Day 456: Love What You Do

Ha ha haaaa. The first thing to be grateful for, after almost two years of blogging, is how to put a link into the blog that actually links. Brilliant!

 https://medium.com/i-dont-know-a-thing/397d01b7cb


I like this. It's a manifesto for being self-employed and why we do it. I DO like this very much. Whenever I worry about money and think 'oh, well, I could just get a job' I really think I'm wrong. I also thing that unless it's a short term or flexible contract, what a poor choice I'd be for any offer of an Actual Job. Not because I can't do it. Of course I can. But am I really interested in a CAREER with a company, by which I mean a career where there are carrots like promotion and silly rituals like performance reviews and 360 degree feedback forms.

I want my work to have at least some of the elements of this

Don't get me wrong - I'm well up for improving performance, developing other people's, developing my own, learning, going further and getting better at what I do, but not so that I get promoted and not for the sake of a bonus. 

I love being able to choose who I work for or with and I love being able to say yes to projects that I find genuinely exciting, valuable, useful and/or glee-inducing. I want to do projects that scare the shit out of me, teach me something, fascinate me and fulfil me. I want to help other people do things that make them glow, that change them, develop them, excite them. I want to work on projects that make a real difference. 

Weirdly, for a long time, it hasn't been about the 'type' of client. I'll work with most people (bar arms dealers, mainly, though if I thought it would make a difference/reduction in the use of them, I'd work with the people they're sold to and the people that use them... ha, maybe arms dealers are exactly the people I should be working with, only not on sales techniques... more on getting in touch with who they are). People are people and relevant work makes people respond. 

Structures and systems are wonderful things, and I want to be choosing mine. I don't think I'd be patient enough to just 'fit in' into a big corporate any more, even if they do do fabulous things. 

You never know, but my inkling is that flouncing in, doing something wonderful and then flouncing gratefully back out again is where it's at for me as far as that kind of career goes... unless it's my company, in which case, Bring It ON. And may I always keep a sane eye on the kind of systems I impose on other people, remembering why and how and what they're designed for, and what exactly they're trying to achieve. There's always another way.

Hooray for naked yoga.* I tried it for the first time today. More than anything, I did it because my Premier Inn hotel room was really stuffy and close. I had about an hour to do yoga and change, therefore no time to air the place out. One thing that's good is that it gets you right in touch with the bits of you that would benefit from a donut or two less. Look at that every day and those oil-drenched, sugary little fuckers will look a lot less inviting. 

I felt comfortable. I never had to rescue any pantage from an awkward situation. I still can't quite see the charm of doing it in a room full of Other People and paying £30 a hit for the privilege (I repeatedly receive emails inviting me to do just that - you pay me £30 and I'll give it a try, but unless you're offering something you're not putting on the ad, I don't see why I should even consider getting my vulnerability out in front of you all.. I'm feeling fairly liberated as it is, thanks. I'll save that money for clowning).

Anyway, I've tasted the pleasures of naked yoga in a Premier Inn now. How can you top that?

* Oh God. I should never have picture-searched naked yoga. It's made me despair of the world and thing ARE WE REALLY STILL DOING THIS IN 2013? So, 99% women - more if you count the women and men together. 97% of those were sexualised in some way, including beaver shots, bumholes, tits, pouting, dildo-bothering or actual fucking/masturbation. Of the very few male shots, I only saw one or two of a man on his own. There were the classic Adam Levine ones, but the crimson-nailed female hands covering his genitals hardly make it non-sexual. THIS IS WHY. For fuck's sake. When I want to do sex, I'll do sex. When I want to do non-sexual things without clothes on, for now, I'm sticking to my hotel room.