adaptation

I have been dissatisfied with my success so far. I have been working for myself for a glorious seven months, and though I have enjoyed every moment, my dreams are far bigger than my accomplishments thus far.

I spent Thanksgiving with my best friend’s family–a family of established, successful and intelligent individuals. I had plenty to share–I always do. But I realized when talking to them that there’s far more that I want to share–with them, and with the world.

I am my own boss. I have been a very lenient, understanding, and even fun boss. That was my dream–to do whatever I wanted whenever I wanted to. But when I am ultimately dissatisfied with my productivity, it is my boss that is to blame.

Tonight I divided myself into two: a boss and a worker bee. Now I can stop my bitching about not having an intern. I do: myself*. I am my own worker bee. When I find myself online shopping I can remember how annoying it was to see my employees wasting their company time and slap my own wrist. “On your own time!”

I have also added in a walk to work. Even though my office might technically be in my living room, I will walk up 40th, down Howe, over to Piedmont, to my PO Box and back. Tomorrow I will put a time card in my PO Box so that I can clock in when I get there. To sweeten the deal–and because I know myself–I am adding in the enjoyable goal of snapping at least one photo along the way, which I will share here.

I arrived at these goals with the help of my awesome roommate. I asked her what I will do when it is raining. She said, matter-of-factly, “Walk to work in the rain, like I do!” The truth is, I love to walk in the rain.

At first I was disturbed that this structure conflicted with one of my core values of being always carefree. I was carefree when I left my job, and I’m carefree everyday when I do work that I choose to do. Carefree is not my only value. Other relevant values here are progress and adaptation. This is how I choose to adapt so that I can continue to make progress. My goal is to double my productivity.

I sat down on the floor of my roommates room dejectedly. A time card!! A walk all that way to work!! A schedule!

She said, “This will hurt.”

It hurts already. Damn those irritating and inconvenient growing pains.

*My good friend Theo has also volunteered, but it turns out it is illegal to have unpaid interns.