What is a 'real job' anyway?

Aged 17, whilst roaming the restricted side streets of the Internet and mastering the art of left handed clicking I remember thinking 'This is great. Why would I ever get a job?'. I wanted a life where I could roam these forbidden paths at any time of the day, whenever the desire struck and the conventional 9-5 formula simply didn't fit these requirements. Unfortunately however (Nigel Farage aside), there's no money in becoming a professional w*nker so I realised that I needed a plan and fast. Luckily a few years earlier I'd discovered that DJing was my thing and that was how I was going to make my living. 8 years on and I'm proud to say that DJing is my 'full time' job and is where I make a vast majority of my income. So why is it in certain social situations people still ask the question - 'When are you going to get a real job?'. 

Now this may not seem like a huge deal because it's usually said in jest and is probably just playful banter between mates. But imagine every now and again whilst you're going about your day to day business, living the life with your dream haircut when suddenly a friend turns and says to you 'When are you going to get a socially acceptable haircut?' whilst laughing with that cheeky, fist welcoming smile. Then a few weeks later another turns and says the same thing (and so on and so forth). Eventually and inevitably you're going to feel pretty sh*tty about that dream hair and you'll probably book an appointment with your barber / therapist, right?

So yeah, I have a therapist. She's awesome and she deals with DJ's, Dancers, Musicians; in fact Artists of all varieties and they all seem to have one similar issue: Anxiety. Oh anxiety, you giant chemically induced f*cktard. It got to a point where waking up in the night with enough adrenaline to confidently challenge Forest Gump was seemingly 'normal' to me. Alas, the doctor disagreed: "Taylor, you're an anxious wreck and I'm shipping you off to therapy for some R&R". But what got me here in the first place? There's got to be a cataclysmic array of contributing factors but one thing is for sure, asking somebody who's trying to follow their dream when they're going to get a 'Real Job' is a pretty good starting point in a quest to chisel away any creative confidence us hippies may possess. 

So I got to thinking. What is a 'real job' anyway? I'm curious because nine times out of ten the people who use the term are typically those who work 9-5 office jobs which they moan about regularly. They moan about the work, they moan about their colleagues and they're almost never happy with the amount they earn. Which leads me to think that it must be the stability factor which makes a job 'real'. But the very term 'stable' defines something as being fixed with limited or no movement. And limited movement means limited freedom, which has limited to no attraction to me. Despite this I find it incredibly disrespectful to highlight these facts to the very people who so easily piss all over my parade without even the courtesy of calling it rain. 

Urban Dictionary - Real job

A term used by college graduate snobs to convince themselves that working in a cooperation isn't a waste of time and following your dreams will get you nowhere.

Even as a bulky right-armed 17 year old it seemed unnatural to me to follow the tried and tested 9-5 formula which a staggering 83% of us reportedly adhere to. I didn't want to feel like a sheep in a corporate mechanism undoubtedly designed to siphon money North in the shape of an upside down funnel. Instead I wanted a life where I was free to do the things I wanted to do whilst being creative in the process and (dust off those violins) I and every other self employed, artistic or creative being out there has sacrificed and will continue to sacrifice a great deal for it.

If there's one thing I've learnt from this little quest it's that the defining factors of what you or I may class as a 'Real Job' are largely subjective. There are no rights and no wrongs in this equation unless you yourself are unhappy with the work in which you partake. I have friends who are Actors and friends who are Psychologists; friends who Build for a living and others who work in Government, none of which I consider as any less of a 'Real Job' than the next. Why? Because they all LOVE their jobs. And essentially, isn't that all that matters? It seems to me that a great deal of emphasis is placed on the security and financial implications of your job as opposed to what it is that really makes us happy. And that makes me sad. 

So whether you're a Cleaner or a Politician, a Nurse or a Musician, ask yourself if your job makes you feel Proud. Does it push you to your absolute limits and still challenge you for more? Fundamentally though, the one question you should be asking is 'Does it make me smile?'. If so then at least in my eyes, your job is 'Real'.