Reading harold_maude's journal

I can feel my focus starting to gell up abit. This is a good thing. My life is ahead of me waiting on me. And what ever is ahead on the road I want to be ready to face, embrace or run from.

The point is I want and need to be ready. The last few days have been filled with an awareness of how burned out I had become, and how exausted I was. It hit me last night just how much the last job took from me.
That's not to say that I don't have some great memories from working there, or things that I might miss doing down the road at some point.
But the point is that it's done. When I'm done, I don't go back. There is no point in going back to something that's done.

So this morning I'm in a forward gear and that's all I need to be in today, is the gear forward.

I've been thinking about what it is that I want to do to make a living from, and a few things have popped up, a writer, a consultant, and as always an artist living outside the box and infecting as many people with the notion that they are just as creative as any famous artist out there, past and present, while selling my art as much as possible.

In the direction of the writer idea, I have joined two news sites, and started writing on one, and am still wandering around the second. The first one is with the local paper here and the other is ireport, it's attached to CNN.
My thinking is this on the idea of writing, I do so much of it, and do it offten enough that maybe I'll write something that will capture some publisher's eye and they will offer me something.
I've been looking at freelance writing jobs, and freelance art jobs on the net for quite awhile now. I'm thinking that it's time to put a web site up.
It will give me a place to showcase all the creative endevors that I do and have done for a very long time.
Art, writing, music, jewerly, and clothes. I would be able to put different things up for sale and start heading tord having a physical store as well somewhere. Maybe not in this town, but somewhere.

Then there is the consultant. This one would be the least physically demanding which means that I would have to take up some kind of extreem physical activity to keep the muscles that I have developed while doing food service.
Weight lifing and running are a good bet in tandum.

Anyway, after this friend showed up at my door in need of talking to me about some decisions he needs to make, I was reminded of how many people over the years have shown up at my door to lay their problems and quanderies out and seek my help in figuring things out.
They just show up. It occured to me that I should be charging for my time with these folks.
So I have thought about hanging out a shingle on the net and in some places where a person can do that, ad boards in stores, in the news paper, and see what happens.
A few months ago I started looking up info on what a person has to do to become a reconized consultant, and for some reason that I can't remember now, I stopped doing research.
This person showing up, reminded me that I really do need to get back to that.

And as to the art, I already have my name out there, and things will sell occasionally. But it's not enough to eat off of so to speak. I know I need to find a really good agent, and so far I haven't been able to find one.
At least one that my gut tells me I can trust. The search is still on there.

Another thing that has been running through my head is this, that this is an opportunity to do something that I will be able to do well and make a living at. More than just a living. That's what all my other jobs were, a vechile to make a living with and little more than that.
I know I want what ever it is that I do next to do more than just make enough to barely live off of.

That arena, making just enough to barely get by on, has served to show me that I am not what everyone I grew up around believed I was.
That more than anything, the need to know the truth, has been the driving force behind me driving me and working like an animal at every job I have had over the last 5 years.
I spent the first year and a half without a job, doing what ever I could, selling art door to door, looking for anyone who would give me a chance to work.
I learned alot about survival. I had a very extreem education in that arena. I learned about how strong I am. And I'm very strong, and very capable, and can be so focused that I have the capablity of driving myself into a state of exaustion when it gets out of balance.

So now I'm more than ready to do something that will show me how sucessful I can be. There are things I have wanted to do, having land where I can build a business on and live on and share with people who need sancturary for a bit, and have a kick ass green house that produces awesome food to eat.
And on that land a gallery where I can show my work and other people's work that isn't in another gallery for one reason or another.
I want to do all of these tings. They take money. So now I have to see just how successful I can be in making money so I can do the above mentioned things.

I know I have to walk carefully here. I've never been crazy about money. I find money to be an odd thing. So much is put onto something you can take a match to and in a little bit it's gone.
Seems pretty silly to me that so much of everything is attached to money. I would love to see the world go back to bartering.
Do you realize that if there was no monitary system in place your life would be easier?

You would be able to use your skills and talents to get what you need to live well. And most of your life would be spent in living real life instead of being enslaved to spending part of it working for someone else. And the return for your life that gets spent, is this thing called a paycheck, and unless your in a job that pays really well, it doesn't even come close to being a fair trade for what you bring to the table.

I've met alot of people here in this town that are working two jobs, just to survive. If one of the jobs offers benefits, they have to pick up part of the tab for that and it's insanely expensive, so hence the second job. The first one takes care of all the money they are spending to having some kind of protection against some kind of disaster in life, so they have to get a second job just to eat.

Funny thing about insurance is this, very often it only pays for part of what you need, which means not only are you paying for the insurance to help you or cover the problem, but your stuck paying out even more for your end of the deal.
Slavery is what that ends up equalling out to.

Anyway, in knowing now that I need to see how sucessful I can be in making money could be a problem because of how I feel about money.
So it's going to be a challange for me.

Anyway, I should stop for the moment, I'm still suppose to be relaxing for a day or two more, I'm really bad at relaxing. I have a hard time with just doing nothing.
When I had the last surgery they almost had to tie me down because I wouldn't just stay down. Too much to do.
So I better be a good girl and enjoy the day. :)