Waking Up

Anxiety - noun - a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome.


Anxiety is something I've become uncomfortably accustomed to recently. I can't recall when it really started, but at this point it feels as if it's always been there, and that I've only just now learned what to call it. It has an insatiable appetite for my well being and only seems to subside when I'm so busy doing something that I don't have time to actually consider my well being. Anxiety is the state, city, and neighborhood I currently reside in and I'm not sure I'll ever be able to move.


Now I might not know exactly when this started (although I could guess), but I know exactly what is causing it; my career. In fact, the more I think about it, the more I realize that my career has been at the center of the vast majority of stresses and anxiety I've encountered in my adult life (second only to my weight, but that's a story for a different blog post).


For those who don't know, I work in television and film. It's funny, when I tell people that in the real world, I usually say that I'ma television producer. That sounds much better than what I actually do, which is struggle. I struggle to find jobs. I struggle to get hired onto those jobs. I struggle to get anything more than a day here or there working on those jobs. And I struggle working my ass off for 15+ hours a day for pennies on those jobs. To think, I went to school for 4 years just so that I could struggle to find jobs that most spider monkeys are overqualified for.


2018 has been the worst for my career so far. After starting off on what I thought to be a high note of a producing job (which actually carried over from 2017) it's been nothing but scrounge and struggle since February. I've had such a hard time that I spend most of my free time trying to figure out what other jobs I could be doing. And there in lies the rub. No matter how hard I try, I can NEVER think of anything else I would be qualified for. Everything I've done for the last 6 years has pretty much only equipped me to work in this industry. The only other thing I ever feel like I would like to do is to become a police officer (like I had always originally planned) but I'm way too fat and unable to get my weight under control for that. So I just stay locked in this spiral, hating what I do and being unable to do anything else.


The other day, my best friend said something to me that I haven't been able to get out of my head. She told me the reason I haven't been able to find another career path is because I haven't really given up on this one. She said that was a good thing. I hadn't ever really thought about it like that until she said it, but I think she's absolutely right. I haven't even been able to fathom another line of work for myself, because deep down, I still want this one. I still want to follow my dream. And that's the problem.


I'm tired. Tired of having to struggle so much for so little. Tired of only working a day or 2 here or there because no one wants to trust me with a full time position. Tired of waking up at 3am to drive miles and miles to the middle of nowhere so that I can stand around in the sun all day. Tired of sending resumes out into the abyss where they're almost certainly never even read. Tired of being embarrassed about just how many days a week I spend at home waiting for my phone to ring. But most of all, I'm tired of not being able to look at the woman that I love and knowing that I can provide for her and the family she deserves. I'm so fucking tired.


So that's it. I have to give up. I have to wake up from this dream. I just don't see any other way. As it is right now, I'm only about $30 away on any given day from having to move back in with my parents. And yet here I am preparing to buy a car and yet I have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA HOW I WILL EVER BE ABLE TO AFFORD THE NOTE. I'd still love to write. And maybe one day I'll be able to again. That's all I could really hope for. But my days of bleeding for other people's art have to come to end. Sooner rather than later. So this has to be it. From here on out, I've got to do things differently. My life depends on it.