AFTER FIVE with Medina Dizdarević
An accomplished playwright and theatre-maker gives us the honest truth on balancing a creative career with a corporate day job.
TLDR After Five is a series where I interview creatives and ask them:
“how do you balance a creative life with your day job?”
“what does your 5-9pm look like after your 9-5?
Find out more here. If you would like to be interviewed, please reach out here!
(ask your friends/ distant cousins/ colleagues please!)
Medina Dizdarević is an emerging Bosnian Muslim playwright and theatre-maker from Boorloo (Perth, Western Australia). Her work explores displacement, culture and intergenerational trauma.
Here, Medina talks about the competing pressures that come with balancing a day-job, creative career and family, and the importance of being kind to oneself.
AFTER FIVE with Medina Dizdarević
Tell us about your creative practice.
I am a playwright, theatre-maker and dramaturg.
What do you do outside of your creative work?
Outside of my creative work, I have worked in the corporate space for the past 10 years as an administrative professional, most recently within the healthcare sector.
Tell us how you got here?
I got my first full-time job during my second year of uni (where I was studying a Bachelors of Creative Writing). I just needed a job that paid the bills while I figured out what the rest of my life would become as I couldn’t figure out what my exact passion or pursuit was, despite knowing that writing was always at the core of my identity.
It wasn’t until I was about 5 years into the corporate space that I started to notice how deeply I felt I had lost my way. Every day I felt like there was something missing, but I couldn’t pin down what it was or what my path forward was. It wasn’t until I immersed myself back into watching theatre that it clicked that this was the world I was so desperately wanting to create work in.
It had never occurred to me that playwriting or theatre was something accessible as I didn’t grow up attending the theatre (and neither did most of my family, friends or community) so it had never even felt like something I could pursue. Moreover, not knowing anyone within this industry made it difficult to find a doorway in. If you wanted to put a show up, you needed a producer, director, performers etc - I didn’t know a single person in this space, nor did I understand how to approach it as a beginner.
Other than committing to seeing as much theatre as possible, something that really began to connect me to this community was starting an Instagram account. Having an online platform as an outlet for this passion began to slowly connect me with other locals doing the same and through that I made friends in the space, found out about more shows and particularly different arts opportunities I had never heard of before.
The first program I ever applied for and was accepted into was called ‘To the Front’ by Static Drive Co, an initiative to upskill people of various CaLD backgrounds with an interest in performance making. The best thing about this was that you needed zero experience, just an interest in the space. While doing this program, I was also accepted into Performing Lines WA Kolyang program, and I very much credit both of these experiences as my official stepping stones into the industry.
I always encourage people to be kind to themselves about where they’re at and how they got there, as well as when considering a path forward, because privilege plays a massive part in how “ahead” others may appear to be.
Medina Dizdarević
Do you see any relation between your creative work and your non-creative work?
The primary function of my non-creative work is to earn an income; it grants me security and minimises financial stress which, in turn, allows me to more comfortably create my art without the pressure of relying on it as my livelihood.
While I do technically keep both worlds separate, they often inform each other. The experiences I have in the workplace and the patients or customers I interact with all influence my storytelling; this ranges from both the wonderful and funny experiences and the downright terrible. So much of writing stems from observing and I can’t switch this off somewhere I am spending the bulk of my day.
As much as I keep these worlds separate, I personally believe that I fundamentally need time away from creating art in order to make better art. I’m a big advocate of making sure that you are also kept busy experiencing your life to create art that is more rich. I feel I might fall into a smaller category of artists that can’t see themselves being an artist full-time because I do need (and want) time away from it to both prevent burnout and maintain the excitement I feel when making work and collaborating.
What challenges and triumphs have you faced pursuing your creative practice alongside your non-creative responsibilities?
The challenges with having to juggle a ‘regular’ day job for me has always been perfecting the balance of things. How to balance a regular sleep schedule, ensuring you are rested enough for an 8 hour work day, but then also leaving yourself enough energy in tank to see a show after work or spend the evening writing; how many days a week should you work (I’m a big believer that 5 days a week in the office should be outlawed) and how does this impact exhaustion levels knowing you only have the weekend to cram the rest of your life, errands, family/friends/social time in (but also, can you financially survive on anything less than 5 days a week wage?).
And this doesn’t even scratch the surface of considering when you have other familial and carer responsibilities on top of a day job and your creative work. I’ve spent many years trying to figure out what balance works for me.
The triumphs that I have experienced while doing both have often been the stories I have come away with; something that has afforded me quite a lot of flexibility and freedom within both worlds has been working casually and as a temporary contractor for a period of a few years. This has exposed me to countless different industries and people from all walks of life, who I don’t believe I would have otherwise I ever met had I not by nature of my work been sent there. I have worked in hospitals, warehouses, government departments and more, and this wide exposure has done wonders for expanding my mind in a multitude of ways. I have been similarly grateful for the bad experiences because these have inspired fascinating plot lines in my plays!
What tips do you have for creatives who are juggling their art, day jobs, social lives and major life events?
You absolutely need to figure out a rhythm that works for you in your specific situation. There are so many things that influence someone’s capacity to juggle both, and one size does not fit all.
I always encourage people to be kind to themselves about where they’re at and how they got there, as well as when considering a path forward, because privilege plays a massive part in how “ahead” others may appear to be. Not everybody has been afforded the same start or circumstances in their life, and this can often contribute to the challenges of having to juggle regular life and an artistic pursuit.
I always encourage taking your time and finding out what pace works for you and not being hard on yourself if that looks very different to someone else.
I also strongly encourage people to connect with others who are trying to make it in the same pursuit; going to events, signing up for classes, meeting people, creating an online platform and reaching out are all amazing ways to move forward.
And I always recommend just reaching out to someone you think could help or mentor you - I have found that in Perth, in particular, most people are always keen to catch up for a coffee and share knowledge.
What’s next?
After a couple of years just writing for myself, I am finally recommitting to seeking out opportunities that puts my work up on stages! I really want to be back in rehearsal rooms and collaborating with people in real time, so that’s what my 2025 is currently setting out to look like. I also have recently found a website that notifies me of eBook deals, so I have been consistently purchasing new books for $1.99 on my eReader, so I’m asking everyone to keep me in their thoughts and prayers that 2025 is also a big reading year for me oops.
BEHIND THE SCENES
Cause you’ve made it this far, here’s some bonus content, in the form of post-interview notes.
I met Medina during our respective hot desk at Centre for Stories, and I love, love her honesty. She is the reason why I finally, finally, finally pulled my copy of MINOR FEELINGS from Cathy Park Hong off the shelf. I finally freed it from the purgatory of my “to read list”.
If you haven’t gotten the gist of it from the answers above, Medina has a wicked sense of humour and an honesty that cuts through all the bullshit — an essential quality that helped me feel grounded during a period of personal and professional turbulence.
SHAMELESS PLUG + CALLOUT
AFTER FIVE is an interview series where I ask creatives how they balance their day-job (and other responsibilities) with their creative pursuits.
Get involved by filling out this form!
I am keen to hear from anyone, including:
people who have transitioned from full-time work to full-time freelancing;
people who have creative/artistic hobbies outside their full-time work;1
parents who are pursuing a creative life alongside parenting;
carers who are pursuing a creative life alongside caring duties
(anyone really!)2
And please feel free to ask your friends/ pass it on to your colleagues.
Thank you to Centre For Stories for giving me the time and space to start this interview series back in 2024.
OBLIGATORY BIOS
Medina Dizdarević is an emerging Bosnian Muslim playwright and theatre-maker from Boorloo. Her work explores displacement, culture and intergenerational trauma. She graduated from Curtin University in 2015 with a degree in Creative Writing and endeavours to use theatrical storytelling as a means of community healing, joy and connection. She was a participant in Playwrights to the Front with Static Drive Co in 2021 as well as Performing Lines WA Kolyang Lab cohort. In 2022, she was the writer for The Complete Show of Water Skiing in Blue Room Theatre's Summer Nights season (PAWA winner for Outstanding Ensemble) and developed her debut work The Strangers with Performing Lines WA and Black Swan State Theatre Company through the DLGSC Playwright Partnership Program. She is currently a part of FORGE, Black Swan’s Emerging Writers' Program.
Ange Yang is a Boorloo (Perth, Western Australia) based writer, lawyer, essayist and congee enthusiast. She won the SBS Diversity in Food Media writing competition in 2022. Her writing has been featured in SBS Food, WA Good Food Guide, Broadsheet, Gourmet Traveller and Westerly. As a proud Malaysian-Australian, she is interested in how food reconnects individuals to their heritage, shapes people's identities and fosters a sense of community and belonging. Shout at her on Instagram @vegemitecongee
you do not have to want to monetise your craft or make a business from your art! If this is you I’m curious to hear what keeps you coming back to art in your spare time!
more people = more potential answers to this question of day job vs creative life. I started this series because I’ve been really struggling with the balance, and I figured the best way to find an answer is to ask people who are smarter/ more experienced/ have different perspectives to me! so please! don’t be shy! we can rant together!