When I first started this blog, I wrote a post, it wasn’t always this bad.
I recall when I was the Arts and Culture director of a now prominent nonprofit in Los Angeles. After some struggles finding a job, I had worked my way up quickly in the LA arts & nonprofit scene. I managed a group of 20 people as well as a departmental budget of $300,000.
I felt important.
Although I had student loans, I lived on my own in Silverlake, a cute, and now almost too-hipster neighborhood. I went out often and had a blast. Everything felt like it was in place.
But I was addicted to bettering myself. I thought grad school, at NYU no less, would make me better — take me to the next level of my career.
And here is where the downward spiral begins.
I feel like all of you know me in a certain place, a certain time in history…when I was broke, partially employed, sad, and struggling.
It wasn’t always this way.
Somehow I feel like I’ve downgraded in status. The egotistical part of me wants you to know that I did indeed have a career job at one point and in my mind felt very successful.
But my story changed.
While it has been an utterly humbling and wild experience to have a career, go to NYU, move to Portland and be on food stamps, struggle to find work, eventually find work, then quit my job to work for myself, somehow I feel like who I come across is as this sad, indebted little girl.
Or maybe that’s how I perceive myself? I am not sure, but sometimes I wish all this stuff never happened. I want you to see me in the good light. When everything was together — at least it felt together.
I hope to change my story right in front of your eyes like some sort of magic trick. Become someone else. Not a victim of circumstances, but a survivor. Someone who was dealt unexpected turns, like many people post-Recession.
It wasn’t just about my choices or my failure. It was about so much more.
Now, at 30 I feel too old to deal with some of this b.s. By typical standards, I was more successful and making more money at age 23. That freaking sucks, let me tell you.
I can’t go one day without thinking of money. I’m always thinking about when the next payment will hit. I’m an addict, waiting for my next fix.
And I wonder, will I ever be ok with money?
When I’m debt free and getting my life back on track, will I be ok then?
Will it ever be enough?
I want to see a day when money is part of my lifestyle, but not an obsession or paranoia. It’s something I’m in control of, not controlling me.
So as I fight through this journey and wonder if I will ever be ok with my money, I have to ask, will I be ok with myself?
