[rebuilder]

The arts as a profession really is one of those things where you should only get into it if you are so driven that you have no choice, IMO. More likely than not, you'll be scraping by in poverty for the rest of your life, seeking validation from funding gatekeepers, compromising your work in the process in order to secure funding to do it in the first place.

If you can bear the thought of doing some other work, then getting a decent paycheck and having art as more of a hobby or side venture may be much more fulfilling. (And frankly, most people I know in the arts do all kinds of side jobs to pay the bills, anyway.)