Of the few friends I have let see me at my lowest point, Eddie Harran is one of them. Eddie is this half-asian, super-wired man of mystery that froths excessively on just about anything with a website attached to it. He is also one of my best friends.
Eddie and I were sitting in my room around this time last year and I was in a really tough situation. Those situations in life where you have to make a decision that one way you are going to let yourself down, the other way, you will let others down. The situation was that I liked what I was doing at the advertising agency, but I felt as though I had a higher calling to pursue a new, unexpected dream – building Hello Sunday Morning.
It was 10am on a Tuesday morning, I had called in sick for the first time in a year. All but my face was shielded from the world by my giant white doona. Just my eyes were peeking out from it to see Eddie who was calmly sitting cross-legged in the red arm chair next to me. He was leaning in with his big compassionate face. Looking me directly in the eyes, saying nothing but just smiling his giant, generous smile. I reluctantly smiled back.
I was depressed and a tad anxious about the decision both Eddie and I both knew I had to make. I had to leave the agency that had been my life for the past 3 years. I would let down down my boss who is one of my best friends in making the call but it was something I had to do. I was anguished because it was a job that I fought for and loved every day and I was leaving it for something that had no security, and no clear future. I was leaving the marriage for the mistress.
I pulled the doona down past my mouth to ask Eddie a question that I was really asking of myself, ‘What do you want to do with your life man?’
‘I just want to get paid to just be Eddie,’ he replied with this obscure little smirk on his face as though it was a trick he played on the world everyday.
‘What a dick’, I thought in my head at the time, ‘You can’t just get paid to be you, that would make you a bum!’
12 Months later – South Melbourne
Eddie and I are walking through a small park in Melbourne, it is 11am on a Tuesday morning so there is no one around and we are indulging ourselves in some sort of bullshit, existential model about life that Eddie has drawn on a scrap piece of paper. I turn to Eddie and ask him, ‘so what do you want to do with your life man?’
With almost the same air of calm self-assertion as 12 months ago, he turns to me and says, ‘I just want to get paid to be Eddie.’
I notice just how different my internal dialogue is now, compared with a year ago in my bedroom. Looking at both Eddie’s and my life over the past year, this is exactly what we were both doing – getting paid to just be ourselves. I smile at the thought.
Eddie has managed to freelance his way across to San Francisco, Berlin and around Australia without actually holding anything remotely resembling a 9-5, yet he still doesn’t have a business card and has no idea what to call what he does. As for me… well, I don’t know what you would call my job or title but I certainly get paid to just be me.
I guess the point is to find what you love to do and just do it everyday. Everything else seems to fall into place, eventually.
I love this Chris. Mainly because I am at a similar point in my life now, when I need to make some big decisions. I could go back to university, get a degree that my heart isn’t really in, then get a normal safe job, or I could keep studying part time, work on my own business ventures and then travel and work overseas.
The first would make my family feel a lot happier but I also know that if I don’t try these things I will always be regretting it and wondering what could have been. I have no idea if what I am doing now is going to work and actually allow me to start making some money, but what I do know is that I really enjoy it. Every morning I get to wake up and work on establishing my own business is a day I am extremely happy.
Thanks for the inspiration once again, it comes at a very pertinent moment for me.
Thanks Alex. It’s rare for people to find what makes them truly happy – that concept of purpose. The path isn’t carved and there’s a lot of bush in the way but paradise awaits. Go for it man
Mr Raine,
Humbled.
Honoured.
Happy.
I am lucky lad to have you as a mate.
(Raises his tea he is drinking)
Here is to being our authentic selves 100% (good and bad), getting paid for it, and making a difference all at once. And in doing it, inspiring others to do themselves.
Dichotomies are illusions.
We can have it all and be it all. A harder path perhaps, but, in the end, worth it.
And before we I get too deep and meaningful, here are a few bad calls that will hopefully make you laugh + cringe
#narrativeAPI
#subjective
#logoootherapyyyy
#analysis
#crushit
Cheers brother. Talk soon
Eddie
Thanks Eddie, raised #tea right back at you.
Chris, thanks for sharing this post and telling your stories with such heart. Your ambition and joy to just be resonates through your projects and your efforts.
Cheers,
Steve
Thanks Steve I really appreciate that. Today was a pretty rough day for me and the ‘doing’ sometimes smothers the ‘being’. I guess the main thing is to just get back on the ‘being’ horse.
Nice post Chris (I love that grab from Benjamin Button too – haven’t seen the movie) … and wouldn’t it be nice if we all got given that clear instruction at the beginning of our lives… “your purpose is to get paid for being you”. Sorted.
I remember when I went overseas the first time, my friend gave me a card which I kept in my journal. The quote on the front said “Your goal in life is to find out who you really are”.
So maybe its a two step process:
1. Find out who you are
2. Get paid for it
Eddie has been in your shoes – and that makes him the most valuable friend you’ll ever find. I loved your piece – beautifully written to illustrate the pleasure and pain of finding yourself and the ying and yang that this search involves. I think some people I’ve met on this type of journey become painfully egocentric and that’s the danger. If you’re a parent, this can’t occur, but for others you will need to irritate yourself in a similar vein. You and Ed do this by your work to do good digitally eg Kiva, HSM, Digital for Good (and scores more of socially conscious ventures of your making).
Thank you, you’ve made my morning!
Lovely post, Chris.
Awesome post, Chris. I love it when people write genuinely about who they really are and not afraid to go to their vulnerable places.
I have always wanted to be a doctor, and went to do my Medical Science degree, on my way to my graduate entry Medical program, but half way through the program, I realised that being a doctor is not really, me. I came out, did whatever I needed to survive and do whatever I really want to do.
I still owe the bank back in Malaysia tenth of thousands of dollars, I have no Centrelink and my government doesn’t give me a cent, I’m doing my second degree, and trying to do every single thing I can at the moment to pay off the debt, to survive, and at the same time, do what I want to do… slowly.
Not easy, and can definitely relate to your “feeling down” moments.