I know how to draw

When I give students an exercise to do, I watch them in their pairs and threes work on the data and the trick is to stop them and go through it with them after they have figured out the answer but before they start over-thinking the question. They start to imagine more depth and difficulty to the question than is there, and get themselves tied up in knots trying to answer imaginary questions that the data can't answer.
I feel like I'm doing this right now with my work/study situation. The teaching component of my job finishes this semester and while I'm keeping a couple of thesis supervision tasks, I'll be looking for work. I was going to lose my job next September anyway, so it felt like time to jump before I was pushed and start pursuing my new avenues with more intention. This is a wholly good thing and I'm excited about peeling away the layers of other people's expectations and demands to find how my 'deep gladness' can meet the world's deep need, as Buechner puts it, which I think is about more than just work, but one thing at a time. Don't overthink it.

"When my daughter was seven years old," says artist Howard Ikemoto, "she asked me one day what I did at work. I told her I worked at the college, that my job was to teach people how to draw. Stared back at me, incredulous, and said, 'You mean they forget?'"

Gregg Levoy ~ Callings

But now I'm not really sure what kind of work to do. I have ideas but I don't feel able to start them now, so in the meantime I just need to pay the bills. But I'm so tired of 'in the meantime'. 'In the meantime' is exactly what I'm trying to get away from, and there's a part of me that knows that training and studying can be ways of avoiding jumping in and just learning by doing. Well, there's more to this anxious rant, but what it boils down to is being in transition. Again. On the bright side, paying attention to figuring out my own vocation will help when I work on it with others.

We can bring ourselves back to the spiritual path countless times every day simply by exercising our willingness to rest in the uncertainty of the present moment - over and over again.
Pema Chodron ~ Comfortable with Uncertainty