I submitted manuscripts to publishers. This was not so much a feeling that I should be published as a wish to escape the feared and hated drudgery of normal work.
It's that one thing that you're passionate about, that you end up developing tunnel vision for and everything else tends to fall by the wayside. Passion is appealing and universal.
I still find it hard to push my own limits. I know where my limits are and that I always have to push myself.