On Risk Taking and Anxiety

Going to work everyday, I literally began to feel hopeless.
I know I need to work on my writing, and I am still developing
the confidence that I have any real talent or skills. I just know I
need the chance to work on it. I’ve been working full-time, going to
school part-time, and it is very frustrating. Although many people
work, and go to school at the same time, just being in the “just ten
more years until I retire” environment of a government job is agonizing
and depressing. I want to do something more. Like a lot of people, I’ve
talked about leaving my job to do what I’ve always wanted to do: write.
My work skills are minimal at best (I’m a damn good typist), but nowhere
except with the United States government could I make the money I do,
with benefits that are almost obsolete in the real world, without a degree.
I know if I leave, I may never have a job this good again, unless of course,
I go back. But, if I become full-time in school now, I can have a
Bachelors degree in a year and a half, (a Masters in three and a half, if I
plan it right). School is important because, I don’t want to just make money
writing. I want to study the history and forms of literature, theory and
criticism, maybe teach on the college level, and have opportunities to write
in areas that would require a degree. I want the credentials.
So, at 43, once again in my life, I am throwing caution to the proverbial wind.

There is no way to know if the decisions we make will be the correct one.
Even the decision not to make a decision will still generate an effect.
It is a cause to not make a cause. Do risk takers feel anxiety? A month
from now, I will be risking some things to pursue my dream and goal of
completing my education to become a writer. I will leave the security of a
good job for financial instability, at a time in my life where I should be
creating a nest egg, in the pursuit of a career that I should have achieved years
ago. Unless one is already financially independent, there is no perfect time
to leave a job to go to school. And, yet I stand at the threshold of another
opportunity to live the life and achieve the dreams of my youth. I want to
prove to the cosmos that I am conscious of my worth in the universe;
that I am capable of reaching the potential it has reserved for me.
Am I anxious?
Maybe.
But, I’m ready.