Certifiable

Yep! I’m Certifiable!

I’m getting all the certifications for the stuff I know about computers. It seems everyone wants to put me into jobs I DON’T want, and they are not looking at what I’ve learned for what I DO want.

One way to fix that is to get certified.

So, I’ve found a couple of places online where I can test all the stuff I know and get a little downloadable certificate that I can print off and put in my “Brag Book” and send copies to folks when they want to ask me what I know.

Hey, I’ll probably forget more than they ever learned, which is true with most things these days. But, if they want to know if I ever learned it; Yeah, I did! And I have the piece of paper to prove it.

Finance-Focused

I’m pretty finance-focused these days. I haven’t worked at all for the past few years – except on my own stuff. But it’s time to take a break from writing books and get out there to bring in some dough!

Cat food costs money. And so do a lot of other things.

I’ve looked at the finances, and I know how much I need to bring in if I accept a position. There’s no point in even talking to someone if they can’t meet my baseline. It’s a waste of time for everyone. I need a certain amount if I’m going back to work. Otherwise, it ends up costing me too much in medical expenses, transportation, loss of support in other areas, and time.

Time, of course, being the only irreplaceable commodity any of us have.

Dreams and Spirit

Does that mean I’m giving up on my dreams? Does that mean I’m not working on my spiritual development and expansion?

Heck NO!

Spiritual development MUST be a priority in all of this. There is no point to life without a spiritual connection! I need to keep my level of meditation up, and my times of reflection and introspection are important to me. I’m still an introvert and I need to keep that connection to spirit alive and well.

Without delving into too much, I think I’m doing fairly well. I keep connected to my fellow man, serve as I can, help where I can, give what I can. I listen first, and counsel as needed. In all things, I rely on spirit to channel through me to others in love.  And as far as spiritually growing goes, I’m still doing that, too.

Without my dreams, what’s the point in going back into the workforce? I need more income to manipulate my life to bring my dreams to life. I have too high a level of expenses with my current debt load. I need all that debt paid off so I can move forward. All my dreams are informed by my spiritual promptings from within.

So these two streams are giving me the boundaries in which to develop a work-life outside the home, whether at a fixed site or remotely.

The four areas of life: Air (mind), Water (emotions), Fire (action), and Earth (the material world).

We think first, then we feel. I learned that from Scott Peck in “The Road Less Traveled” which is also the title of one of my favorite poems by Robert Frost. Maybe that’s why I was drawn to the book. Anyway, according to Peck, our emotions are a response, or reaction, to our thoughts.

Here’s how it’s playing out right now in my life:

Air – Planning healthy meals; Meditation; Budgeting; Journaling; Evaluating past actions. This is the nebulous area of meditation, contemplation, thinking about philosophy, and coming to conclusions about our lives. This is where ideas generate.

Water – Therapy; Sharing with friends.  My desires for increasing my income are generated here as an emotional response to the evaluation of my current financial position. It’s an emotional reaction, just like wanting to hide my head in the sand every time the president opens his mouth and mumbles some incomprehensible nonsense.

Fire – Shopping for and Preparing healthy meals; Taking exams on coding to become certified; Applying to companies for work; Writing, Crocheting items. This is where I do something to fill my needs and wants. I take the action.

Earth – Healthy body, Clean apartment; Written work, Crochet items for gifts or sales, a job offer, a paycheck. These are the material results of the steps above.

From the feelings, we reflect and plan, then we act. At least I hope we reflect, not just react! A reaction is a knee-jerk. It’s something we do without thinking. It takes a lot of psychological work to get past that instinctual response to our thoughts. Once those are straightened out, we can move forward.

We take an action. Whether it’s packing the car, cleaning the house, taking out the trash or applying for a job. We take some kind of action. Our fingers move, our bodies move, we say words. We DO SOMETHING. That’s the nature of an action. It’s a VERB, not a NOUN, not an article. It’s a DO, not a THING.

From there, things show up in the material world. The results. Arguably, not always the desired results, but results none-the-less. By applying for a position, one may get a rejection letter or nothing at all, or be asked to come in for an interview. That latter result is what we are looking for by applying.

By preparing and following a budget, we may or may not have money left at the end of the month, but the funds ended up where we wanted them to go, which was the result we were looking for.

This is Also Called Manifestation

The material world is easy to influence. It seems difficult, and it can be. Remember to keep the stream in mind. Fears belong in the feeling realm, not the action realm. Fears are Water, and we want to remain in Fire. But if we concentrate on the fear, it manifests from the ether when we get to the action realm. What we do (response, plan, action) will manifest.

Thinking, Feeling, Action, Materialization. That’s the stream.