a day in the life

This is kind of what I want my daily life to be like:

• 8am: wake up fairly early feeling magically refreshed. eat a couple muffins and workout for 30-45 min then shower. (ideal workouts would be fun aerobics like dancing, plus stretching and core building through stuff like yoga and pilates).  
• 9am: a really good, well-rounded breakfast with reading. lots of fresh fruit and water.
• 10am-5pm: the work day begins. i would either have a job i love or be self-employed to work on my own projects. or have a sugar-daddy "sponsor" paying my bills so i can work on whatever i want.  these projects would be all the stuff i like to make and do as outlined throughout this entire blog. if this time was for me to do my own projects i'd probably have to set up a schedule of which things to do on which days.
• (1pm: lunch. something simple with lots of fresh vegetables.)
• the evenings will be open for attending different group meetings or events each night (amtgard, bel, choir/band practice, gallery stroll etc)
• dinner would probably be around 8pm, something simple and healthful and delicious.
• in bed by midnight!
• weekends would be totally non-commital... as in i don't want any absolute obligations so i can choose to go out of town for events, go camping, have parties or whatever.

so i guess i just want a simple life with the freedom to do the things i love.  i'm guessing that's what most people want.

So what's stopping this life from being a reality?

largely my own lack of self-discipline. I'm a total sleep addict. yesterday i slept about 7 hours, went to church, ate lunch, slept for 6-7 more hours(!!!), hung out with some friends at the park, and went back to bed for 9 more hours. WTF! this is unhealthy.  i'm sure that if i train my body i can adjust to getting 7-8 hrs of sleep a day and be totally happy with it. i want to be more productive, especially in the summer.
and then i've never been much of a routine-follower. i've never had a regular exercise schedule, or even normal eating habits.

So if i just force myself into following a schedule half of this ideal lifestyle would be taken care of!

the other obstacle is the whole money issue. i need a decent source of income, of course, to pay my bills, but mostly i want a job that fits into the time slot outlined above. i'm sick of night jobs and weekend jobs and inconsistent jobs and "flexible hours" that just mean hardly any work with unpredictable hours. i guess it's time to grow up and join the real world? OTOH i would LOVE to make enough money on my own from all my side projects (plus maybe a fun part time job) but i am clearly lacking the discipline at this point to do that, and it's not a good time for me to experiment with self-employment as i still need to pay rent every month. actually i would love a part-time job that is nearby (to minimize commuting) and fun to go to, that pays enough to cover my basic living expenses but allows me enough free time to work on my own projects as well. i only ask that the hours are regularly scheduled so that i can plan the rest of my life around it.  I find i've been wasting a lot of time lately, my most recent job has had unpredictable hours so whole days go by without me accomplishing much because i can't plan around work because i don't know when it will be.

As it stands right now, i'm kind of in-between jobs. i worked at an embroidery shop on contract for a while but the business got bought by another company and apparently my services were no longer required. I've been applying and interviewing for lots of other jobs; real, grown-up, full-time graphic design jobs and design/art/production-related jobs i think i'd enjoy. in the meantime, while waiting to hear back from any of those, i have a lot of free time. so it's perfect for starting to train myself to follow a schedule while i have this kind of freedom, right?