses his income.

There is nothing “passive” about that arrangement. Of course, CEOs can abuse their positions and extract vast sums of money from a company while providing very little in return. It may suit their lifestyle for a while, and maybe they can extract so much money that they are materially comfortable for the rest of their lives without “working”. A lot of these companies generally don’t last more than one generation, and any family wealth that’s built up can get lost pretty easily unless they find ingenious ways to keep the racket going.

It also doesn’t seem like the individuals who go down this route end up being satisfied with their lives, either. Some may go on to take all the money they extract and “invest” it in other businesses, but again, the individual is still “working”, whether it’s managing an investment portfolio themselves, or managing the people who are doing that for them.

There is nothing “passive” about this arrangement, either.

What About The Books?

I write all of this as someone who bought the lie. I believed the “passive income” setup was the key to making my writing ventures a success. After all, that’s what the most successful authors do, right? They put out great-quality books that keep selling long after their initial publication date, and dine out on the royalties for eternity to come. Or, I can augment this with courses, lectures, offerings, and my archive of previous work.

I’m guilty of having this as part of the mindset that I went into poetry-as-a-vocation with. The “passive income” layer had to be a key part of creating the foundation I need to grow beyond that. For someone who has always struggled with having my energy sapped by the environments and people I have surrounded myself in, the opportunity to build something that can “do the work for me” if I fall into low-energetic victim mentality was tantalising.

Life has been graciously brutal in highlighting that’s not how it works. My bank card statements are evidence of this. And as I came to learn, the very idea that this is how things should work in the literature world is a fabrication of a growing publishing industry in the latter part of the 20th Century. Tasmina Perry summarises this well in her recent write-up The End of the Career Author, which I recommend reading below:

In truth, most of these arrangements where the most successful authors “make a living” from their book sales alone mirrors the arrangements of successful businesses. Each new book that is written is the strategic long-term planning and visioning of what comes next for the “business”. The writer acts as the CEO, handing off his “business plan” of a manuscript to his “employees” of agents, publishers and marketers to refine the plan and execute it in a way that brings money. In the meantime, the writer is the “face” of the company, becoming a crucial part of the marketing machine required to let people know about the book, going on podcasts, to fairs, and conducting interviews to promote the book in a way that he simply cannot delegate to someone else.

There is nothing “passive” about this arrangement. A writer’s book is not “passive income”. But the idea for new authors that it can be “passive income” is an attractive carrot on a stick. The publishing houses know this, and I suspect much of their current business model - given their financial circumstances - keys in to this “thought epidemic” of literary stardom… only to be dropped by the publisher and agency after enough value has been extracted. After all, most of the publishing houses income comes from their back-catalogue.

The J.K. Rowling Phenomenon

So far, everything I’ve covered can explain contemporary authors very well. But what about the “classics” - works from authors who’ve passed away (or who have stopped writing) which have become culturally significant and continue to sell? What about the Lord of the Rings or a Harry Potter, or even a Homer’s Odyssey? Because they continue to sell even when the author does “nothing”!

Firstly, if the author is dead, they don’t need to do anything… but the families and their estates may choose to continue their work. This explains phenomena like The Lord of the Rings, whereby Tolkien’s estate continue to be involved in how Tolkien continues to be remembered, how his books are published, and so forth. In this role, the estate are taking an active role in making Tolkien’s legacy their business, promoting projects that honour Tolkien’s legacy while challenging those that don’t.

For authors fortunate enough to still be alive and have their works reach this level of cultural relevance, such as J.K. Rowling, the situation is pretty much the same, only the author is still involved in that process of defining their legacy, and the legacy of their Harry Potter.

There is nothing “passive” about this arrangement.

Moreover, this still applies to the more ancient texts now considered “public domain”. The descendants of Homer are not receiving royalty payments for each new edition of The Iliad or The Odyssey. But they continue to make other people money. They make publishers, translators, bookshop owners and printers money because they are making the work of Homer their own. Those organisations are making money for themselves through the “busy work” of a plan that has already been handed down to them.

Again, there is nothing “passive” about this arrangement.

Breaking The Spells of Bad Language

Despite all of this, the spell of the “passive income” continues to captivate aspiring business leaders and creatives - and of course it does! It taps into the self-limiting belief systems we all carry that we are not worthy of being good at the “hard graft”, or that the world doesn’t value our presence, and offers a “magic pill” to have our needs met without actively participating in our “tribe”.

But it will never satisfy you, because that’s not what you came to this world to do. You did not come here to work in the shadows, putting out offerings without the right-to-reply, or to resign yourself to solitude and let the tech do the talking. You did not come to just create something, then dust your hands and say “I’m done”.

You did not come here to build “passive income”.

You came here to be an active builder of a better life for everyone.

You came to this world to be seen and to engage with others. You came here to bring your best gifts to help others solve their problems. You came here to inspire others with your presence. You came here to do this face-to-face, heart-to-heart, in active response to the needs of the community and of the moments in time you are in.

That’s what you signed up for. And while it might not seem like it, you have everything you need to be really fucking good at it, in your own unique way that only you can do.

I work with others through language because sometimes we need help to see that potential in ourselves and communicate it to the world. What’s more, I can only do this through “active” work. That’s true for supporting aspiring poets strengthening their communities through the Sovereign Poet Society. That’s true for helping individuals write a better life narrative through Master Your Word. That’s true for creating bespoke poems and working with organisations and social initiatives to help others refine their messaging.

If any of these resonate with you, and you’re facing challenges where some of these offerings could help, then let me know directly:

Get In Touch

Thank you for making the time to read this piece. Leave a comment and let me know what this sparked in you - and let’s talk about what more I should explore: