I have been an employee in Corporate America for most of my career. I put myself through college by cleaning a department store in the mornings before school and by selling housewares in the same store at night. I got my first “real job” in a software company helping troubleshoot customer technical issues. My next job was as an internal consultant, helping create IT solutions for other departments.

Last year when I lost my job I briefly and only semi-seriously considered becoming a consultant on my own. Then I got a part time job doing data entry, and there went that. I didn’t have the flexibility needed to be a consultant, and it would mess up my unemployment benefits if I made any money at all doing it. Around the same time a friend and I started a side-business which, so far, proved to be more a distraction than a real prospect for financial independence. I enjoyed the idea of being a business owner, but the reality was…well, less than fun.

So I continued looking for a chance to get back into a nice, secure job (even though there is no such thing). Eventually I found it, or so I thought. I would be required to sell business services. I could do that, though I don’t like selling. The idea was that eventually I would bring in enough clients that my boss would need me to step up to a different position to help take care of all those clients. So I took the job, neatly overlooking the hints my boss dropped about sales being the place to make money. I didn’t care. I was working for someone again. Back in my comfort zone went I! This would be SO much better than being self-employed!

Except it wasn’t very comfortable. Even when I proved I could do the selling part it didn’t feel right. It took me the better part of a week to put my finger on it. I was pursuing security that just wasn’t there. I had no promises from my boss that another position would open up for me, or what it would even pay. I would make money only by closing sales–not just doing the work of selling, but closing sales. And if I wanted to keep eating I would need to do it again and again, month after month, and maybe someday get to move into something more stable, but may not pay well.

This was no less risky than working for myself, and perhaps more so! Here I would need to sell a certain amount, month after month, indefinitely–whether the market supported it or not. I would not have any control over the product I sold, nor would I get any benefit from any ongoing revenue from customers continuing to subscribe to the service. I would be relying on someone else’s product and rules to be able to feed my family.

It got me thinking. If I could find my own service to provide I would still have to sell, but I’d be able to keep whatever I brought in. I would have control over the quality of that service. The game would be to sell a customer once and then keep them coming back rather than bringing in an endless stream of new customers. If I sold for myself, successful sales would mean I would get to slowly transition into work I enjoy. Sales would always be a part of the job, of course, but it would not be the main activity.

Pretty soon it became obvious. If the risk was at least equal–I had to sell something to live, regardless of whose service I was selling–then I would rather sell for myself. Something had changed inside me. Unlike a year ago, I was now ready to accept the risk of failure in exchange for the greater benefits of success. I was ready to own my own future.

Who knows. Perhaps someday I’ll by desire or by necessity go back to working for someone else. But unless there is something specific I need to accomplish in doing so, I’ll likely be intent on getting back out on my own as soon as possible. I’m not going to rely on the corporate comfort zone any more. The “I’ll pay you this much to do that work” agreement lasts only as long as the employer’s desire to continue it. You can take steps to mitigate the impact of losing your job, but you can’t control when it will end.

Am I trying to justify my decision to take the risky step of entrepreneurship? Probably. I could very well be trying to psych myself up for a hard road ahead. I have no delusions of overnight success. For every day like yesterday, when it seemed a contract was all but assured, there will be days like today when the prospective client calls back and cancels the next appointment. I’m going to have to toughen up in a lot of ways.

But I do feel more engaged than I’ve felt in a long time. My first efforts to gain clients have been encouraging. I’ve been able to connect with them and open their eyes to possibilities. I do have skills and experiences that are useful to others. I’m excited about my work, and the only problem seems to be that there is just so much of it to do in starting a new business.

It’s empowering (gah, I hate that word, but sometimes it just…fits) to not be sitting around hoping some company will see my resume and want to interview me and hire me. It’s a bit intoxicating flying solo without a corporate support system to rely on–and not entirely in the “pleasant buzz” sort of way, but far too often in the “urrrp, why is the room spinning” way. It’s forcing me to face down some of my demons and bad habits which, while certainly good for me, is not overly pleasant. I am about to learn a great deal about myself, including some things I’ll probably wish I hadn’t.

But I can’t help but think that I will come through this a better person. I’ve been playing it safe for a long time, letting things happen to me in my career rather than making things happen. I’ve followed the path of least resistance for most of my life, and I think I’m tired of it. It served me well for awhile, but to quote Rodgers and Hammerstein, I’ve “gone about as fer as [I] can go”.

It is my hope that the path I’ve chosen is the path to self reliance. It’s the conscious decision to act and not just be acted upon. It’s the notion that I have a say in where I’m headed. It’s the idea that I can do what I set my mind to; that I’m capable of a great many things. It’s the realization that I can make for myself a life far different than what society tells me is the norm.

You know what I’m talking about: “Carpe Diem” and all that feel-good twaddle they crammed into “Dead Poets Society”. Except we believed it for awhile, because the movie felt right–the young men climbed onto their desks to salute Robin Williams at the risk of being expelled, after all! Then the Live Mediocrities Society beat reality back into us, and when we found we couldn’t sustain our extraordinary living long enough we decided it had to be twaddle, lest the problem be found to be us all along.

That was me. Being mediocre was okay. It was safe. But then the recession came along, and we mediocrities found ourselves in the unemployment line. Salieri, the patron saint of mediocrities everywhere, had neither succor nor absolution to offer. (Woo! Another movie reference! I’m on a roll!) It turns out he was never actually canonized.

So the time has come to choose. Do I choose to follow the failed saint or the twaddle-peddling English teacher?

Mr. Keating, may I have a heaping helping of twaddle, please?

Certainly! And Mr. Anderson! Don’t think that I don’t know that this assignment scares the hell out of you, you mole!

Popular Mechanics ask and answers the question: is it valuable to tinker with things?

But this begs the question, are the modern day DIYers’ wild projects as worthwhile as “serious” projects such as car restoration or tiling a bathroom? Should we care what the “it” in DIY stands for?

Here at Popular Mechanics, self-sufficiency is a virtue. The abilities to change your oil, build a shed, paint your house, fix a leaky toilet and construct an Adirondack chair, in our opinion, all lead to a better life. Of course, none of these projects is necessary for survival, or even all that frugal.

…Because a project doesn’t save money or time, however, doesn’t mean that it isn’t valuable.

The deck demolition project continues. Last weekend we got all the deck structure removed, and over the week friends have been coming to lay claim to the scrap lumber. We still have some of it, but enough is gone to be able to begin working on the exposed area, getting it ready to put into garden beds.

Today’s project was been to remove all the posts and their concrete pilings. I spent much of the morning just unearthing the piles, getting them loosened enough for removal. Then I had to figure out a way to get them out of the holes–safely. Understand I am not a big boy. I weigh 130 lbs. These piles weigh at least 50 lbs, and they are in a hole below ground level. A recipe for pain.

But then came the idea. This is one of the reasons I enjoy working with my hands on projects like this because invariably there will come a point when muscle alone will not solve the problem. I get to engage my brain more significantly to come up with a solution.

In this case the solution was a lever. I found some rope and a 5′ length of 2×4. I tied one end of the rope around the post still exposed above the concrete. I tied the other end around one end of the 2×4. Placing the other end of the 2×4 firmly against the ground, I could then pull backward on the top end of the 2×4, which would drag the concrete piling out of the hole. By moving the bottom end of the 2×4, then pulling on the top end, I could continue dragging the piling to the collection point much more easily than I could roll it or boost it into a wheelbarrow.

Here, let me demonstrate with a diagram:

You will note, of course, my big, burly muscles, and that I can do it one-handed. And yes, I really do float on air! (Note: picture is not drawn to scale, nor is really at all indicative of my appearance, nor my physique (especially the muscles), nor the gravitational conditions in my area.)

So anyway, thanks to my simple machine, I have cleared out all the posts that are in the way. There are a few I will just leave, as they’re not in the way of anything. But it’s amazing how simple machines can make such a difference. I continually had difficulty getting the piles to budge with just my shovel, but the minute I got the idea to get one of my 25-pound landscaping blocks to knock against the top of the post, things went much easier. I could knock the piles loose much more quickly than I could excavate them. And the lever was simply wonderful! I couldn’t have done it otherwise.

Archimedes would be proud.

The Atlantic has an interview with James Bertini, founder of Denver Urban Homesteading:

If there are enough people who care about raising and growing their own food, it will inevitably encourage people to cook more and spend more time on food preparation. And consequently, people will lead healthier lives and have healthier bodies.

There are certainly people who don’t have the time and aren’t interested, and that’s fine. We’re not telling people that they ought to choose any particular lifestyle. We are providing the information about growing and raising your own food and getting in touch with the soil and with cooking.

Animals can be great for individuals, great for families, and even for a neighborhood. Many of the people who have chickens in Denver tell me that neighbors come from doors down, sometimes blocks down, to visit them just because they want to see the chickens or let their kids play with the chickens.

I’m the president of a home owners association that doesn’t allow livestock, and doesn’t allow xeriscaping. The rules were written twenty years ago. Times have changed. I’m trying to not have to enforce those restrictions, but there is regular pressure to do so. So far no one has complained about the family with the chickens, but I’ve received several complaints about the two xeriscapers. I need to have a talk with them about keeping it as neat and tidy as they can so people won’t have as many grounds for complaint.

But ultimately, it’s a different world today. Governments, cities, and neighborhoods have to change with the times. And people have to change too–and be as responsible as possible to make it easier for people to accept.

Lauren at Path Across has an article on four ways to save money and time. To summarize:

• Use smaller amounts of cleaning products
• Eat leftovers and use up less-than-crisp vegetables
• Cancel the cable TV
• Grow a few houseplants and feed then kitchen compost

Read the whole article for details. These are good ideas, though we already do most of these. In our case our kitchen scraps already go into some composting bins I made a few years back. We never have had cable TV, and I am the “Leftover King”. Quite frankly it boggles my mind that people could actually throw away perfectly good food just because it’s leftovers. Some food tastes better the next day and beyond.

So the only one that we aren’t already on top of is the first one. I’ll have to check with my wife, as she handles the laundry. I know I could probably go a little easier on the cleaning products in cleaning the bathrooms.

That’s one problem with being frugal–it’s hard to cut back any further. Yet somehow we managed. When I lost my job we cut our budget by a third, and not all of that was the money we no longer put into savings. On the whole our lifestyle has not been impacted that much. On the other hand, I do pray regularly that none of our major appliances decides to go out before we get a solid income stream going again. When I get my first paycheck I intend to not mention it anywhere near the kitchen!

It was neither a astounding success nor a miserable failure. I’d call today a good, solid win. I didn’t last the entire eleven hours. I only made it nine before I got a headache, wore out, and called it a day. But I did make quite a few contacts and develop over a dozen good leads.

My prognosis: I can talk to people in person. But now the thought of calling these people back to set an appointment scares me. I hate the phone. I prefer face to face. But there’s no turning back now.

The funny thing is that I actually found the morning networking session invigorating. I enjoyed talking to people! Of course it helped that they were all energized, friendly, and there to make contacts, too. But as the day wore on and people wore down it got more difficult. People didn’t make eye contact as easily. People’s body language just wasn’t as welcoming. I think an eleven hour event is too long, quite frankly.

I did try to go to the last two hours, which were also a networking opportunity. But the energy of the room had changed dramatically from the morning session. People were tired. They were sitting down at tables. They were hanging out with their friends, and no one was budging. I quickly surmised that networking was going to be difficult, even without my headache and exhaustion, and beat a hasty retreat.

Onward to the next phase. It will be interesting to see how many of the people who were so welcoming today are still welcoming when I call them up. I hope I’m pleasantly surprised.