I have always felt like having a side job, or a talent that can earn you a little extra income here or there is a great thing. I have a son who played lacrosse in high school and college and he sometimes coaches. It’s a few hours on some weekends, he enjoys it and gets a little extra money in his pocket. And, that extra money, while not a fortune, makes a difference. It might buy a piece of furniture for his condo at the end of the year or a flight somewhere, but it counts.
My other son has a roommate who has a small Etsy shop and hand-makes collages. She has a regular job, and this is a little something on the side. It covers some groceries, movies, etc. And, she enjoys it: it is her creative outlet.
In my head I visualize my work-life in 3 categories: income, ideas and dreams.
Three Income Categories
The first is income. Not a lot to say about that. We all need it and we all work to get it. Some of us love what we do for a living and some of us just don’t. It may be your passion…it may not. And I include in the income category moms at home and other caregivers. The jobs they do may not earn actual dollars, but their hard work contributes to the household management, so I count them.
Ideas are the coaching and the collage making activities. I used to sell antiques with a friend twice a year at a local flea market. It was fun, we got to work together on the project and we walked away with a little bit of extra money. It felt like free money, which it was not, but it felt that way. I loved it. It was more fun than my regular job: it was harder work but I loved it.
Finally, the dream category. I shouldn’t really call it a dream. A dream is something that is 100% in your head. It has no basis in reality. But if you are actually working on your dream, however infrequent, it’s more. I have two items in my life that are dreams, but if either of them were to come true…well, my life would become a dream, that’s for sure. One is a project that I am working on with my son and daughter. How great would it be to have that come true and get to work with them sometimes? The other is with a long distance friend. We may only get one step ahead by the end of the year, but I am sticking with it.
What the dream project does for me is that it allows me to do just that, dream. Kind of like buying a lottery ticket. What if…what if I got to spend more time with my children and help them financially, as well. Or, what if my friend and I really get this going? What would life look like then?
It helps me to write it down in a chart:
- Income (my “regular” job)
- Idea (my one side interest that might get me a little added income)
- Dream (the big burrito in the sky, but one that is in the works)
As I get older, the categories have shifted a bit. The truth is that the dream is taking a much more prominent place in my brain. Maybe because I just don’t have as many years ahead to make it come true. Or maybe because it is more exciting and more important to me than it used to be. And, if I am honest with myself, the idea portion of my life has turned more into hobbies. It is more important to me now to make time to knit or play the guitar or read than it used to be.
One more thing about the ideas and the dreams…there is no shame in them not coming to fruition. There is only shame in not having them at all.
