Sitting in a local coffee shop perusing inspirational blogs about leaving work and pursuing a dream. Just had an heart felt and enthusiastic conversation with a good friend sharing my vision, only to have her return the excitement. This is heaven!
Hello world!
Starting a blog for the first time at 4 am is not probably maximizing my creative energies, but between being up with a cold and teetering on the edge of uncertainty and excitement of a possible new beginning, I can’t stay away!
Whether this blog turns out to be a way to map my goals or clarify my thoughts, I see it as the beginning of what could be a great thing. After teaching for 9 years, I am feeling a little burnt out and feeling like I am no longer ‘loving’ what I do. Work is called work for a reason, but I am a firm believer in loving what you do. I need to feel passionate about my work and need to be able to be creative in the process. What started out as the perfect profession to tap into that, has lost many of the things that I use to love, leaving me feeling stuck in a monotonous hamster wheel; we’re all working harder than ever, trying to do too much in not enough time, only to get nowhere. At the same time, we have turned teaching from an art, into a science. I miss the art.
In re-evaluating what truly makes me happy in life, I look back to my early 20′s, before marriage and children. Those two things have been the best parts of my life and I wouldn’t trade them for anything, but you do lose a part of yourself, when your focus is on everyone else. My early 20′s were a time of exploring what I loved to do and finding what made me feel satisfied. Those days were filled with reading, crocheting, making jewelry, writing down quotes, listening to inspiring music, going for walks, sitting at a cozy, local coffee shop, writing in a journal….Just picturing those things brings a smile to my face!
I am not delusional in thinking that any of us could find a job that we are 100% blissful in all the time. Every job has it peaks and valleys. But I feel like we have one life; one shot to not just go through the motions. I think of what is keeping me in teaching right now and it’s the pension and the hours. Is that a good enough reason to invest 30 years of your life into something? Could I be doing something that I am more passionate about and fill my days with more of that blissful feeling that I miss having?
As of now, I am thinking so…I say that I teeter on the edge of uncertainty and excitement because I proceed cautiously, knowing that because I am a passionate person, I tend to throw myself in a new project every so often and don’t always see it through. Do I always seek new projects because that’s who I am as a person or am I waiting to find the one that resonates with me? Do I not follow through because it is too much work, or because I am learning and discovering what I really enjoy? I’m recently discovering that as much as I am an intra-personal person, knowing myself pretty well, we are always learning about ourselves. We can’t possible know everything there is to know about ourselves, because we never fully arrive at becoming ourselves. We are always growing and changing.
And so this phase starts a new growth in my life!
Etsy Bound
I have always been a crafty person.
When I was in 5th grade, I took an after school enrichment session to learn how to crochet. While this may not have been a major move for popularity, I loved it! In those 5 weeks, I made more babies blankets, booties, and afghans than I knew who to give them to. It has remained a hobby of mine that I still enjoy to this day, having had taught my roommates in college, as well!
When I was 12 years old, the thing I wanted more than anything for Christmas, was The Incredible Sweater Machine. How I longed to sit at this plastic contraption, sliding the glider back and forth forming row after row of evenly stitched chains until I made a beautiful sweater! Unfortunately, the infomercial showed the product gliding effortlessly and the outcome, a store bought quality garment. When I actually got the Incredible Sweater Machine for Christmas, I had to fight with it each pass to the left and yank it back reluctantly to the right. My outcome did not fit the infomercial as it was sent back to the company via UPS.
When I was in my later teens, I got a sewing machine for my birthday, making pillows, skirts, futon covers, window seat cushions, and anything else I could make by eye. I use to buy plain items, whether a side table or pottery and paint my own designs on them.
In my 20′s I learned how to make jewelry and actually did pretty well selling it, only stopping when I got pregnant with my first child as I didn’t want to handle the pieces with lead.
I tend to know what I like and if I can’t find it, I’ll try to make it or find someone who can….Enter Etsy.
After finding out that I am having a girl in May, I scoured the internet for the perfect crib bedding! I knew what I wanted as I had seen it 2 1/2 years prior when pregnant with my son. But of course, you can never find what you are looking for when you want it. I ended up falling in love with a fabric board I found on Etsy and designed what I wanted to order. Crib bedding….check!
I then went on to look at diaper bags, knowing again what I wanted but not seeming to be able to find it out there already made. I came across an Etsy site where you can design your own diaper bag and again, fell in love! To be able to pick out exactly my own fabrics and make it a one of a kind? Perfect!
Looking at the baby girl dresses makes me wish I had a second job to buy half of the things I saw. The prints and colors were beyond beautiful but I didn’t want to pay $40 for a dress that will get 3 months wear.
So all of this has gotten me to thinking….is this something that I could do? What a dream to spend hours in a fabric shop, feeling and searching for a smooth, high quality, beautifully printed bolt that I could then have the satisfaction of making into a bag or dress of my own! I then thought further….people are making a good living off of doing just this and are at the same time able to be creative and spend their days designing and creating!
So my dream looks like this…I am setting a goal for myself that for 3 years, I will continue teaching and all the while brush up on my sewing skills, learning and practicing as much as I can to master quality and craftsmanship, immerse myself in the world of Etsy and what it takes to successfully open up a shop, and then to eventually be able to bow out of teaching and leave the tedious, unsatisfied feeling of never getting it all done well feeling behind, for a life of creative freedom and enjoyment! And all of this while raising a toddler, welcoming a new baby in the spring, and being a wife and homemaker. Sounds daunting, but as my new favorite quote goes…”Someone out there is doing it…It might as well be you!”
