Waiting

Well, my current employer in my off uni time is slow, so I have a lot of down time. I am considering what else I can do, besides studying Japanese. I really should keep putting out feelers to try and get some copywriting and/or rewriting work. That and write the book my wife was talking about, an activities guide for Japanese-English teachers.

But, I really wonder what I should be doing, and whether it’s what I should be doing. Isn’t that the way it goes, people doing what they hate, people not knowing what they should be doing, and that small lucky minority that know what they want to do, and feel passionate about doing it. That leap of faith to that category is tough, that and finding what that is (and hoping it’s something that you can make enough money for the lifestyle that you want to have.

Must it be security or passion?

I keep thinking I need a job with a pension, but then I wonder if I would live long enough with the boredom. Sound like a cliche for a car ad? I suppose it is a dlilemna that many of us face, whether we can do something we enjoy and become financially ‘fit’, or do we have to buckle down and do what we have to or need to do to get by.

I’m considering applying for that DOD ESL  job, but I keep thinking I’ll be teaching ‘waterboarding’, though perhaps Obama’s emergence might save me the trouble. My wife keeps objecting only considering that if we renovate, she doesn’t want to leave the house?!  Beginning to sound like a ball and chain to me. I can understand not wanting to leave, but also after we do this full scale renovation, we can get a regular renter fairly easily I would imagine, and one that would pay top dollar for a small house in central Tokyo.

I think flexibility is key. I just am not sure what else I can do in Japan, I’m not as swift as Sam when it comes to figuring out what can be done online. Oh well, we can’t all be young geniuses, guess I’ll have to settle for being an average whatever.

Getting in touch

I had an emotional moment yesterday during karaoke.  I know, sounds like an odd place to get in touch with a lost feeling, but for some reason music does trigger that sometimes, even music using cheezy synthesizers to emulate rocking guitars. I just started tearing up, and the worse part of it was one time I was in the middle of singing.

Getting in touch

This happened twice,  the earlier time I was just thinking about a Chinese song my wife was singing called ‘I believe myself’.  Discounting the bad grammar in the song (‘I believe in myself’ would make a lot more sense), the Ayaka version features a simple piano melody with soaring vocals. It often makes me consider what I do believe that I can do. Right now, I feel puzzled and stuck as to where I want to go, and some things that I do want to do seem impossible to do. I feel vulnerable, and I’m not sure that is the feeling that I want to deal with, but you have to deal with the hand you’re dealt.

On a related note, I was thinking about something in a Donald Trump book  I read yesterday, ‘Think like a Billionaire’. I don’t agree with some of his opinions, but one of his comments really struck home.  He said that very rich people are often passionate about what they do. They don’t think of their jobs or business as work because because it’s something they really enjoy doing. He commented that if you have a job that you don’t feel passionate about, you should fire yourself and find something you enjoy doing and are good at.  Life is too short to spend your time doing something that doesn’t draw you in fully.

Of course he didn’t consider having to make a  living, and the other things you might enjoy doing besides work.  Sometimes it seems to be really wealthy, you have to be obssessed about what it is you want, which was another point that he made. So the question is, which obsession do you want to go with?