✑ Broke, but not Broken. [On Financial Literacy and Artistic Starvation.]

     Oh, for the love of money. 

I mean, let’s be fair; it’s why we’re all here. It’s what crypto is. It’s how we learn’t about the blockchain.

And yet…

Let me tell you a truth here that I don’t think I’ve ever been honest enough to admit. I love money. Always have. I love that money buys you time. It buys you options. It’s as simple as having the option to buy a Tesla over a dirty, greasy Toyota. 

I love that with money, I can choose to spend a bomb on the best, and never have to worry about re-purchasing ever again. Anyone who’s had the opportunity to purchase a good pair of shoes will know this lesson.

And yet this is something I’ve only recently come to consciously admit, and that admission seems to have come with the entrance of crypto into my life.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve known of Bitcoin and even the underlying blockchain system for many years now but only first started purchasing recently. It’ll be a day I hope I’ll never forget. (And not just because it was also the day Roger Federer won Wimbledon again.)

But I digress!

All of a sudden, I am fascinated by economics.

Something which I abhorred. I have very vivid memories of suffering through stuffy, hot summers in that top-floor maths classroom (painted an obscene shade of salmon for some reason,) with a dizzying array of these things called numbers scattered all over the grubby whiteboard. And my fuzzy post-lunchtime brain.

As you can probably imagine from the above description, I’m not good at maths. I even get a bit of maths dyscalculia.

And yet now I’m reading candle charts. I’m keeping an ear out for the stock news every evening. I’m learning about how a debt-based economy works (spoiler alert: it doesn’t.) More importantly, I’m learning how to get out of a debt-based economy.

I am budgeting every week; I balance each pay-week against the previous and the forthcoming and I’m cutting my spending in half in order to invest more in crypto.

But… but. It still comes back to that one thing that I am still struggling to come to terms with.

Fear.

I will never be an economist. I’ll never be a shady trader. I am, and always will have the heart and hope of an artist.

I just don’t want to be a starving artist.

I don’t want to be that artist who has old shoes. Who has a car with no air-conditioning. Who has that terrible haircut. I don’t want to be that person who can’t afford to choose between paying my rent or paying for wonderful experiences.

Unfortunately, this fear is another reason why I still live with my parents at 26. On the wage I am on, I could move to the city where my desired industry is, pay my rent and finally begin building my career experience. I could not, however: eat, wash, clean or travel.

And, call me a brat, but that is something I am not willing to sacrifice.

I’ve spent too long watching my mother organise her shopping trolley by priority of price. I’ve spend too long watching the tight pull of anxiety on my father’s face every time she asks about going out to dinner. I spent far too long being heckled for not being clothed in Adidas skate shoes or Supre camisoles of all things.

And so although, yes, I wish for the opportunity to delve deeply into immersive storytelling and never have to make small talk with a paying stranger ever again, it’s not something yet I’m in a position to let go of. Because that painful, low-wage job is what allows me to even be here on Steemit. It’s what allows me even the teeniest little shred of hope.

The trick is to not become content with just that little ray of hope, but wish and strive for the drowning warmth of sunshine.

I guess what I’m trying to say is...

Is that so much to ask?