Thanks for the post Beatrix,

Makes me think of Maslow's Heirarchy of needs. (I posted a diagram in the photos area)

I spend energy keeping myself housed and fed. And thinking about how I'm going to keep myself housed and feed. If I set myself up having these two things consistanly, I can come to expect them. Knowing I have those needs met frees up energy to be directed into...my most creative pursuits.

The question for me is: would it be more usful to take a job I didn't really love to set myself up with a sturdy foundation in which to grow my dream?

or

Trust in the blossoming of what I'm doing.

hmmm. both very well-stated points.

i have found these concerns to resonate w/ me too. so much so, that i am pretty much unwilling to "test the waters" of self-employment without the stability of consistent income. i can devote more creative energy outside of myself if i know that my "maslow's needs" are met (house, food, etc.). i figure that i can always start independent employment opportunities while otherwise employed in a somewhat motivating/relatively ideal job where i answer to someone else. i struggle, too, with the confidence to step out on my own.... do i really have what it takes? what if....

Whew, I hear that. I'm currently on a two year part-time contract with Vancouver Coastal Health coordinating an anti-tobacco program. It's a great contract, I've learned a lot, but it's outside the 'circle' of my core business and where I want to put my energy. I've spent some energy in the past year and half cursing the lack of trust in myself that spurred me to seek and take the contract. At the same time, for the last year and a half I've known that even if everything else fell through I'd still be able to live and eat. And now that I've only got a few months left I've started to feel some anxiety about what's going to happen in June when I'm relatively on my own again. It's exciting but scary, too. I keep thinking what expenses I can cut if I need to, and how I can best invest my energy now so that I'll be covered in the summer. Focus is a big challenge for me. The best thing that I've done for it in the last year is hire a friend who's a business coach to work with me twice a month. In truth most of what she does is listen while I talk out what my plans are and which ones I want to put energy into, but she also has offered valuable reflections when I get off track and advice for moving forward. I can't stand all that 'coach-speak' and the advantage of hiring someone I knew is that I could say "if you ask me to 'examine my reaction' to anthing I'm going to barf... if you think it's a bad idea just say so and we'll debate about it." I'm not sure that it needs to be a 'coach' who's doing the reflecting - I think that we can probably do just as well for each other. After all, most of the time we know what we need and how to get there, it just takes saying it out loud and sorting it out. -michaelbean

I drew a picture that for me really embodies the energy of faith. I made it into a prayer and framed it. Now it hangs on the wall above my dinner table, reminding me as I eat that to be truly nourished is to live in faith.

Here is a beautiful segment that was posted on Tribal Harmonix. So very appropriate:

Then a ploughman said, "Speak to us of Work."
And he answered, saying:

You work that you may keep pace with the earth and the soul of the earth. For to be idle is to become a stranger unto th
e seasons, and to step out of life's procession, that marches in majesty and proud submission towards the infinite.
When you work you are a flute through whose heart the whispering of the hours turns to music. Which of you would be a re
ed, dumb and silent, when all else sings together in unison?
Always you have been told that work is a curse and labour a misfortune. But I say to you that when you work you fulfil a
part of earth's furthest dream, assigned to you when that dream was born,
And in keeping yourself with labour you are in truth loving life and to love life through labour is to be intimate with
life's inmost secret.
But if you in your pain call birth an affliction and the support of the flesh a curse written upon your brow, then I ans
wer that naught but the sweat of your brow shall wash away that which is written.
You have been told also life is darkness, and in your weariness you echo what was said by the weary.

And I say that life is indeed darkness save when there is urge,
all urge is blind save when there is knowledge,
all knowledge is vain save when there is work,
all work is empty save when there is love;
and when you work with love you bind yourself to yourself, to one another, and to God.

What is it to work with love?
It is to weave the cloth with threads drawn from your heart, even as if your beloved were to wear that cloth.
It is to build a house with affection, even as if your beloved were to dwell in that house.
It is to sow seeds with tenderness and reap the harvest with joy, even as if your beloved were to eat the fruit.

It is to charge all things you fashion with a breath of your own spirit, and to know that all the blessed dead are stand
ing about you and watching.

Often have I heard you say, as if speaking in sleep, "he who works in marble, and finds the shape of his own soul in the
stone, is a nobler than he who ploughs the soil.
And he who seizes the rainbow to lay it on a cloth in the likeness of man, is more than he who makes the sandals for our
feet."

But I say, not in sleep but in the over-wakefulness of noontide, that the wind speaks not more sweetly to the giant oaks
than to the least of all the blades of grass;
And he alone is great who turns the voice of the wind into a song made sweeter by his own loving.

Work is love made visible.

And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gat
e of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy.

For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man's hunger. And if you grudge the
crushing of the grapes, your grudge distils a poison in the wine.

And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man's ears to the voices of the day and the voice
s of the night.

from The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran