I wonder how your relationship with money has changed over the last two years or so.
Mine started to change when I lost my job in July of 2007 and the paychecks stopped. After over 18 years in corporate America I made the somewhat scary decision to walk away. I received a generous severance and transition package, while my wife continues to work full time at a job she (mostly) likes. We fortunately had paid off our mortgage earlier and had been saving the same monthly amount since then. We owned all of our vehicles and had very little debt.
With us financially secure enough, and with my wife’s blessings, I set off to find out if I could make money without a job. After trying a
hauling endeavor,
selling on Craigslist and
through consignment I decided this was the time to pursue a lifelong dream of writing.
What that decision has lead to, so far, is much pleasure and little money. At the old job the ratio was often little pleasure and adequate money.
How much money I earn today is entirely dependent on my own efforts. No matter how hard I worked before, my hourly wage did not change, and a paycheck for exactly the same amount was deposited into my account every two weeks.
It didn’t matter if I was dragging on Monday, super productive on Wednesday or ho-hum on Friday, the paychecks continued. Once those disappear you either try to find another job or get creative.
I was preparing supper for our dog recently, shortly after I had checked my Google stats and earnings for The Buck List. I asked my wife how much we had paid for the 50 pound bag of dog food. When she told me
I added up the yearly total and remarked that the money I currently earned annually from the blog could support feeding the dog. We both laughed, but it struck me that this is now how I relate to money: compartmentally, from need to need. While we have always lived a pretty frugal lifestyle, the last few years before loosing my job could see us spending $20 or $40 recklessly here and there with zero impact on our budget. Not so today.
I have become much more willing to do menial tasks for cash because they supplement my meager income and break up my writing days.
That $20 to $40 recklessly spent in the past has become goal amounts for odd jobs. While we are both currently happy with this new relationship with money (or old, if we consider the first few years of our marriage) we would both like to see the money float up to the level the joy is at.
I feel blessed to have this opportunity to be able to pursue a longtime passion and to try to make money doing it. This experience has reminded me of the difference between making just enough money to scrape by and of making such an excess that you are able to both save and splurge.
