We need to be less afraid.

I mean, come on, what do we really have to lose?

Think about it: if you have your health and people who love you, you have everything. Art – or any creative endeavor – is just play in this wonderful game of life. It might be what we do for a living, and we might be dead serious about it, but in reality what’s the worst that can happen to you if something doesn’t go right with your art?

That’s what I thought. It’s not that bad, is it.  So what are we so afraid of?

Most of us we stumble on the financial aspects and risk-taking that going full-time (and by full-time, I mean you make your living financially from your creative work) brings. There’s uncertainty. There’s what ifs. There’s the sense that you are absolutely, ultimately responsible for your financial fate. Which you are. But until you cross the border into full-time creative work, you won’t know the true extent of your personal power to create a life you love.

For all those folks who will talk you out of taking the leap – of, dare you even mention it, quitting a job in this economy (there’s never a ‘good’ time to quit a job, by the way)- they need to answer for their own dreams that are waiting for them to take a risk.

What happens when you take the leap? You learn that you can fly.

But here’s the secret: you’ve always been able to fly. You were born to fly. To follow the path of your unique talent and dreams. It’s just that you’ve spent too much getting dizzy looking down at the ground below and not enough time looking up at the endless sky.

I know, I know…what if it doesn’t work out? That’s what you want to know, right? What if you have a family, dependent on you?

Well, what if you could know that you had the power to lose it all financially and then earn it again? What if money wasn’t such a big deal? What if we took a more playful perspective with this amazing opportunity we have to live by our creative work and took more chances? What if the worst that could happen is losing a job, losing a house, losing the ability to maintain the same standard of living – wouldn’t you still, ultimately, really, in your soul, be okay? Couldn’t you find the resolve and power to find another job (there are jobs out there in many fields), to live with less, to start over, if you had to?

Of course you could. Many people are. And that’s one of the greatest blessings of a tough economy – it hurts, but it shakes us up and sets us free from the fear we have of what might happen if “the worst” happens to us economically. Because we are stronger than that.

We’re always stronger than we think we are.

Money is energy. It follows your lead. And if you are making decisions based on what you know in your soul to be right for you, you’ll create the financial energy you need to live your life.

So, let’s be less afraid. Let’s take more risks. Let’s enjoy this journey on earth and dare to do what we love.