Financially Free!!!

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Comment by Maria Whitworth on August 12, 2009 at 8:17pm

Hey Susan, I look forward to meeting you at Rethinking Education/Rethinking Everything!!

Comment by Brenda on August 12, 2009 at 4:18pm

Hi All,

I did an update on our journey to being FINANCIALLY FREE awhile back and in there i talked about how I had picked up a transcribing job that is VERY part time and we use that money for fun money. Well our real estate investing business has really taken off and i am no longer going to be typing. I was wondering if anyone is interested in this and i can pass along the information to the person i do the jobs for. There is no guarantee that they will hire you on, but it is very easy and you can do it at any time from any where. I would love to be able to help out another RU family get a little closer to their financial freedom. Email me off list if you are interested!

Comment by Susan Burke on August 7, 2009 at 7:45am

Are any of you going to the Rethinking Education conference in Texas this September? I am eager to go to the seminars on unjobbing!

Comment by Heidi Bazilian on August 3, 2009 at 6:52am

Maria, I love that "unjobbing." I will have to ponder what I would do anyway. I think it is changing.

Comment by Maria Whitworth on August 2, 2009 at 11:59pm

Financially free means to me that I am generating plenty of income engaged in activities that I would do anyway, even if I were not being paid. I call this "unjobbing," and it's what lights my fire and motivates my inspiration. Instead of simply making a living (surviving), we are naturally designed to thrive. So how can you thrive? What does your prosperous life look like -- what is new and different from what you are experiencing in your life now?

Comment by Heidi Bazilian on August 2, 2009 at 7:36pm

Nance,
I guess I am in a pretty good "un" position, but not in a position yet to do the RV thing. We are working toward getting out of debt, kicking around the idea of selling the house. I guess we will keep our vision and plod along.

Comment by Nance Confer on August 1, 2009 at 8:56am

It sounds like you are about as "un" as you can get and still make a living. :)

At least you have the option to work at home and are extending that option to more families who can use the cyber charter choice.

Nance

Comment by Heidi Bazilian on August 1, 2009 at 8:10am

I am a newbie to this group but have been schooling my children at home for about 8 years. I can't say I've been "home"schooling (we are too laisse-faire for that) but I can't say I've been "un"schooling, really. My husband has fully embraced the unschooling philosophy and easily lives it. I, however, though totally agree with and by nature am inclined to unschooling, am still in desperate need of deschooling. I'm working on it. My problem is, of course, financial. I've been a public high school teacher for 20+ years. I am in a great gig now; a public cyber charter school working from home. But it keeps me "schooled." I want to "de"school. But I am not in any kind of financial position to quit my job, or do anything else; can't really think of anything that will make me the same income; we are stuck financially. I am the breadwinner and as many Americans, we are in debt, blah, blah, blah. Our ultimate vision is to "live" in an RV so we can really, radically not just unschool, but LIVE. So, any suggestions, advice, listening ear is appreciated. Thanks.

Comment by Brenda on March 11, 2009 at 4:26pm

my un"ing" spirit has always caused me to not be able to remain employed by others for long...however I do it from time to time. Currently my partner and I are self employed AND I work 20 hrs a week else where for the cheap health insurance it provides my family (not many companies will provide benefits for my partner since we're both woman). She still works full time else where. We are SOOO ready to quit our jobs, I would go for it but my partner is extremely causious in life so she needs us to wait till more income from our business is in the bank, can't say I blame her during these times but historiclly I have always been so much happier when totally self employed. It leaves time to do so much I love not just work...

Comment by EL on September 10, 2008 at 8:35am

Meredith, by all means steal the words, grist for the mill, don't you know.

Good luck being understood though. It's a hard nut to crack.

A few years ago I attended a high school reunion. Several of us migrated to the parking lot talking about and as the mandatory potation was being passed around, we were talking about life, the universe, and everything. Expectations, if we only knew then what we knew now. We were having a fine time. It is especially well remembered because by now several of those fellows have died and so it will never be followed up or repeated.

Amid the snortles and guffaws a reserved, somber figure strode up. He had been class valedictorian, gone on to a major university, and is now a well known biochemist.

The parking lot 'muchachada' contained the grandson and assumed heir to the local pharmaceutical manufacturer who had eschewed it all and had spent a number of years as a fishing boat hand in the northwest, he looked every inch the pirate. The son (and apparent heir) of the largest mortuary business had found his way to owning a small stained glass window shop. Etc and etc.

The nearest cabron passed the bottle to our valedictorian and we prepared to raise our motley collection of paper cups, soda cans, coffee cups, whatever had been handy, in the toast we'd done as each of us had wandered over. His genteel nose recoiled at first but none the less he joined in the 'a votre sante' and then looked about the group that had reached a hiatus in their banter to allow him to speak.

"What do you fellows do?"

By 'do' he meant 'do for a living' of course.

The jocund mode was not so easily to be dampened. One replied, "Oh, I suppose just about anything we want to do!"

"Do? There's 'things'(heh,heh) I'd like to do before I'm too old."
"You're already too old."
"Well, I'm not doing anything. I've done enough."
"Yeah, all this doing business, it's not what it was cracked up to be.
"Boys, here we are, out here under the stars, ('street light' someone corrected him with a chuckle) feeling fine. Looks to me like we're doing fine."
"Hear, hear, and the paper cups were refilled and raised again in a salute."

The valedictorian stared a moment then turned without a word and shuffled away. His whole life and whole being were tied up in his research grants and what was written about him in the trade magazines. If he could not engage us in the "what do you do" game, he had no other way of relating.

I emailed him once after that. The reply was deadpan and there was none of the fine fellow I'd known in high school left, more's the pity. When I pressed him in that one brief exchange as to what he was really about, don't want to hear about the PhD or the grants or the accolades, I can read about those on the internet when I plug in his name. What do you really think? He said he saw himself as making an attempt through biochemistry to improving human life.

Ironic, that. What he so much identified with as improving, it seemed he himself had never indulged in it.

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