Rethinking

It's been a bit of a weekend, one where my head felt full of cobwebs and viruses - literal and figurative. My brain was in such a mess that I even dreamt about Chitty! :)

And then, as the clouds started to clear out this morning, I found myself doing some thinking about the future again.

It's a fact that I'll need to make a move from this job and this life around the end of the year if I'm to survive financially, emotionally and spiritually. That leaves me with about 7 months to come up with a definitive plan of action, and enough of a headstart to make it happen.

I was planning on taking the extra month I was due in June/July to start my business and launch it toward profitability - but have been asked to move that leave now to August/September, as it interferes with too many other folk being out of office, and a couple of deadlines. That of course means there's less up-time available for making cash before the end of the year, if I only get started on business matters then! So I've got to take another look at my timetable, goals and plans.

I have to start putting in more time after hours to get things going, and spend less time lying around the house relaxing. Along with that, I'm also looking at all my other options.

In short, I'm thinking as far outside the box as I can manage when it comes to my future. I've said it before - I've got a chance that few have to do whatever I want with my/our life/lives. I don't have a spouse upon whose job we depend to go here or there (nor the extra salary, but nevermind that), I don't have any solid committments to anything anywhere. I can go anywhere or do anything, as long as I'm not scared to.

But I am scared to, in a way. I'm a logical as well as creative thinker - I weigh up things carefully, I like to have a crystal ball to tell me what will happen so I can plan accordingly now. Of course, the latter doesn't really work - but I like to make sure I don't veer off into disaster as much as possible. So there are some givens I need when looking at the future. I need a house, food and schooling for the kid. A yard for the dogs and space for me to create - especially if it's part of my income-earner.

And then one of the old dreams reared up today. There's a 650 ha piece of empty mountain land (with spring water) for sale near here, at a very small cost - well, it's not too small a cost, but you wouldn't get a shack in a back yard here for that amount. I've been chatting to a couple of friends about a sustainable community... What would it take for us to fund that place jointly and start it?

That takes care of house, and maybe food (we'd get growing..!), and if there's a teacher in the community, perhaps even schooling.

Now I don't want to go all isolated-treehugger-weirdo, but it's one of those out-of-the-box future options I can afford to look at.

There are others too - lines of work I never thought I'd be into, but which I can see myself freelancing for, and which have the potential to bring in a load of cash. If I can get up the courage to give them a go.

Anyway, all this thinking is starting to wear down my brain into little ball-bearing things that are simply rolling around creating static electricity. So let me hit "post" and submit this one to cyberspace as evidence of yet another step on this journey called life.