When I started this blog I was committed to writing every day about this odd status of not really having a job or certainly not having a 'real' job. He remarked "you'll never do that." His perspective on that topic also likely came from a 'gut feel.' For a period of time I wrote daily to prove him wrong. I lost. Somewhere in my head I was also following some obscure guidance from other writers that encouraged simply sitting down and writing every day. It's now clear that those writers, and those who write books about writing, write about writing every day when they are stonewalled by a blank screen. It's sort of a 'go to' topic. The issue is that you need 'seat time.' Looking for motivation while not in the seat is usually a waste. The screen is the motivation.
Writing seems to be the thing to do at this point. Of course I've ground through quite a few texts and online seminars and so for looking for key motivations to get me down that path. A while ago I read about a writing seminar on an island in Lake Superior with 'real authors' with 'successful formulas' for getting your work, your blogs into the mainstream. That was interesting and the lazy part of me said "yes, wait until next summer when the ice is out, go to this seminar and pick up some good motivation and ideas and then you can start this part of your working world..." Distraction. Delay tactic, logical at that. Chuck Close, noted portrait painter, offers the following real advice. "Inspiration is for amateurs--the rest of us just show up and get to work." In hindsight that was the key to my former executive work. I just went there, plugged away with the tools and resources at hand and did good work. I need to simply leverage that path elsewhere.
The small business has taken most of my time that I would have dedicated to a 'real job.' Real jobs pay real money, you sit in strategic planning sessions, construct budgets, hire and fire 'talent,' mentor, build relationships and other sorts of tasks. Now at 66+ I find that people who want to manage money ask me what I want my 'legacy' to be. I think that means what happens to any residual money after I'm dead. If I contrast that with what 'real' jobs have to offer I don't find either particularly appealing.
AARP, which puts out nice magazines, always have articles and commentary about second careers, "doing what you're always wanted to do" and other consoling sorts of themes that attempt to make one feel all that much better about being unemployed. The writing is well done but I'm resistant to feeling better about not having a real job. This effort, this creative one, with a different set of tools (words, blank screens, intuitive and deductive melding and conflict, etc.) is likely the path.
I'd like to leave a bit more that people love or hate.
