December 20, 2014
By Michael Erlewine (Michael@Erlewine.net)
Before I continue with more practical experience that I have had from being an entrepreneur I want to at least paint a picture in the mind of the esoteric side of it all, because that is what drives me
.
Having the educational door closed behind me early on, with all of the perks, livelihood, and opportunities that it can bring left a resounding silence in the somewhat frosty air I received from society. It was a little bit like going to prison, perhaps a prison of my own making, but there was a sense of resignation that I felt. I wouldn't compromise and the result was that I eliminated myself from society and was free and definitely out on my own.
But there was also another side to it, a much brighter one. My heart and soul were very much still intact, and still are. I had not traded away anything of value for a few wooden nickels. I was free to do what I wanted for my entire life, but what did I want to do, and more important, how do I do it?
In other words, I had inadvertently created what was (at least for me) a perfect storm for being an entrepreneur. I am sure every entrepreneur has their own approach, probably based on their particular circumstances and talents. I was not a "wanna-be" entrepreneur, coming from within society out, beating the bush looking for money- making ideas. That is not my idea of what an entrepreneur does. I was already on the outside and needed to find some way of tagging society just enough to stay alive so as not to be lost in the shuffle of life.
My type of entrepreneur follows his heart to the bitter end. I took every opportunity to go deeper within, as this little poem I wrote back then makes clear:
Time Out
What if at every out, I set an “in.”
I said:
What if at each out, I set on in,
And in on in on in on in ... And if on in, I'm lost within? Time is sure to see me out.
I have mentioned that I believe entrepreneurs (by definition) have to have a practical angle on things that connect them to society, even if it is hardscrabble all the way.
Otherwise we are just dreamers without a dream that can ever come true. In order for entrepreneurism to work there has to be some compromising, some point where the hand touches the ground as Buddha's earth-touching gesture or mudra makes clear. In other words, there has to be a market for what the entrepreneur produces, a practical connection and exchange. Once that is understood, everything else depends on the differential that I mentioned in the last blog, the exchange rate.
I was already fully engaged in exchanging my life energy for whatever wisdom I could find, but in the process I had to have some way to exist. It would seem that all wisdom is obtained at the expense of life. We must be willing to spend and exchange our life- energy for knowledge, bit by bit, but I have been very careful with whom I make the exchange, thus my inability to accept teachers and schooling. I have sought out wise beings with life-savvy, whom I respect, and I am willing to pay my respect in exchanging the gift of life with them for the gift of death, wisdom. I very much admire the lines in one of my daughter May's songs ("A Beautiful Mess"), which read:
"Find a little love, along the way, Die a little, every day."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAq_6ehZp2o
If you really want to understand the different options we have in life on the road to death, take time to study the various ways that stars live and die. It is all spelled out loud and clear in the heavens. It is my form of the "Book of Revelation," those star lives and deaths.
My kind of entrepreneurship does not come from clever, but rather from the heart taken to great lengths or depths. I have very good concentration, am persistent (perhaps even stubborn) and, once inspired, I keep going. I tend to create whatever I come up with just for the beauty of it and only later try to find some practical use for what I have created that will help me to recoup my investment, stay alive. All of my businesses started out as hobbies, so I loved to do each one. I have turned all my hobbies into money making enterprises.
And I see all of my creations as gestures, mandalas that arise, bloom and, like all earthly things, fade. Perhaps mudras is a better word, signatures written in time that express something otherwise inexpressible. The physical residue of all this spirit is the body of the work we do, what the Buddhists call "Skillful Means," just like our own physical body is the ultimate talisman.
[My first painting, a self-portrait when I was six years old. How funny is that.]
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