Laid Off, Fired Up

I was recently "let go" from my job, a music store that was treading water and I couldn't keep dry. I think the hardest part of losing your job, harder than the financial stress and the blow to your pride, is the entirely new situation with which you are faced: where to go from here. Thus far I've justified finding the next platitudinous job I can get into, telling myself I can pursue more meaningful means on the side. Now, however, my last justification chip has been played and lost, and I need to think about getting out of this game.

So, what were my dreams. It's something I've asked many people I know. For many people I know are about my age, and in that time of life in which their thoughts are similar to mine and they ask "what should I be doing?" I try to get them back to that hopeful time when their aspirations were right in front of them instead of left in an old yearbook they can't find anymore. At the time of my high school senior yearbook (almost 11 years of yore) my friends thought I was a pretty talented musician and considered me one who'd go far. I wanted to be a musician then, but my specific dreams were scattered. Though I have been blessed and established with many things since then; a faith in God, a beautiful wife and companion, and a more developed character; it has stayed the same. My dreams are as scattered as the ponderosa pineneedles outside on this windy day. And like those pineneedles, my dreams have yet to be raked into one pile.

My needles are all of the same color. I have been blessed and cursed by creativity and anything I could see myself doing is of that same tincture. It is the cry of every boss who has let me go that I am a great and talented person who could do so many things. Though at the time they say this, I can't help but harbor bit of resentment while I think "Yeah, yeah, that's what they all say." I do see the truth in it however, and my latest [former] boss has added that I am great with people. When I think of all the things I would count myself fortunate in doing, the things that come to mind are numerous. I could be a musician, yes, and have a band with whom I'd get paid to travel. I could write music, teach band, or give private lessons for a living; and besides music I could be a photographer, a park ranger, arborist, councilor, or have a business doing my signature artwork on the walls of people's homes. With the exception of the arborist, photographer, or the councilor, I have tried these things. I have pedaled the flyers for my artwork, promoted my private lessons studio, decided not to get a teaching certificate in college, can't get anyone to play my compositions long enough to get a recording, and have endeavored countless times to start a band of my own.

I believe my endeavoring hasn't been played out as it should however. You see, I try for most all of these things at once, the philosophy being that the more lines I put out the more chance I have to get a bite. Though as of yet I have only caught the equivalent of a few small perch. The wisdom may lie in reeling in all but one or two of my lines and maybe finding a better spot. My downfall does, after all, lie in a lack of focus. So now the question is: What do I Pursue? Like I said before, where do I go from here? And though that is indeed the hardest part of losing your job, it does allow for a bit of excitement. I look forward to figuring it out because I know this a new stage in my life, finding something important to do and knowing that I'm doing it well.

 ^*^ Dusty