First Step: Simplify

posted 24th August 2009    Written by: Robyn    CATEGORY: All Posts, Job/Career/Work, Quarterlife Crisis, Robyn, Season 1

RamenMy freelance work is picking up, and I’m preparing for my transition from my 9 to 5 to working for myself.

Right now, life is hard… Trying to balance all the work is a little difficult, but once I have the 9 to 5 off my back, I think I will have a nice pace going.

When I first decided to work for myself, I imagined living on Ramen noodles and tap water and being forced to rent out a corner of my tiny condo in order to make ends meet. However, I created a budget to see what my real expenses were and how much money I truly needed to make in order to keep living the life I do.

It was eye-opening to see how I spend my money, and I encourage everyone to do this.

Not only did I realize that I spend way too much money at Dunkin Donuts and Ebay.com (who can resist all the cheap crap on there?!), but I also realized that I really don’t need to make a lot of money to keep living the fabulous life I currently live.

Once I had brought this to my own attention, I reconsidered the whole “live to work or work to live” idea. For the past year and a half, I have put myself through hell, thinking that I had to make all this money to pay my mortgage and buy groceries and put money away in savings (ie: living to work and placing all value on money and the material items it brought me).

Once I start working for myself, I will be working just to live. I don’t need much to be happy. I still need to pay my mortgage and buy groceries, treat myself to a nice dinner out with friends, spend a little too much on a night out, and, of course, it’s always nice to have some backup savings…

But that’s about it.

What led me to this revelation?  I thought back to the time two years ago, right before I left to go traveling.  I was living in an awesome place in Chicago, I was saving to go travel for three months, and I was still going out and enjoying Chicago on the weekends…   AND not eating Ramen.  Do you know what I was making two years ago?  I was a full-time intern making $12 an hour and a part-time waitress.  Regardless, I was living large!

I’m not sure when I changed my mindset and thought I needed a bigger salary and a fancier job title in order to be happy, but I am changing my mindset again and going back to my previous thought process.

My first step to getting back there?  Simplify.

This past week, I have spent a lot of time “de-cluttering” my life.  I cleaned out my closets and cleaned off my shelves.  I donated a lot of stuff, and I sold some stuff—eliminating about three stuffed garbage bags full of clothes, books, and miscellaneous crap.

It felt good.

My place is cleaner, I have more space, and I feel refreshed.  I didn’t need any of that stuff…  And now I am closer to traveling again—less stuff to worry about putting in storage!

robyn-bio1

photo credit: pinprick

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One Response to “First Step: Simplify”

  • Twitted by knitpurl Says:
    August 24th, 2009 at 12:53 pm

    [...] This post was Twitted by knitpurl [...]

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