Every Job is a Real Job as Long as It Pays Real Money

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I hate it when people use the term “real job” to describe a certain type of employment.  Like, what do people even mean when they say this?  If some jobs are “real jobs,” are the rest of the jobs out there “fake jobs?”  How about “unreal jobs?”  “Pretend jobs?”

I’ve sometimes asked people to describe what they meant by “real job” and each time, without exception, the person found themselves at a loss for words.  Being full-time seemed to have something to do with it, but not all full-time jobs were “real jobs.”  Paying out a lot of money also seemed to make certain kinds of jobs “real,” but that wasn’t the whole story.  Was a “real job” one where you took your responsibilities seriously?  Not really, since I know a lot of people who don’t take their so-called “real jobs” seriously at all.  Or was it a job that leads to a bigger career?  That description falls short too, Continue reading »

When You’re Busy, You Get More Done

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This week’s post is going to seem obvious, but it’s actually worth some thought.

Last week I had a few things to do, but not too much—my To-Do list was nice and short with no looming deadlines and plenty of time to work on long-term projects.  As a result, I took my evenings at a slower pace, didn’t work any late nights, and read a few hundred pages of John Steinbeck’s East of Eden (a badass novel full of savage beatings and do-it-yourself abortions that makes The Grapes of Wrath look like a kids book).

It was a pretty chill week, and as it went on I found myself taking longer breaks, scrolling through more social media, and just plain staring into space when I could have been working—or at least doing something I enjoyed. Continue reading »

How I Think About Money Now That I’m Out of Debt

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Last week something happened that should have been a momentous, once-in-a-lifetime experience.  It should have led to endless celebrations and singing from rooftops and cavorting drunkenly naked through the streets in ecstatic glee at this thing I’d been looking forward to for well over a decade and a half.

I am now completely debt free.

Paying off that final loan should have caused me to get really excited, but it didn’t—it just felt like making a regular bank transfer.  Maybe the anticlimax was partly because I won’t get to mark the big zero down on my net worth spreadsheet until next month, or maybe it was because I made the payment Continue reading »

Good Work Will Find Its Way: An Interview with Author Jonathan Face

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Jonathan Face is a computer programmer by day and the author of Catharsis, a horror novel set in a small New Hampshire town, which has over 28,000 downloads on Amazon. He’s also the author of The Remnants Part I and II, and most recently, Odd Tales, a collection of short fiction.  We grew up in the same small town of Warner, New Hampshire, and he graduated from the same high school as me a few years before I got there.  We met for the first time when I was back in the state and sat down at his parents’ dining room table to talk about minimum wage jobs, self-publishing, job security, and being open with your coworkers about your writing life. Continue reading »

Whiteboard Visual Organizers Are Awesome: Part 2

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Last week I wrote about my new whiteboard organizational system and how it’s helped me divide my goals, projects, and daily life habits into different categories so I can keep track of what I’m working on.  In addition, by giving each category a rating from 1 to 10, I can easily see how well I’m doing in each category, and what needs improving.

The categories I made are going to look different than the categories you might be thinking about for your own goals and projects.  Several of mine are Japan-specific, and a few are specific to my goals as a writer.  I’m listing them here so you can get an idea of what I’m trying to improve in my own life, but also so you might get some ideas for how to sort your own future goals.  In no particular order: Continue reading »

Whiteboard Visual Organizers Are Awesome: Part 1

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Organizing your shit is hard.  I don’t mean your physical shit like papers or clothes or books, which I tend to do a pretty good job keeping track of—I’m talking about organizing your ideas.

Organizing my ideas is hard because there’s a lot of things I’m trying to keep track of on any given day, week, month, or year, ranging from big-picture shit like how in God’s name I’m going to get my writing out into the world to little things like remembering to get a haircut.  If ideas were physical objects I could see, line up, and sort using a predetermined system, I’d have an easier time dealing with them, but because ideas are non-visual and frustratingly ephemeral, I’m prone to forgetting them or not knowing how to bring them to fruition (lame…).

Writing my goals and tasks down on paper so I can visualize them has been a HUGE help to me over the years—I started keeping schedule books back in 2011 and never looked back.  More recently, though, I realized that I was still having trouble keeping track of the dozens, if not HUNDREDS of things I want to do, Continue reading »

Can You Trust Your Coworkers With Your Creative Goals?

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Last week I wrote about how, during a night out with my Japanese coworkers while mildly under the influence, I revealed to one of my superiors that I wanted to be a novelist.  In addition to helping me reflect on my personal goals, the episode got me thinking about the question in the title: when is it OK to talk with your coworkers about your creative goals?

I’ve written at length about how and why I’ve kept my creative goals a secret at my different Day Jobs, but there have also been times when I’ve felt comfortable telling coworkers, and even bosses, that my real goal was to be a writer.  This was usually because I’d developed comfortable relationships with them, so revealing more of who I really was felt natural, and helped strengthen those relationships significantly.

There’s a few things to consider when debating whether to tell your coworkers about your creative goals, so here’s a quick list: Continue reading »

A Kind of Short Post About Why I Want to Write Novels

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Two weeks ago I was at a work party with a lot of my Japanese coworkers and some of the higher-ups.  As with most Japanese work parties, this one involved a fair amount of drinking, which meant that everyone felt more relaxed, which in turn meant they could have more open and honest conversations.

One of these conversations was with an older coworker who’s not quite my boss, exactly, but is definitely my superior.  He asked me about my goals and general life purpose, and as one thing led to another I ended up telling him about my novel writing and showing him this photo of Eikaiwa Bums for sale in an actual bookstore, which interested and excited him in a way that felt genuine.

I wouldn’t have told him these things if I didn’t trust him (at least to some extent), and while he clearly responded positively to my quest, he also seemed confused Continue reading »

Summer Progress Report – How Am I Doing?

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It’s been…a busy few weeks, which, as I talked about last month, was entirely my own fault for taking on too much.

I’m realizing that more than anything else, my tendency to say “Yes” to things (sometimes with an exclamation point attached) is really having an adverse effect on my productivity, because not only does having more things to do quantitatively reduce my amount of free time, it also pulls me in multiple directions, giving me more things to juggle and making me exponentially more stressed.

I’ve been thinking a lot about how to make this problem better, and though the solution definitely involves taking on less things, making this happen Continue reading »

I Don’t Drink As Much As I Used To, and I’m Cool With That

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At no time in my life was I ever a marathon drinker, but I definitely went to my fair share of parties in college and the years after.  The most drinking I ever did was probably during my first time in Japan, where I used to meet coworkers and friends for drinks almost every weekend and fairly often during the week.  Drinking during the week back then wasn’t much of a big deal, since I started work at noon and had plenty of time to sleep a hangover away.

More recently, back in America most of my hangouts with friends and family included drinks of some kind, though never to any kind of excess.  I also used to pick up new beers to try at home, usually with dinner, but occasionally after a hard day (or a very hard day) at my Day Job.  Drinking alone wasn’t (and still isn’t) appealing to me unless it’s a new, interesting, or Continue reading »

Sometimes I Don’t Finish Everything, and That’s OK

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Yesterday was Sunday, and as usual I started the day by laying out everything I needed to do.  I’d fallen behind on my Japanese studying the week before, and in addition to being a big 日本語 catchup day, I also had some cleaning to take care of.  My plan of attack in order from start to finish looked like this:

  • Finish Japanese Kanji Lesson
  • Practice all Japanese vocab
  • Finish Japanese Speaking Lesson
  • Schedule Blog Post
  • Reply to Important Email
  • Respond to all Texts
  • Clean Shower and Sink
  • Glue Bedframe
  • Clean Out Closet
  • Go Grocery Shopping
  • Work on Story/Poetry Reading for Lit Mag

I decided to start with Japanese studying because it was the most mentally intensive task for the day, and because I wanted to Continue reading »

I Stay Away from Jerks and So Should You

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Two years ago I posted a piece called Is Your Workplace Socially Toxic? where I talked about how your coworkers play a BIG factor in what kind of experience you have at your Day Job.  If you work with people who are cool, laid-back, interested in the same things you are, and have a similar attitude toward work, then congratulations, because you’re in for some smooth sailing.

BUT, if your coworkers are boring, manipulative, gossipy, mean, passive-aggressive, the type to throw you a lot of last-minute deadlines, or some combination of the above, you’re in for a rough ride.

I’m lucky enough in that my coworkers at my Japan job are pretty cool to work with—though I imagine the language barrier helps protect me from most of the negative stuff ;-)  Continue reading »