Day 173: Overwhelmed by the new profession

In the last several years, I have been involved in projects that looked very promising from the perspective of positive global impact and also financially. However, all of them were not able to fulfill the promises money wise. Recently I decided that it is about time to make a radical change since the lack of money is also influencing my desire to be in a relationship and to have a family. Because how would I be able to take care of my children if I can hardly earn enough for myself. While contemplating many ways to generate a bigger income flow for me I considered that best for me would be to restart offering my own services like I did from the year 2000 to 2013. Firstly I planned to offer quite a broad list of services like graphic design, website development, photography, video editing, and psychological counseling. That was expected to bring me enough jobs to earn money very fast.

However very soon I realized that it would be harder to market such a vast array of services. And also the knowledge, equipment, and space needed to execute them in a professional manner would be more extensive. In that time I also came to understand that what my mayor pattern was in the previous career was a relatively fast change of my professional focus. I made radical cuts, changed my way and burned the bridges. By this approach, I was losing previous clients and have started building a business from scratch many times. That consumed a lot of my money and time because it takes several years before people get educated about the new services and become regular clients. So while I have been consistently waking the path of self-perfection, business-wise the professional path looked very chaotic for the outside observer. I have disregarded the stability of my business and allowed myself to be directed by new discoveries in many different fields of science. Basically, I have been spreading myself thin.

During my process of self-transformation, I discovered that the underlying pattern for such decisions in my life that I inherited from my father was the need for attention and making myself more than others. The accompanied habit was also the accumulation of things in order to impress others by showing the sheer quantity of stuff. While my father was a hoarder of ancient books and old printing equipment, I became a hoarder of knowledge and information. While he enjoyed guiding the visitors through his home paper and printing museum, I felt good by sharing the most secret and advanced knowledge about how this existence works. While there is some educational purpose of such behavior, the problem is in the hidden motivation behind such activities. Since it was all driven by fear of abandonment and not being accepted by others, it did not allow going into depth of a certain field, to root properly and to stand as an expert for the benefit of the whole society. It all resulted in becoming a jack of all trades and master of none.

I see that there is a fear of missing out associated with any specialization. There are some real dangers of the focused approach like we are able to see in our western civilization. High education created a compartmentalized mind that lost the understanding of how everything in existence is connected and interdependent. Our society definitely needs a more holistic approach to understanding life and to expand the awareness of reality. Informational technology has also influenced us by enabling to share knowledge and new discoveries faster than ever. An individual has now much more difficult time to decide what information to absorb and what to ignore. However, in order to root yourself significantly, one must pick the as narrow field of professional focus in order to be able to succeed business-wise. This is also why I have now decided to go into the depth of things. And I have additional motivation for this by my physical body. It very nicely reflects all of our mental states and it also showed me the lack of my grounding by my too cold and sweaty feet. The condition already improved in the last years as the result of my inner change however there is still a lot of room for additional enhancement.

Keywords: Slowing Down, Diving Deep, Narrowing Focus, Being Persistent

Based on this I quickly decided to reduce the number of professional services that I will be offering only to photography. Reasons for this were that it enables me a more physically dynamic work in comparison to graphic and web design that mostly require a lot of sitting behind the computer. I wanted to provide my physical body much more movement for better overall health. Thus I purchased a mid-range DSLR camera with two zoom lenses, a Speedlight, a tripod and bag with some other basic accessories. I have been working as a professional photographer for many years however in the last 10 years I only took pictures with my mobile phone for my personal albums. Now I have to refresh my knowledge of photography, learn how to master the new hardware and software tools. I noticed that now there is a lot of free educational materials available than it was when I completed my distance study at the New York Institute of Photography. I am surprised at how many professional photographers share extensive behind-the-scenes video lessons and many secrets of the trade. And by watching them I also learned how wide even the sole field of photography is.

Years ago I did some swimming sports photography, shot food and products, and I also captured over 40 weddings. At that time I had the best camera, sharpest lenses and the most powerful flashes. Wedding photography can be very lucrative however it is also very physically and mentally exhausting. It is a special event with high importance and one has to make sure that nothing goes wrong. This is why a lot of backup equipment is recommended and in many cases, there are at least 2 photographers that work as a team to cover all the angles. Then there a lot of additional retouching and processing with many options what final look of photos to creates. Currently, I am not yet very comfortable to shoot such events and have decided to invest more time in enhancing my skills and tools. The next business opportunity that I noticed was in the field of real estate photography. Because while I was browsing the flat renting ads many had not even one photo. So I started to study also how to shoot architecture and learned how professionals do it and what equipment they use.

While I have been testing my new photography equipment it felt heavy, bulky and it produced a lot of strain on my eyes. While reading the camera user manual I noticed how many functions it has. While using the photo software I became aware of all the tools and options. And while watching the online courses I saw how many different approaches are to do the same job. I started to wonder to what field of photography I am to specialize and how good should my skills and equipment be in order to start offering my professional photo services. These experiences must have accumulated to the level where I started to feel pain on my shoulders and in my lower back. Consciously I felt quite present and able to direct myself step by step to develop my photography business however I guess there have been also a lot of unconscious activities that started to crystallize in my tissue. Thus I will be now writing also some self-forgiveness to release these accumulated energies:

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to fear that it will be harder for me to restart my photography business since a lot of photography schools have emerged in our country in the past decade and also there are a lot of online photography courses available now. I realize that this is part of evolution where the abundance of everything is being created, including education which is good news that will result in society slowly being transformed at a very deep level. I commit myself to develop my business slowly and align myself based on new discoveries and opportunities. 

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to feel threatened by the new generation of young photographers which many are coming from our local university of media communications. I realize that only around 10% of photography graduates end working in the field of their study and that I can benefit from collaborating with young talent and create synergy at working on photography projects. I commit myself to network with other photographers and discover where we can support each other technically and by exchanging knowledge and insights. 

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to think about giving up photography after viewing online tutorials of other photographers which portray photography as something easy and when me trying to repeat their work in the physical and finding it much harder to execute as imagined. I realize that the physical experience of someone doing a task is very different than just observing others how they do tasks and that due to the amalgamation of mind the experience of own physical body is being changed significantly. I commit myself to be gentle to my body, to have patience and to slowly practice the execution of photographic tasks.

Suggested related online resources for additional support:
Free online course DIP Lite
Comparing Images and Imagination
Building Your Business
When Desires Becomes Overwhelming
The Secrets of Competition

Day 172: Flatmate relationship dissected

The other day my flatmate came home after she left with her bicycle the day before in the evening. Soon after she went to her room, she started to scream the name of her boyfriend with excitement. A moment later I heard apartment doors opening and the voice of her boyfriend while I was in my own room. Then my flatmate nocked on my door and explained with loud voice through the door about how she thinks that I think about her and that I should stop that. I answered that what she imagines is far from the truth and that she should stop imagining things about me. Minutes later I wrote her an SMS text message, explaining that last day I am experiencing a lot of stress and that if she will not stop with such untrue accusations, I will ask the landlord to replace her with some more peaceful flatmate.

If I self-honestly reflected on the described event, I have concluded that the problem was: Allowing myself for the recent past events, especially the confrontation with the working inspector, keeping me in an emotional state. Not taking action to reflect on the confrontation by writing and calming myself down. Using my emotional state to play the character of a victim and responding to my flatmate with projected blame where I make her reponsible for the level of my emotional disturbace to accumulate over the limit.

If I would have been self-honest, the moment would look like this: Realizing that I am in a state of emotional disturbance due to the recent confrontation with a working inspector and taking action to assist myself by writing in order to return back the energy of stressful experience so that it would not accumulate over the limit when my flatmate decided to also speak to me about her stressful emotional state. Listening to what my flatmate had to say as one and equal and responding so that so that I and she would be supported equally.

And here are the related self-forgiveness and self-commitment statement that I wrote in order to correct myself and to assure that I will act differently in similar events in the future:

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed to expect that my visit to a work inspector will have the outcome where she will acknowledge that I lacked the experience and had nothing but good intention. 

I realize that despite how I perceive my actions to be, others can see them from a different perspective and respond in a way that I did not anticipate. 

I commit myself to when and as I am meeting an official person and presenting my case and my mind is producing thoughts like: “You are a good person with the best intention so expect to others also see you like that.” to stop and breathe. I then have a meeting with them and be ready to their response regardless of what it is.  

I forgive myself that I have allowed and accepted to in the past years to influence my current flatmate by indicating that I am willing to be her boyfriend while she was in deep emotional distress and primarily wanted to speak with me to give her professional support. 

I realize that I have not been sensitive enough about what she actually needed and that now she prefers to speak to me through the closed door since speaking to me face to face is too much intense and uncomfortable for her. 

I commit myself to when and as some female contacts me and asks me for support and my mind is producing thoughts like: “Maybe she actually wants to become my girlfriend and is just shy of telling me that.” to stop and breathe. I then rather keep my distance and give as professional support as possible without having any preconceived ideas about what the female wants. 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear approaching women that I find attractive due to the risk of being turned down. I realize that refusal from others is a natural process of seeking a proper life partner and also a part of doing business in general. 

I commit myself to when and as I see a girl that I like and my mind is producing thoughts like: “She is too pretty for you and you will certainly have a lot of competition if you start flirting with her so best not to bother.” to stop and breathe. I then rather gather the courage and address her regardless of what the outcome will be. 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to only be open for a relationship with women who express that they are in distress and need help. I realize that this was my tendency because I have perceived such women as the one that I can approach more easily and there is less danger of them turning me down since I can present to them as someone who can effectively help them. 

I commit myself to when and as I notice a women who has problems in her life and my mind is producing thoughts like: “Get in touch with her since she needs help and because you know the tools that she can help herself with she will definitely be grateful to you and maybe become even your girlfriend in order to express her gratitude.” to stop and breathe. I then rather offer women in distress a professional help and look for a potential partner among the women who do not show the need of wanting to be saved by someone. 

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed past recent stressful experience with a working inspector to keep me in a strong emotional state and postponing with taking action to assist myself with writing.  

I realize that many shocking things can happen during each day and if I procrastinate with facing past events that have triggered an emotional response within me regularly, new events could accumulate too much energy and render me incapable of facing future events with state of common sense and equality.  

I commit myself to when and as I experience a stressful event and my mind is producing thoughts like: “Ah it is just a small disturbance that is not significant to write about is so just let time to pass and it will go away naturally.” to stop and breathe. I then rather write on a daily basis and face my emotional reactions regularly in order to keep a sufficient level of my energetic stability.

This blog post is part of my assignment within the advanced Structural Resonance Alignment course. I invite you to assist also yourself with awesome Desteni I Process self-perfecting courses, starting with the DIP Lite free online course. And to listen to the following related educational audios from Eqafe web store with hundreds of extremely supportive educational items that hold answers to any imaginable question about life and this existence:

The Difference Between Male and Female Emotions
Relationship Fantasies
Saviour Complex
Goat and Saviour Complexes
Why is it so Difficult to Find Love?

Day 171: Biting off more than I can chew

Recent experience in trying to build a team of people that would work for me made me wonder about my actual current capacity to lead such a professional collective. My objective is to constantly expand and improve myself so I have been pushing myself out of my comfort zone. The question here is how far out of comfort zone is too far or when the bite has been bigger than I can chew. I definitely want to improve myself and contribute to this world in the as beneficial way for all as possible. Also, I understand that it is possible to create more if working as a group. Due to this principle, I decided not to work alone on projects anymore but to build a collective within the organization that I would direct in order to produce a synergetic and multiplicable effect of my efforts. In the past years, I went through many experiences, courses, and training in order to develop my leadership skills. I read a lot of books on communication, presentation and project management. I overcame a lot of fear and insecurities, however, the level of transformation has not been yet to the extent that I wanted to.

When observing great leaders I have been admiring their ability of calm and effective response to any provocation, how self-confident they are, fearless and relentless in regards to their agendas. And those are the qualities that I also want to have. In my mind, I can imagine myself being in such positions and play out all possible scenarios. However, when facing other people in this world my emotional responses are still not such as I would like them to be. My mind is full of all sort of information and thoughts since I have been within the past 20 years researching how the global system and human mind works. While I can have good intentions and follow the principles of what is best for all there are all sorts of dangers in this world that can quickly limit the freedom of actions.

One sort of dangers originate from the human mind and are manifested in the form of thinking and behavior patterns. Thus regardless of what one says or does, the responses from other people can vary extensively and can result in a verbal or physical attack by others. And another sort of danger is in form of global legal and monetary system which is actually externalization of our minds. Combining those two systems can result in others misinterpreting your words and actions in their minds and using the legal system to take away your possessions and freedom. So in order to protect against those dangers, one must learn how to master own mind, how to direct the minds of others, to understand the legislation and know how to protect yourself against legal attacks.

Thus being effective in this world can not just be done by desire and wishful thinking. It takes a lot of study and self-introspection. Then regardless of how strongly one makes effort to learn and change, each one of us has a very different predisposition and environment that contribute to a different level of success. What I also learned within recent online group chats at our Destonians social network is that natures of our core beings are very different. There are those who prefer solitude, are more the observers and connect internally and there are those who strive for the connection with others externally. I realized that my nature is more of a being that is very comfortable working alone, doing independent research and am never bored or lonely.

Until recently I thought that I will be able to impact this world in a very limited way if I would work on projects mostly alone. Thus I tried to build a local team to multiply my effectiveness. However, I noticed that deep inside me I feel very uncomfortable about having to constantly take care of many people and provide the necessary funds for their salaries and all the projects. There are yet many fears that I need to face, skills to develop and information to integrate before I would be able to be in such a function. But even with my current capacity and skills, I do not need to compare myself with others but to just do my best with what I am and what I have. One single person can influence many others by writing a book or producing a video for example. So even the biggest introverts can contribute to making this world a better place for all to great extent.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to be directed by the savior complex and wanting to change this world by controlling every single aspect of all decisions that humans make. I realize that the nature of this physical reality is division and separation where expansion of awareness of each human being is achieved through a long-term process through physical communication and manifested consequences. Thus I commit myself to when and as I think about how to change this world and my mind is producing thoughts like: “You must create an effective educational system that would produce a new generation of completely purified human begins or you will completely waste your life!” to stop and breathe. I then within the understanding that each of us is already directed by life towards equality and oneness internally rather focus on my own personal improvement and teaching by example and other means that I am able to use productively.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to rush and move into a direction before I have taken necessary time to build strong fundation. I realize that a stable foundation is the most important part of any structure that guarantees for the project to stand the test of time. Thus I commit to when and as I want to create something and my mind is producing thoughts like: “Just start building since if proven that foundations are not strong enough you will be able to strengthen them later!” to stop and breathe. I then within the realization that weak foundations create a lot of damage to the structure and even result in the structure falling apart completely rather slow down and make sure for the foundations to be strong enough before I proceed to build the walls.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to define myself as advanced intellectual and spiritual person that must not do basic jobs that I am overqualified for. Within that, I have been also looking degradingly towards people who had lower qualifications than me and defining them as not very useful to society. I realize that there is all sort of physical labor that needs to be done in order for our society to prosper and also for me to enjoy my current lifestyle. Thus I commit myself to when and as I decide what to do and my mind is producing thoughts like: “You must do only the jobs where all your skills and knowledge can be used to full potentials and also be paid very good for that!” to stop and breathe. I then rather decide to also take jobs that needed to be done for the benefit of all the society despite not requiring all the skills and knowledge that I have acquired so far.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself for not wanting to seek employment at any other organization due to believing that I will be paid much less than I deserve. And also that I will earn only a bit more than I am receiving currently as unemployed in form of social support money. I realize that despite my attempts to develop projects on my own, I am not willing to deal anymore with all the necessary decisions about setting the prices, doing financial activities, studying complex legislation and all sort of other stuff that are necessary for running a business. Thus I commit myself to when and as I consider what to do and my mind is producing thoughts like: “You are quite in some debt so the best way to solve your financial situation is to develop your own organization where the options for generating income are much greater than being employed elsewhere!” to stop and breathe. I then rather apply also for other jobs in order to provide for my basic stable income and after that generate additional income through activities in my spare time. 

In relation to this blog post, I invite you to assist also yourself with awesome self-perfecting tools within the DIP Lite free online course and to listen to the following related educational audios from Eqafe web store with hundreds of extremely supportive educational items that hold answers to any imaginable question about life and this existence:

Workplace Dynamics
Developing Communication and Expanding Relationships
Leadership
Self Leadership
Leadership and Energy
How to Unburden Yourself from Responsibility
Taking Your Emotions out of Your Business
Overcoming the Burdens of Leadership
What is Leadership to You?
What is Blocking the Leader Within You?
The Birth of a Leader Begins with Self
Leadership: Control Versus Guiding
Leadership: Being Able to Work With Everyone