Afternoon Pages: May 6th, 2020

Due to the coronavirus pandemic, the D.C. metro region has been in a state of lockdown. To alleviate fear and stress, my writer's group has put together a daily "morning pages" get-together on Zoom in order to touch base before starting the day. Here's some of my brief thoughts.

Today I'm feeling rather afraid. Afraid of what, it's hard to say, but it's not like there's any shortage of things to be afraid about. I think my challenge is to convert fears into problems, problems into challenges, and challenges into solutions and achievements. If you find yourself marching through hell, keep marching, that sort of deal.

I think my fears come from my insecurities (doesn't it always). This statism from the lockdown put me right in my comfort zone, and my comfort zone is this North Korea-esque life where I pretty much just eke out a survivalist existence. Nice thing about it is, it keeps me safe (I think everybody staying home is living in my world now...). The downside is there's no need for coping mechanisms and social / people skills if you're always in your comfort zone at home, and I don't have the means to permanently live by myself. Otherwise I'd be up in a cabin I built myself in northern Canada with a dog.

So I think I need to put myself out of my comfort zone, one way or another. I've been thinking about taking up some software freelancing as a way to stretch my meager savings a bit longer and see whether I can get enough financial runway to make a SaaS-based product a thing.