Gneech Report, Late December 2017

Source: ModernReston.com

Solarpunk – a plausible near-future sci-fi genre, [...] based on updated Art Nouveau, Victorian, and Edwardian aesthetics, combined with a green and renewable energy movement to create a world in which children grow up being taught about building electronic tech as well as food gardening and other skills, and people have come back around to appreciating artisans and craftspeople, from stonemasons and smithies, to dress makers and jewelers, and everyone in between. -Olivia.

The house is starting to take shape, although laurie_robey and I seriously need some downtime to just come together and work on it, as she's been doing most of the organizing herself by virtue of actually being here. The B&N job, while it has its virtues, has been an enormous time/energy sink, and I suspect it will not last once I get into training. It doesn't make that much more than commissions + book sales, but has made those harder to get done in a timely way.

Being back in Virginia is definitely a relief, and we've made a point of getting some walking around the neighborhood in. The neighbors we've met are all very nice and there's a good sense of community here, which pleases me. And of course, Reston was solarpunk before there was solarpunk, despite every developer in the world trying to turn it into another Crystal City for the past fifty years.

Fuck off, developers. :P Nobody likes you.

The cats have been loving the new place, once they got over the stress of moving. The wide open living room gives them lots of room to tear around when they play, and Dasher particularly loves to Tokyo Drift all around the hardwood floors. (He very clearly does it on purpose when he's happy and excited– when all he wants is to get from point A to point B he just takes the turn normally.) We're particularly happy to see Dasher being energetic and having fun, as he is starting to show his age. He's not processing vitamin B12 properly, so we have to give him a weekly injection of that, and he'll be off to the vet later today for a heart checkup. Given everything he's been through, he's still doing very well.

Also today I have a call with someone from the life coach training organization I'm interested in. I already spoke to one person there, an alumnus who I made contact with through my counselor and who has a very successful practice as well as still working with the training group. The person I'm speaking to today is actually one of her trainers, and I intend to get into a bit more detail about the nitty gritty of the actual program. (Hours, schedule, tuition costs, etc.)

It sounds quite promising. The program is designed to give you hands-on experience fairly quickly and helps you set up your own practice, find clients and referrals, and so forth. Some people (such as my initial contact) stay with the program or create a hybrid career combining clients of their own with program clients, while others simply strike off on their own after completing the course. And since part of understanding what life coaching is all about is having a clients'-eye view of the process, you get the services of one of the instructors as a coach yourself while you go through it all. (Given that I have been more-or-less acting as my own life coach for the past few years, it'd be handy to offload that task onto someone else for a while– not unlike the lawyer not representing themselves. ;) )

Seriously tho, once I started examining the idea of coaching, the more I began to think it was a good fit for me. I've basically been doing it for some of my friends for years (or decades) just by instinct, but it would be good to actually know what I'm doing. ;) (It would also be good to have a profitable line of work again, without going back to the code mines. I don't think I could successfully be an I.T. guy any more even if I wanted to, which God knows I don't.) I suspect the hardest part of the business for me will be the actual entrepreneurial aspect– i.e., billing, accounting, all that jazz– and part of the training program is helping you get that all set up.

Besides creating this as a new career, I'm also thinking about ways I can use the skills to help out the fandom(s) I'm in. I'm looking at creating a "How To Successfully Human" panel to run at furry cons, for instance. Plus anything that makes me a better businessman can only help with selling books and running my tables at conventions. If 2018 goes as I intend, I shall be well on my towards making a better future for myself and the world. :)

-The Gneech