Bringin' home the bacon...

[jakestepstool]

If this thread should be somewhere else... I couldn't find one.

What do you guys do? Construction, admisistration, stay at home dad, professional ___ ?

I'm a graphic designer/production artist. This is what I'm really good at. I work for a company that makes flexo printing plates. Our largest customer prints 97% of the flour and sugar bags in the USA. So go look in your cabinet or pantry for the flour or sugar. If it's in a paper bag then chances are, I made the printing plates that printed that bag. Great Value, Brookshires, Gold Medal, Safeway, Richfood, Our Family, you name it... virtually every major or minor store, chain, or mill brand you can think of. We also do some cat litter bags, feed bags, seed bags, charcoal bags, and yard waste self standing bags.

[David Cunningham]

If this thread should be somewhere else... I couldn't find one.

What do you guys do? Construction, admisistration, stay at home dad, professional ___ ?

I'm a graphic designer/production artist. This is what I'm really good at. I work for a company that makes flexo printing plates. Our largest customer prints 97% of the flour and sugar bags in the USA. So go look in your cabinet or pantry for the flour or sugar. If it's in a paper bag then chances are, I made the printing plates that printed that bag. Great Value, Brookshires, Gold Medal, Safeway, Richfood, Our Family, you name it... virtually every major or minor store, chain, or mill brand you can think of. We also do some cat litter bags, feed bags, seed bags, charcoal bags, and yard waste self standing bags.

Sounds like interesting work. I have several diverse professions and businesses because I like to stay busy and don't like to fight market cycles. I've been a professional trader for a long time; currencies is my current favorite. I'm also a business consultant. I do executive, business, life, personal, and marital/relationship coaching. I do IT consulting and even still do some network and software troubleshooting for some really old clients who became close friends over the years. I roast gourmet coffee and train roasters and baristas, and I have a furniture and cabinet shop. I started out in military and civilian intelligence as a cryptographer and ended my military career in USSOCOM. Trained to be a chef at one time but didn't want to leave the salary I had at the time to start life as a professional chef. Grew up on a tobacco farm. So I've been all over the map, learned a lot, and enjoyed it all. All of my businesses grew from hobbies, so everything I do for work is something I have done purely for pleasure and/or personal development at some time. Having a lot of different hats to wear and being a good multi-tasker, I don't have to fight market cycles, have enough to do that I can be quite picky about what I do, and consequently am probably the happiest person I know.

[jakestepstool]

Sounds like interesting work.

It is and somewhat complex but it's art, which I love, and it's not something just any artist can jump into without learning a lot of technical stuff about printing and bag construction. It gives my a great sense of accomplishment. Plus, I can see my work almost everywhere I go. lol! So it's fun but it is challenging so I really couldn't ask for a better career for me. I too am always a happy dude, except for the last couple of months of course and people tell me that I have a very commanding presence and they just want to be around me and hear what I have to say. It's a pretty cool thing and I have a very blessed life. Even with the hard times that have hit my relationship recently.

[David Cunningham]

What about the rest of you? This sounds like as good a place as any to have everyone talk about what they do, and especially whether they are satisfied with it, what they've learned from it, what they might like to change about it, etc. I have a friend who is a career consultant whom I might be able to entice into joining us if many need some specific direction, and for those stuck on the fence between something they have and don't want and something they want but aren't sure they can achieve, I'm sure we can round up enough facts to get you off the fence one way or another if you want to participate.

[richie.cupertino]

I am a correctional officer. And I am extremely unsatisfied. The only plus is it gives me time to read David's newsletters. Being a single father of 2 at 36 years old, I don't have a lot of options. I am however exploring things.

[David Cunningham]

I am a correctional officer. And I am extremely unsatisfied. The only plus is it gives me time to read David's newsletters. Being a single father of 2 at 36 years old, I don't have a lot of options. I am however exploring things.

Have you ever thought about being a firearms instructor and living in the Southwest? If so, PM me.

[richie.cupertino]

Have you ever thought about being a firearms instructor and living in the Southwest? If so, PM me.

Thank you for replying. Actually guns have never interested me. I have always had a strong interest in photography and journalism. When I was 18 I was beginning a precollege course in writing for journalism. My father saw the materials in the mail and snapped, said I was going to be a correctional officer so I would be set. The next weekend I took the civil service exam and the rest is history.. Was married and had a kid before I was 22 and it was stable work. Looking back, I should have told my father to get bent.... or at some point over the last 18 years I should have done something different. But it was always steady money. I am now at a point where money doesn't scare me and I could walk away from that job.. as long as I had something waiting for me. I sold my camera about a year ago to pay the power and light bill, but am now at a point where I can begin to save for a new one. My plan is to do independent photo journalism stuff using the web as a vehicle(while I work in my current job) and work my @$$ off to make a career out of it.

[David Cunningham]

Thank you for replying. Actually guns have never interested me. I have always had a strong interest in photography and journalism. When I was 18 I was beginning a precollege course in writing for journalism. My father saw the materials in the mail and snapped, said I was going to be a correctional officer so I would be set. The next weekend I took the civil service exam and the rest is history.. Was married and had a kid before I was 22 and it was stable work. Looking back, I should have told my father to get bent.... or at some point over the last 18 years I should have done something different. But it was always steady money. I am now at a point where money doesn't scare me and I could walk away from that job.. as long as I had something waiting for me. I sold my camera about a year ago to pay the power and light bill, but am now at a point where I can begin to save for a new one. My plan is to do independent photo journalism stuff using the web as a vehicle(while I work in my current job) and work my @$$ off to make a career out of it.

Indeed! Oustanding! Whatever you do, follow your passion. There is no torture that can befall a person any worse than getting trapped in a job that you don't look forward to getting out of bed to do every day. The secret to career and business success is to find something that you passionately enjoy and find a way to get people to pay you more to do it than it costs you to do it, generating a profit. All of my businesses over the years have been cash-producing hobbies, and I have never once wanted for anything nor have I ever spent a minute lingering in bed because I didn't want to get up and face the day. Check out your options, and when you find a profitable one that will sustain you and fit in with your other life goals, needs, and desires (see http://forum.makingherhappy.com/show...-for-Happiness for a full-proof method of absolutely and accurately determining what these are and eliminating anything in your life that would get in the way of attaining them), commit to it fully.

Incidentally, I practice what I preach. My wife and I just sold our home and several businesses to move back to the Southwest in a radical career path change. The economy has slowed to the point that those businesses did not provide enough challenge or throughput to keep either of us busy and an opportunity arose to do something I had always wanted to do, and she found the prospect exciting as well. Taking it requred a huge change in income, but advancement is performance-based and we can get back to something acceptable in a few months; career isn't about money, but rather about fulfilling two things: your potential and what you see as your purpose.

Yes, everybody always wants to make more money, but taking a lot of money to do something you hate doing is prostitution, not career involvement. If what you love to do doesn't pay enough to uphold the lifestyle you want to maintain, supplement your income with other efforts, such as the web-based photography business you describe, an information product that doesn't require a lot of your time, a rental property, etc. -- some other income stream(s), not some sort of speculation that could destroy the wealth you create in your primary career pursuit.

l recently heard a very intelligent and enterprising young man say that the average millionaire has seven different income streams. Think about that. He or she doesn't have a bazillion speculative ventures going on, isn't glued to a screen doing day-trading (I've been there, made good money at it, and hated it because it is stressful even when you're very good at it and it tends to cut you off from the rest of the world), isn't buying up every trendy collectible he or she can get their hands on to sell on eBay, and isn't flipping houses. He or she has income streams established in things that don't require inordinate amounts of their time and effort, like the businesses I described above. The key to an easy and profitable second-income business (that may well develop into a primary income business) isn't to build a better mouse trap and wait for the world to beat a path to your door, but to find an easily-identifiable and reachable market segment and sell them what they want. For instance, if you have an extreme interest in customizing cars and have a great source for parts and materials, put up a web site selling them and buy an e-mail address list from some car magazines, or people who have bought a particular product that is typical of your product line.

In a nutshell, do the "Getting Your Life in Order for Happiness" exercise, clear the clutter out of your life, examine your options, pick something you are truly passionate about and has a reasonable chance of profit, establish pass/fail criteria before you begin ("the last rational thought anyone has about a trade or venture is often the last one they have before they start"), and commit to it fully, to hang with it unless and until your fail criteria is triggered. If the latter should occur, it is the venture that fails, not you. Learn from it and move on instead of labeling yourself as a failure.


Man, I wish someone had told me this when I was young. ;-)