It’s such a horrible cliché that all artists are starving artists working day or night jobs to get by.  You typically think of a writer or a painter working as a bartender by night to pay their rent and for their car and everything.  I’ve ever heard of some artists who take up trades or construction or something like exterior wall cleaning, but people do what they have to do.  I’ve known a few guys who are so certain that they’re going to get discovered and become huge rock stars that they lack all other ambition.  They still live with their parents and they work these worthless jobs that go nowhere that they don’t put any real effort into because they’re going to be rich and famous some day soon.  Real soon.  I feel bad that a lot of artists, particularly writers, give up once they graduate from school.  They don’t have time with their “real jobs” or they find out that they weren’t ever that serious to begin with.  They don’t have the motivation of a writing class or a painting to get them working.  But like anything else worth doing, you have to find time to dedicate to your art.