What if?
I'm realizing more and more that people nowadays are hyphenated. We don't just do one thing anymore. We are restaurant servers/models, bartenders/actors, office professionals/bloggers/artists, nurses/designers, managers/photographers. For the chosen few who make their money doing what they love every day, I both admire and envy you. For the vast majority of us don't make our living pursuing our passion, I feel you. Enter the side hustle. The side hustle is what drives us, what fuels us, what moves us along. It is the thing we love to do, it is the thing we would do for free, and often do, at least for now. The side hustle is that creative release we need in order to function as our alter egos during the day as some else's employees.
But what do you do when you want to turn that side into your main squeeze? What plans do you make? What steps do you take? When do you take that leap? In other words........
HOW DO YOU KNOW?
Please don't look at me, I don't have the answer for myself yet. But what I do have are the experiences from people I have talked to. Many of whom were members of Team Side Hustle, but who made the move to pursue their passions full time. They took the leap, and they aren't starving, or living under a bridge or dressed in the latest issue of the Atlanta-Journal Constitution.
If I'm being honest, I must admit that I am my biggest obstacle. I've talked myself out of countless opportunities. I've convinced myself that I wasn't ready or good enough or that I needed to master every aspect of what I was trying to do to absolute perfection. I wanted to write, but I told myself that I couldn't. Who would want to read what I wrote? I wanted to design, but I told myself that I couldn't because I wasn't professionally trained. I even held myself back from blogging .......for years. I need a new computer, I don't know how to take good pictures, I don't have anything to say (which was probably the biggest lie I told myself, because I ALWAYS have a something to say!) Anyway, I'm sure you see where this is going. I was afraid and fear kept me from doing anything.
I remember a scene in the movie Sliding Doors staring Gwyneth Paltrow when she'd left her philandering boyfriend and moved in with her best friend. She'd just started seeing another guy played by John Hannah. This guy was encouraging her to go into business for herself because she'd been fired from her job and couldn't find anything suitable to replace it.
To paraphrase, in the scene , she asked him what if she did go into business, failed and ended up looking like a complete fool? And he said, SO!
He said it as if failure wasn’t a good enough reason not to try. So what if you fail? That scene stuck with me. What if I did try my hand at writing or designing or anything and I failed miserably? Would the earth open up and swallow me? Would my friends and family disown me? Other than a bruised ego what is the worse that could happen? What would be so bad about spending time doing what I loved even it didn't make me a single penny?
What if it worked out? What if I didn't stink? What if I did make money? What if I was happy?
So I may not know exactly how I will get from Point A to Point B. But at least now I'm doing something. I wanted to write so I'm writing. I wanted to design so I designed my apartment (multiple times in the past 6 years but that is another story). I still don't take great pictures, but I have a wonderful photographer (Hi Aquila!). And I did purchase a grown up camera and plan to take classes.
I decided to stop endlessly What If'g myself and just do something. Just Do It. Who knew that catchy Nike slogan was so profound?
