Working Jane

So I started my own business last year.  You can check it out - it's cool!  www.vinyl-unlimited.com. We do awesome decals, t-shirts and other random stuff our machinery will do that people will pay for.

I also got another awesome job this year, as the marketing manager of an up-scale professional services firm.  The salary is pretty awesome.  My mentors and colleagues are awesome-er.

And what both of these mean is that I've checked off two major life goals in one year.  I started that business.  I broke that 6-figure salary ceiling I kept bumping up against.  TWO, count them.  TWO life goals in ONE year.  I've never been so accomplished.

And life is... hard.  Business finances are a constant concern as we endure the burn-in stage of every startup without angel backing.  Life is full of work, work, work, as I cycle through from one job to the other to home to mommy-dom to stolen moments of alone time to poignant and growth-filled minutes with my honey bun.  I've gained weight.  Weekends are about cramming as much rest into two days as possible.  I've had to manage the anxiety that comes with the month-to-month figures in the bank accounts.  I've learned how one day can start with amazing possibilities and end in the pits of despair.  I've experienced how sometimes all it takes is a quick conversation with a potential client, friend or fellow marketer or entrepreneur to lift one's spirits and gather my gumption to get back on that horse.

And people.  People are more generous, lazy, caring, shallow, encouraging, flaky, strong, weak, and everything in between than I've ever known them to be.  And this includes myself.

As much as I would never give up my projects, my commitments to family and friends (and my desire to be thinner), I would never say that all this isn't worthwhile.  It is.  I wouldn't say it's easy.  It's not.  I wouldn't say it's all rewarding, because it isn't yet.

The one thing I will say is...

...I need some more FUN in my life!  All work and no play makes Jane a dull girl.

Shabbat Struggle

I'm a non-Jew trying to institute the practice Shabbat in my life, and it's hard.  Not because I can sing the typical song of modern woe about just being so busy all the time (though I am), but because for me work is comforting and life-giving.  And I have come to understand that Shabbat is about doing life-giving things.

Writing grocery lists or plotting out the next month's budget.  Cleaning the kitchen (sometimes) and sorting old clothes to go to Goodwill.  These things bring me satisfaction. And I'm not a codependent person; it's hard to explain, but I just really get a kick out of getting stuff done.

When I contemplate what a meaningful Shabbat is  - a 24 hour period of intentional stillness -  it's hard to parse work from rest.  To pare down to a minimal pattern of rest is sometimes like entering a recently moved-out house.  It's dirty and hollow, just barely echoing of what used to be so cheerful and full.  It reminds me of the First Testament episodes when particular characters would go into the wilderness (aka wild places, lonely places, places of non-cultivated land).  They would often go without food in their questing, but the stories record most of them finding something significant out there.  There is this extreme dichotomy of starvation and plenty in those stories, for although the people physically starve and thirst, those significant experiences they bring back with them become life markers, things that redefine their past, present and future.

I wonder what I will find.  My relationship with this emptiness is volatile.  Some weeks, I long for it and anticipate with joy.  Other times, I find myself, like today, longing for activity to bring solace to a patternless day.  One thing I've learned so far is that simply having fun isn't necessarily life-giving.  Too many video games and movies can make life grey instead of glorious.

Gosh this is hard work!