This quote reminded me of something today. Reminds me that I didn’t get sober to settle. That I don’t care about money, the way my father and mother pined over it, broke their backs for it, sweated it out, and died for it. I would rather work more hours, in a physically demanding job, alone, than ever go back to that state of being where I valued status or ego, or place in society more than my own peace of mind. I’ll not settle for the lesser state of mind from which I came. Sobriety is incredible. I would rather be sober and homeless, broke, riding on the bus, than care about what kind of car I drive, or what kind of job I have, or what people think of me. I have given it all away, more than once, and I’ve gotten it all back in sobriety, and that which hasn’t returned, I did not want.
I was great at sales, when I lied and manipulated a lot. But I was not happy.
If my sales career comes back to me on my terms, than so be it, but for the time being I will be content to take a less stressful job, and simply replace that energy, effort and worry I would be devoting to my career in the practice of writing. The autobiography needs to be cut down, edited, commercialized before marketed to paperback, but the format of Books4free.com works well, and now I just need to really find a vein of content where I can sink my voice, and spend some time devoted to a story that spans centuries… or maybe just multiple complex characters. God knows I’ve known a few.
I’ll return to the editing of the Hippopotamus Sea when I have some more time and money, but for now I think I’m going to begin just by practicing writing some short stories. They may not be great. They may only be rough drafts and I may even mix up character names or use them to line my kittens litter box, but I figure I may as well write them in the this blog as IÂ can hide and unhide them as necessary, or even go back and edit them. I’m not sure how the copyrights work on a blog, but hopefully, I’ll just prove I have enough content that I’m worth hiring over time, haha… But the basic premise and idea is that I write a few short stories per genre and see what I enjoy writing the most.
War Stories
Sci Fi
Horror (including but not limited to Vampires and Zombies)
Romance (though cynicism may reign in this topic)
Job Interview 2011
Sales Job 2011
Modern Church Experience
Divorce w a Child
Hunting & Fishing Stories
More or less this is to practice and exercise writing in a public setting… I figure if I just start with something, some sort of goal oriented project, I’ll accomplish more than just randomly writing cartoons that are hit or miss. This way, I’ll at least be working on my overall body of work. And I can feel better about my career in sales going to the sidelines for a while, as it’s made me so terribly unhappy in my sobriety. In my drinking and drugging it was always the means to an end, but soberly, I just feel like to much of a fake always trying to smooze, manipulate, make friends with people for the purpose of selling. I’d rather do an honest days hard labor and be able to write than to sell… Maybe one day I’ll be able to do both, but for right now, just really putting my heart and soul into cultivating my writing seems like it makes sense. I guess we shall see. haha, I make plans and God laughs!
-Jared Bryan Smith
JB Smiths Blog - Author @ books4free.com 