This week I’m continuing my list of every job I’ve ever worked with my first four years after college. If you missed the high school and undergrad years, check out Part I here. Continue reading
Every Job I’ve Ever Had Part II
Schedule Books and To-Do Lists Are Awesome
Staying focused is important—and hard. My biggest faults in this area are procrastinating, getting distracted during worktime, and taking on too much and getting overwhelmed (especially when I’m supposed to be writing). Case in point: I probably should have started this entry an hour ago.
As I’ve talked about before, structured Day Jobs make it easier to get things done because they provide goals, timelines, Continue reading
Why I Went to Grad School (and didn’t stay for more)
I get asked this question a lot.
When I applied to grad school, I was at a crossroads (wanted to become a writer but wasn’t sure how) and had a Day Job I needed to get out of since I wasn’t yet at the point where I thought of it as a Day Job. Years before, someone had suggested grad school as the main path Continue reading
Set Your Own Goals, Not Somebody Else’s
When you’re a kid, life’s easy because you don’t have to make any scary, life-changing decisions. Mom and Dad buy the food, decide where you’re going to live, take care of Christmas, and send you off to school. All of your goals are clearly laid out, and until age 18, they pretty much look like this: Continue reading
What I Learned From Working 70-Hour Weeks for Two Months
Writing about overtime hours last week reminded me of last spring when I took on the challenge of working 70 hours a week, every week, between three different jobs. It was pretty intense.
How did this happen, you ask? Since there wasn’t much to do at my regular Day Job working at the research greenhouse, I sought out a work from home opportunity (a.k.a. my Continue reading
Paul Hanson Clark Interview Part II: Cookies, Capitalist Voodoo, and the Work-Art Balance
This is Part 2 of my interview with poet, artist, and part-time cookiemaker Paul Hanson Clark, so you can check out Part 1 here.
But I Also Have a Day Job: So to make your life work and still do your art, you have to go to your web editing job during the day and make the doughs in the afternoon. Continue reading
How Much Time Do You Spend Commuting???
I used to commute. A lot.
Back when I started my first office job, I was driving 23 miles to work and back, which took 35 minutes AND since I used a busy commuter route I had to get to work 20 minutes early or waste even more time sitting in traffic. I listened to a lot of music during that time, though, to the point where I still to this day associate certain parts of M83’s Hurry Up We’re Dreaming album with that drive. Continue reading
6 Paths Creative People Take to Earn Money
So back in my Day Job Basics Guide I wrote about the difference between Day Jobs and Real Jobs, but in real life the spectrum’s a bit more complicated. I’m a big fan of being honest with yourself about how your job fulfills your goals and passions, since knowing one way or the other helps you organize your goals and make positive changes. Continue reading
I Paid Off My Student Loans!
…well, most of them anyway. Last week I cashed out a good chunk of savings to pay off one of my final two student loans, a financial move that cut my monthly payment by two-thirds (!!). That basically equates to a ton more financial flexibility each month (i.e., more cash for whatever I want).
The biggest reason for the payoff, though, was to ease the transition into working fewer Day Job Hours. Think about this: It took me 20 hours of Day Job work each month Continue reading