Thanks to a couple recent emails, I have decided to update my FAQ page with the following item:

Do you actually make money as an occult investigator? What’s your day job?

Originally, I wasn’t going to answer this question, because I wanted to leave it up to your imagination. Actually, I didn’t want you to ask it at all, because I don’t think it’s important. But obviously other people do, or they wouldn’t keep asking me. So I feel like I should at least address it.

Personally, I resist the tendency that we seem to have as a culture where we reduce everything to economics - especially creativity. If I had a dollar for every time an artist, writer, musician, etc, was asked ‘But what’s your real job?’ I would be so rich that none of us would ever need to work again. The wonderful fact is we are all so much more than how we pay the bills. And it’d be lovely if we could focus on that for a change instead.

I’d invite people who are wondering along these lines to clarify for themselves what they are really asking. If this is not my ‘day job,’ does that make what I’m doing somehow frivolous? If it is my job, does my making money off it enhance my credibility? Or are you simply interested in alternative paths through life, and looking for practical examples of how people are doing that and still surviving in the modern world?

If the last of those three questions is what interests you, then we’re on the same page. If you want to ask me some specific stuff in that direction or are just looking for inspiration, I might be able to help out. Otherwise, I’m not here to help prove your narrow world view and I don’t care to indulge anyone in furthering an obsession with money, occupation and status derived therefrom.

For anyone who’s still curious what I think about “day jobs” you might like to check out these two posts on the topic:

1. 10 Tips to Stay Enslaved Forever
2. How to “pimp” your cube