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Brooke Craig's avatar

I know it’s not actually about the water drip but my HVAC system was the cause of a recurring water leak in my ceiling 🙂.

But more importantly, your words about not needing to tear it all down and maybe just being full really struck me. I’m in a space where I got what I’ve said, for years, that I wanted - freedom to set my daily schedule - but it’s not really what I wanted. I retired from teaching high school math recently to run my home organizing and decorating business full time. After years of dreading Mondays even though I generally liked my job and my colleagues and dreaming about having that time freedom and being my own boss, I’m finding it’s not enough. I do love setting my own schedule - I mean, here I am at 8am still in my pjs, relishing another cup of coffee and reading blogs instead being halfway through an algebra class with 32 not-so-excited teens debating whether I had time to pee in the upcoming 5 minute passing period.

I love decluttering and organizing and styling work and I think I’ve found my niche with working with midlife and older women. In decluttering work, though, I’ve been more of an emotional support friend rather than someone who uses her design eye. And that is rewarding in many ways. I don’t want to be that pro who comes in with a team and does the work for the client and then does a big reveal of the “finished” product, after making sure the client dropped a grand on new containers that I earn commission on. But I’m not really satisfied creatively even though I do prefer organization work over interior decorating (I don’t like picking furniture and countertops for clients 🙄).

And I don’t have to work as much as I did as a teacher because I can charge a higher rate and have a partial teaching pension now. But there’s definitely something missing. I could work harder and build up my client base, for sure. I do have debts to pay off and two kids in Uni or law school. But I’m also bored. I don’t want to go back to teaching in the traditional sense. And I don’t want to give up my business. I do miss the act of teaching, though. And I have an insatiable desire to travel, especially with my children living in New Zealand and my love for Europe.

And I’ve been resisting doing some online coursework that I paid good money for to help create online courses - you know, something that could help me combine my love of design and organization with teaching and perhaps satisfy my theater-kid need to perform and be creative and would allow me to travel because I could work from anywhere. So why am I avoiding it? Good question, eh?

You’re making me think, Scott 🙂

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Marianne Smith's avatar

It is so human to make a mountain out of a mole hill. Sometimes the drip is indicative of a potentially major problem and sometimes it is minor. Either way, you need to address the drip to get to the source and if you wait to address the little drip, it will only become bigger

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