This is a letter to my creativity coach Sara
Before our call I always give her a headsup.
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Dear Sara,
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It is almost ironic that from two weeks of “OMG there’s SO MUCH I have to tell Sara!” I’m here behind my computer with exactly one Bon Jovi cd worth of time to write you about, yes, about what?
It all seems so entirely pointless.
I even considered calling this blog post Bullet Point Men, because I feel torn between giving a super emotionally involved update about my feelings about two men in my life on one hand; And a bullet point memo that the good part of our plan we/ I came up with in our last session, and the things I still felt that week, is now gone entirely.
So let’s start there, and see how many songs I have left afterwards.
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You know – I even thought of not writing at all, and simply emailing that I didn’t know what to write. That’s how pointless it all seemed.
Either way, the biggest shift, objectively speaking, was realizing that over a week after our last call, I still had not set up the new blog and new YouTube channel to stay engaged in my love for marketing and sales.
And I now know why.
Because the day after our call, I got inspiration to start a new career as a computer programmer. I learned the basics at university, and already have the materials to educate myself this summer.
It would allow me to start a new career that doesn’t have anything to do with toning down or adapting my creative skills, nor my marketing skills, to a job that would only allow me to do a part of it.
To write for SEO.
Market for leads.
All the while having to communicate with non-autistic people, with whom, let’s face it, my patience is extremely limited.
Computer programming would also allow me to have a job that actually pays, instead of having one that would constantly be on the verge of being given to an intern instead.
But just like the job in marketing:
I still have not started.
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Part of it is because of a financial task (again) which I m behind on for months. It s probably one or two days of work, but I have not put it in, and do not want to start with this new thing, until I have that done.
Next to fear of not being good enough (or motivated enough) causing this procrastination, I also think it’s because I have some mourning to do.
That ultimately NOTHING is going to satisfy me, except making art all day.
And that I feel like I m throwing away my life, doing anything else.
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Maybe I need to reframe this switch in careers – which DOES have the added benefits of (bullet points!)
– putting me in a male dominated environment of men whom I understand and love to hang out with
– giving me specialized work
– excusing me from many of all other forms of human interaction all other professions do require
– giving me intellectually challenging work
– DEEP work, with large uninterrupted blocks of time
– allowing me to think at an extremely abstract level, which is something I absolutely love
Where other jobs almost always mean some kind of partial task, that has zero satisfaction, no meaning, no purpose; Programming isn’t any of those things.
Every part of programming is whole in its own way.
You know – I even thought of not writing at all, and simply emailing that I didn’t know what to write. That’s how pointless it all seemed.
Either way, the biggest shift, objectively speaking, was realizing that over a week after our last call, I still had not set up the new blog and new YouTube channel to stay engaged in my love for marketing and sales.
And I now know why.
Because the day after our call, I got inspiration to start a new career as a computer programmer. I learned the basics at university, and already have the materials to educate myself this summer.
It would allow me to start a new career that doesn’t have anything to do with toning down or adapting my creative skills, nor my marketing skills, to a job that would only allow me to do a part of it.
To write for SEO.
Market for leads.
All the while having to communicate with non-autistic people, with whom, let’s face it, my patience is extremely limited.
Computer programming would also allow me to have a job that actually pays, instead of having one that would constantly be on the verge of being given to an intern instead.
But just like the job in marketing:
I still have not started.
.
Part of it is because of a financial task (again) which I m behind on for months. It s probably one or two days of work, but I have not put it in, and do not want to start with this new thing, until I have that done.
Next to fear of not being good enough (or motivated enough) causing this procrastination, I also think it’s because I have some mourning to do.
That ultimately NOTHING is going to satisfy me, except making art all day.
And that I feel like I m throwing away my life, doing anything else.
.
Maybe I need to reframe this switch in careers – which DOES have the added benefits of (bullet points!)
– putting me in a male dominated environment of men whom I understand and love to hang out with
– giving me specialized work
– excusing me from many of all other forms of human interaction all other professions do require
– giving me intellectually challenging work
– DEEP work, with large uninterrupted blocks of time
– allowing me to think at an extremely abstract level, which is something I absolutely love
Where other jobs almost always mean some kind of partial task, that has zero satisfaction, no meaning, no purpose; Programming isn’t any of those things.
Every part of programming is whole in its own way.
One way I m already reframing it, when I m not worrying about this financial task that is, is by imagining 22 year old Lauren has quit her job at the publisher’s, and starting as a programmer in 1995.
It gives it a lighter feel!
But considering how stuck I still am, it obviously needs a lot more lighting up before I am really excited.
It gives it a lighter feel!
But considering how stuck I still am, it obviously needs a lot more lighting up before I am really excited.
Or maybe I need to see how I m still going to do my own art work after 6 P.M..
But it was during this whole trail of thought about becoming a computer programmer, that I lost ALL my interest in being of any service with anything and everything but IN PARTICULAR with regard to marketing and sales!
Marketing and sales, even in the form of a free-advice YouTube channel and blog, were just way too pragmatic to be combined with already giving my life to a craft I had not chosen naturally.
That I was not called to.
Marketing had to go.
Giving advice had to go.
Everything had to be stripped to its core, until only the pure, raw, dare I say unsaleable core of my expression remained.
If I was really going to be serious being of use as a computer programmer, this could only be counterbalanced by not investing anything in making my other work more polished, user-friendly, more accessible or more understandable.
But it was during this whole trail of thought about becoming a computer programmer, that I lost ALL my interest in being of any service with anything and everything but IN PARTICULAR with regard to marketing and sales!
Marketing and sales, even in the form of a free-advice YouTube channel and blog, were just way too pragmatic to be combined with already giving my life to a craft I had not chosen naturally.
That I was not called to.
Marketing had to go.
Giving advice had to go.
Everything had to be stripped to its core, until only the pure, raw, dare I say unsaleable core of my expression remained.
If I was really going to be serious being of use as a computer programmer, this could only be counterbalanced by not investing anything in making my other work more polished, user-friendly, more accessible or more understandable.
.
My other work needed to be impossible to capture. And marketing and sales as a metier, as well as a skill for promoting my own work, would probably have to be ritually sacrificed in order to be okay with giving my life to something useful.
I could only make myself be of use in one place, if I was allowed to blow something of use up, on the other side.
I could only make myself be of use in one place, if I was allowed to blow something of use up, on the other side.
I did start setting up the system that would allow people to pay me, but it’s very slow, because I first need some changes with the Chamber of Commerce, and if I would then proceed, I would need to open a business account, then apply for our local payment system, and then a daughter of the local payment system is software that is for donations (not payments).
So I m thinking if I still feel invested enough in this plan, to follow through.
I think I need to reallign with my goals on this:
For me it is clear that I can’t be serious about becoming a programmer, and at the same time have ANY sort of client relationship – not even donations! – going on on the side.
So I m thinking if I still feel invested enough in this plan, to follow through.
I think I need to reallign with my goals on this:
For me it is clear that I can’t be serious about becoming a programmer, and at the same time have ANY sort of client relationship – not even donations! – going on on the side.
Maybe that is the biggest catch for becoming a computer programmer, I feel it sucking the life out of my energy to monetize my art.
Maybe it was a stupid idea after all, even though work wise, the work and the environment of being a programmer, appeals to me very much IN THEORY.
In practice I sometimes think art is such a veracious monster, that any idea of anything else being able to breathe let alone blossom, within a ten mile radius, is absolutely ridiculous.
Maybe it was a stupid idea after all, even though work wise, the work and the environment of being a programmer, appeals to me very much IN THEORY.
In practice I sometimes think art is such a veracious monster, that any idea of anything else being able to breathe let alone blossom, within a ten mile radius, is absolutely ridiculous.
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Sometimes I think my art is going to claim my life, and that I keep falling for the idea that I can do anything else that is not art.
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Maybe if I see computer programming as a temporary solution, I would be able to do it.
I don’t know.
The entire plan seems stuck and perhaps already floating belly up, what do we know.
Either way, a lot happened, yet I seemed to have gone around in circles.
I don’t know.
The entire plan seems stuck and perhaps already floating belly up, what do we know.
Either way, a lot happened, yet I seemed to have gone around in circles.
I have three Bon Jovi songs to tell you about the men.
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You remember our MBTI sessions, the 16 personality types of Myers Briggs?
I found out Jon Bon Jovi is an ENFJ.
Not just because he is typed like that by the expert I hold in the highest regard,
– this is the link to the very short but brilliant test he designed for MBTI typing –
but I could also recognize Jon Bon Jovi in ENFJ roll model Ethan Hawke, in this clip from Before Sunrise. Even the voices are similar;
[ text continues below video ]
I found out Jon Bon Jovi is an ENFJ.
Not just because he is typed like that by the expert I hold in the highest regard,
– this is the link to the very short but brilliant test he designed for MBTI typing –
but I could also recognize Jon Bon Jovi in ENFJ roll model Ethan Hawke, in this clip from Before Sunrise. Even the voices are similar;
[ text continues below video ]
YouTube is filled with videos about how the INFP (me) and the ENFJ are the perfect match, the perfect mix between the same and being different.
They re both thirsty for meaning and purpose and act intuitively, but ENFJ does it in a push forward way and requires conversation to discover his feelings and determine his stand, whereas the INFP requires a lot of alone time, and knows what their values and stand are.
They re both thirsty for meaning and purpose and act intuitively, but ENFJ does it in a push forward way and requires conversation to discover his feelings and determine his stand, whereas the INFP requires a lot of alone time, and knows what their values and stand are.
.
And I saw the clip with Ethan Hawke and I realized, well first of all I realized why I m fascinated with Jon Bon Jovi, but also – a feeling of complete and utter helplessness:
“Where on earth am I going to find a man like that ever again?”
I mean, I don’t know if my lover was ENFJ. From the fact that we’re not together anymore, I might think he’s not.
But I mean, where do I find a man, who can stand his ground in pursuing a woman?
Who is not consumed with fears and insecurities, all of which are immediately projected onto me?
“Where on earth am I going to find a man like that ever again?”
I mean, I don’t know if my lover was ENFJ. From the fact that we’re not together anymore, I might think he’s not.
But I mean, where do I find a man, who can stand his ground in pursuing a woman?
Who is not consumed with fears and insecurities, all of which are immediately projected onto me?
It made me appreciative of what we had for five years.
But also gave me a sense that my life was over.
But also gave me a sense that my life was over.
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Because regardless of Myers-Briggs, the men who are so stubborn and steady yet playful –
they do not drop out of the sky.
And you can’t code them in either.
they do not drop out of the sky.
And you can’t code them in either.
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..
the writer currently residing in 1995
~Lauren/LS Harteveld
My diaries en erotica are available at my BOOK SHOP
coming soon: new books
1. Reboot – a hero’s journey. Diary 2017-2020
2. I M NOT CHANGING MY FUCKING SHOW
3. Big Mistress – confessions, columns and sex advice from the other woman
4. Blote Kont- (Dutch)
5. ALL THE THINGS – unpublished work 2010 – 2020
The best way to receive updates on when these books are ready is to follow this blog. The subscription button to this blog is on this page, probably on the right.
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Nederlands blog:
https://zegmaarlauren.com/
LS Harteveld 