Sunday, November 8, 2009

Let’s Play – The Joy Diet – Menu Item #7

I googled the quote “Find a job you love and you'll never work a day in your life.” and was surprised to see that it’s attributed to Confucius.  It seems such a modern concept.playing parachute

In this chapter of The Joy Diet, Beck encourages us to conceptualize our real careers.  She gives us some ideas for figuring out what our real careers are. I am not sure I know what my real career is … yet. I do know this. There are three strong elements to my real career: art, working from home, and teaching.  I also know what the biggest impediments are to exploring my real career. My issues are fear and lack of time.  I fear what my life will be like if I am suddenly making less money than I do now.   One of the passages in the book, that addresses this issue, and really spoke to me, in particular was, “My real career has always been, and will always be, whatever action my heart and soul need to take.  What I do for a living is just part of the structure I build to support myself.”  So the message is…. I can do both.  That’s great.  Except for one thing … the laws of space and time.  I feel like I need to “keep my day job” to pay the bills but four kids also take up a great deal of time. 

Today, for example, middle chicklet has a hockey game today at 7:00 a.m., two oldest chicklets have a Remembrance Day Service at 9:40 a.m., smallest chicklet has a hockey practice at 9:45 a.m., middle chicklet has a second hockey game out of town at noon.  Of course, somewhere in all of that we have to squeeze in eating, grocery shopping, and other routine activities.  I am truly not making excuses.  I just have to be realistic and figure out a plan to make this work.

I would like to backtrack a bit.  Menu Item #5 was Risk.  Every day, do at least one frightening thing that contributes to the fulfillment of your desires.  I have definitely not been doing a frightening thing every day but there has been one intimidating task looming.  For several years I have wanted to join the local art club.  There are a couple of reasons why this is so intimidating. The biggest issue is that if I join an art club, I’m putting it “out there” that I consider what I do to be art.  This is a major hurdle for me.

Hey everyone – look at me – I’m an artist!  I feel brazen and vulnerable at the same time. That’s a very uncomfortable feeling.  Anyways, yesterday I forced myself to go to a local art show put on by the Art Club and I talked to several of the artists.  I asked questions about the art club and joining the art club.  It’s definitely a first step.  My next step is to actually go to one of the meetings… stay tuned.

3 comments:

  1. It looks like you took a great first step. Sometimes the first step is the hardest. I will looking forward to hearing more about the art club meetings. I bet you will have fun.

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  2. Congratulations on your first step.....that was a big move. I also understand how hard it can be to say you are something (eg - an artist) when you don't feel you have arrived there yet...but I've found as I start saying I am want I want to be, I begin to grow into it - and I hope you will too.

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  3. Oh, I know how hard it can be to claim your are "something" -- fill in the blank: artist, poet, musician, writer. Maybe we shouldn't label ourselves at all. I think that our expectations are loaded onto those words, sucking the naturalness out of the simple doing, and stuffing in a bunch of scary nonsense that keeps us from simply following our hearts and creating. Maybe you should think of art club as not a bunch of Artists (with many assumptions loaded onto that word) but as people who love art and want to grow and develop their love of it and their skills. Bravo for taking the first step. I hope you continue on the path. Follow your heart!

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