Upcoming Year Reflection

I turned thirty this year, and I feel I'm grappling with a moral and ethical dilemma. I've always possessed a creative mind, achieving remarkable feats during my time as a classical musician. I received invitations to serve as an artist-in-residence at schools and as a guest artist at conferences. While others were invited as students, I was welcomed as a performer. When I transitioned to full-time tabletop GMing, I stood among the pioneers in the field, and my experiences were even covered in an interview by Polygon. 

As a writer, I secured a position early in my career at Major Spoilers without relying extensively on unpaid work. I also had the privilege of contributing to my favorite tabletop company (I'll delve into that further later). 

Subsequently, I became a college professor, finding immense satisfaction in my work and believing I excel at it. In fact, the fulfillment I've experienced in teaching writing surpasses what I ever felt when teaching music.   

However, my financial situation has never truly been stable. I've borrowed significant sums from financial institutions and family members to maintain stability. Although I've made partial repayments, they remain insufficient.   

I had envisioned that by my thirtieth year, I would have attained more stability, possibly considering settling down. I imagined perusing the housing market and achieving success in publishing or through a prominent exhibition. Contrary to these expectations, I'm now facing another 5-7 years of academic pursuit to earn a doctorate, potentially enabling me to secure a desirable full-time tenured professorship. This path involves a substantial series of moves from one university to another, eventually to a tenured position. This timeline significantly delays my prospects of purchasing a home. 

This issue weighs heavily on my mind. I yearn to spend quality time with my children and relish social activities. I want to be paying off aggressive amounts of debt, both student and otherwise. I want to feel secure and take care of my health and raise my kids and spoil them. Yet, I allocate an extensive amount of my time to tabletop RPGs, assuming it's a worthwhile endeavor financially one day. In truth, I invest more into this hobby than it yields. Consequently, Skald's Tale Entertainment remains in a monthly deficit due to the expenses of services and contracting roughly half of my players. Thus, I've made the difficult decision this summer to reevaluate my objectives. 

I've opted to discontinue streaming. Balancing the demands of running games on streams has proven too strenuous, and even if I wanted to produce a game show, the workload would be overwhelming. I've relinquished my show idea to another network (I'll elaborate on this later) and reduced costs to a minimal level, yielding only a modest profit while reducing my workload from 15 hours to approximately 5. More details will follow. More information about this in September!

We'll maintain the current approach for Ashen Snow until we complete the first book. At that point, we'll reassess our financial standing. I confess that I haven't edited a podcast in two weeks due to contemplation and my responsibilities for the new school semester. 

I'm committed to maintaining Skyfire, my cherished project, though I have fallen behind on the editing process. 

We're returning to writing, a pursuit I deeply enjoy. I aspire to craft some one-shots under the Kindred Journeys brand and potentially develop a more extensive adventure path in 2024. 

As a result, we're reverting to a straightforward release schedule: Skyfire will be released on Wednesdays and Ashen Snow on Fridays. Additionally, I plan to contribute more to blogs in the upcoming months. But as of right now, Twitch and Youtube are off the table. I just want to focus on making more money, spending less time at my computer, and working on my failing health conditions.

Happier blogs soon.