Day Forty-three

Every once in a while a great idea comes along that changes everything. Usually, however, it's the incremental changes we make each day that compose the biggest differences. I let myself off the hook today. I was tired, sore, and foggy headed, so I slept in. I allowed myself to not be on top of things because I had a few high-priority errands, which took precedence over my other daily chores.

My daughter came over for dinner tonight with her boyfriend. We cooked, ate, and played games all evening. It was an awesome time. Tomorrow, my boyfriend is flying to Brazil, so spending time with him before he leaves will supplant all else. However, once he leaves, I'll have nothing else to do all week but get work done. I'll have plenty of time; I just need to make the most of it.

Day Forty-two

Even though I want to focus on my writing at the moment, it would be good for me to have at least a part-time job to help cover expenses while I get my new business venture off the ground. I've put out several applications, but haven't done much to follow up on them just yet. I received a phone call from one of the places, but I felt very reluctant to call them back. It was a dread I can't quite articulate, as though working there would produce in me just as much anxiety as I had experienced at my last job. Today, I received a voicemail from another company about an open position, and I felt really excited about it. I'm going to call there tomorrow to schedule an interview. Sometimes, it's not always best to go with the first opportunity that comes along.

Day Forty-one

Baby steps. I don't expect to reach a billion dollars one dollar at a time. That would take forever. What I do expect to increase incrementally is my mind set. I need to prepare myself mentally to be able to receive a billion dollars and to be able to be a good steward of it. I'm responsible with the amount of money I have available to me now, but a billion dollars is a completely different level of responsibility.

Wrestling with personal and societal expectations is what I'm dealing with currently. Do I seek out another dead end, part-time, minimum wage job? I don't want to be limited to that type of employment for the rest of my life, so why should I go seeking it now? It's important to be able to meet my expenses. I know I'm taking a huge risk, hoping to support myself financially by selling poetry books and paintings. But if I want to achieve something I've never had, I need to be willing to do something I've never done.

Day Forty

If you want to run, run the right direction, toward your fears instead of away from them. Everyone wants to avoid pain; it’s the main driving force of human behavior. Becoming a billionaire, however, requires a willingness to go through that which most others would run away from.  Running away from your fears doesn’t require anything unique or special.

If you’re willing to run toward your fears, you’ll soon realize they have no substance. Your fears are merely the illusions your mind has convinced you are real. As you run toward them, they vaporize like the mist they are, and, as they dissolve, your path becomes unobstructed and you become free to receive the reward of the rare and heroic champion you are destined to be.

I’m clinging to the hope that my fears have no power over me. I’m reaching out, stepping out of my comfort zone, and taking a chance I normally would be too frightened to conceive of risking. I’ve suffered immense rejection. It’s not fun. Rejection is the core fear I’ve struggled with my entire life. And yet, as fate would have it, rejection is an inevitable reality I must endure if I am to become a published writer. I have to put myself out there for others to criticize and judge if there is to be any way for my writing to benefit anyone other than myself.

Is it frightening? Yes. Is it worth it? Absolutely.

Day Thirty-nine

No such luck, I'm posting from the phone again. Limitations foil me, but I strike back deliberately, mocking the insanity at the core of my humanity. I really wish it were as cool, and as profitable, to be a poet as it is to be a computer programmer. If you don't know computers, what use does society have for you? I don't entertain or amuse; I write prose and interfuse obsession with profound ideas. I don't know why, but that's how it is.

Day Thirty-eight

Traveling to CA took everything out of me, and I have no wifi. I'll  have to hit Starbucks tomorrow.
 

Day Thirty-seven

Life is circular. Every time I try to run away from my problems, I end up right back where I started.  There is no escaping them. I can either learn from my mistakes and spiral upward, or, I can get caught up in a flurry of frustration and obstinate determination and get sucked into a downward spiral. 

Lately, I’ve been horribly sick. I caught a flu virus just as I was transitioning from working two part-time jobs while going to school to only working one job full-time. The resulting panic I felt from not getting enough hours and not being able to do a good enough job due to my illness made me even more sick. The worse I felt physically, the more anxious I became. The more anxious I became, the worse I felt physically. Giving myself permission to fail at work was the only way to pull out of this vicious cycle. Now, I finally have hope for improvement.