mindful stream of consciousness
It’s been almost a month since I posted on this blog.
I’m trying something new with this post; and I’m leaving soon to meet some friends to play board games, so whatever I publish, I publish.
Right. Like I said, it’s been almost a month since I posted on this blog. It’s not like I was a particularly prolific poster in the first place, but a month feels long. Too long.
My lack of posting has a very clear cause: I started a new job. This new job is actually pretty interesting, and I’m pretty excited about it! I’m definitely counting my blessings here — everyone around me is constantly complaining about how much they hate their job… but at the same time constantly complaining about how it’s impossible to get anything better right now. In some measurable ways this is certainly true, but personally, I’ve been focusing a lot on how my attitude shapes my perception.
This new job is somewhere between a freelance role and a salaried role. Having only worked traditional full time salaried roles, making this adjustment has been interesting. The social dynamics are very new to me, but after a few weeks, I’m getting the hang of it. Still haven’t figured out all the nuances of billing my hours, though. I definitely bill bathroom breaks (I wasn’t before), but should I be billing the time it takes for me to cook, eat, and clean for lunch?
Having spent a long period of time prior to this job being (willfully) unemployed, I’ve been hesitant to post anything about my job search journey. Which is a shame, since this journey is arguably one of the more interesting things I’ve been up to lately.
This hesitation has a pretty clear cause: who the heck will even see what I write on this blog??
This blog was never meant to be completely anonymous. Every word I’ve written, I’ve considered how I would feel if my mom / coworkers / hiring manager / love interest happened upon this corner of the Internet and read my words. Don’t get me wrong, in many cases, I’m hoping they never do. But I’m publishing words on the Internet. So whether they read those words or not isn’t 100% in my control.
I don’t want this blog to be completely anonymous because there are people in my life I want to show this to! (And I have, to a very small number of close friends.) But additionally, I started posting on Bear Blog because it seemed like an interesting community. From the very start, I wanted to list a way to contact me on my page, and I wanted to reach out to people who wrote things I found interesting.
I want to make connections with people on this platform. Maybe that’s as simple as exchanging a quick note, one and done, as it were. This has happened. Maybe it’s a bit more involved, exchanging electronic mail back and forth. This has also happened. Maybe it turns into something even more — a collaborator for a creative project, a professional mentor/mentee relationship, a tour guide for when I’m visiting their city.
If I want those things, then I can’t be truly anonymous.
And that’s okay. But finding the balance here has been hard for me. I look back on some of my older posts and cringe. Like, a cringe that consumes me and suffocates me and makes me want to take the post down. But I think this is something unavoidable that comes from releasing your creative energy into the world.
I said earlier that I’m trying something new with this post. I’m experimenting with a new style. You could call it a “word vomit”. But the label that’s resonating with me right now: Mindful Stream of Consciousness.
Oof. I’m running late for board games. There’s so much more I’d like to say, but I hear Bear Blog is built to last forever, so I’ve got time.
Thus concludes my first MSoC.
Sincerely,
Sam,
Tryer of New Things