I let time slip away from me a bit today, which didn’t leave me much time to pursue new goals. But yesterday I did myself a few favors and started honestly looking online for jobs. Getting more paychecks will certainly take the edge off mentally and let me prepare for emergencies better. More than that, I’m looking for physical out-of-the-house jobs AND online work.

Even more than that, I’m taking the time to really look for gaps in my skill set (especially the technological and communication ones) and seeing what I can do to fix them or learn from them and move on. It wouldn’t do me or my sanity very much good to pour everything into a job search only to realize I’m not qualified for anything because I didn’t take the time to learn what I should.

As far as tech stuff goes, I think it’s strange that I tend to put it off so badly. I’m afraid I have a dose of the “boomer mentality” when it comes to all the rapid change in tech. I just can’t keep up with it and much of it I haven’t found useful. What I’m trying to figure out still is keeping my private life separate from my online life much as possible. When it comes to basic jobs that don’t require special publication, oh yeah, my real name will just have to do. When it comes to online (especially if I get into vlogging) and stories or books I get into writing, the pen name will have to come along. Somehow I overcomplicated things and assumed I’d have to pull a witness protection move and go completely dark with my name online.

Getting some sleep sure helped me figure that out. And it lifted a load, because if I’m trying to build a career with flexible gigs and whatnot, I’ll have to have some kind of researchable history. And since I suck at lying, I wasn’t gonna try to build a persona from scratch. The only thing I should be really be thinking about is how to avoid confusion (mostly online) with posting things or requesting info or sending/returning assignments or info from the right accounts.

I’m getting tired and about to fall asleep, so maybe I’m not making much sense, but this is the best way I can describe it.

I’m also finally free of my helpful obligation to my neighbors and can resume using my gym nice and early to get a good start to my day. I tried the 4am thing and ended up giving up altogether (didn’t help that I was fretting so much about my financial issues and trying to research about curbing the problem). I suppose this is a good thing; I’m tired enough to crash in bed earlier than I have the whole week and change, and will no doubt wake up nice and early, ready to tackle the bench press and the elliptical.

So, getting back to good, and hopefully better. I made a promise to myself to apply to 3 jobs a week (and do my darnedest to learn what I can do elsewhere). I was gonna aim for every day until I saw what was out there and that there are tons of skills I probably need to think about acquiring. I applied to one yesterday, and spent this morning looking for what I could and bookmarking some possibilities. It’s gonna be a touchy process for a while, but I don’t care. It’s better than doing nothing and fretting constantly.

Well, exercise in the morning will definitely clear my head, and I hope it’ll be enough to get me out of this funk. Going to some online sites like skillshare and seeing what’s available to help will be fun, too.

Anyway, hoping for the best for everyone, and that if you’ve been in an off-way for a while, hope you get back to good soon, too.