JEREMY BIGGERS We visited artist and photographer Jeremy Biggers while he was painting a mural in South Dallas. Here's what he had to say:
Quitting my full time job was absolutely the most stressful, fulfilling, and liberating thing I’ve ever done. So I’ve been telling people to quit their job. When you take into consideration how much money a corporation makes and what they’re willing to pay you for hours of your life that you’ll never get back or see again. I’m a fan of putting in those same hours you spend with other people making money for their corporation and putting those hours into your own life. Because with or without you, they’re going to get someone in there that will make them that money. You might as well put those hours into your own. They don’t care. They don’t care if you ever get rich. They need you to stay with that employee mindset. I don’t think there is a way to do it without being super broke. You just have to accept that you’re not going to have money. And once you accept that you’re not going to have money you realize, “hey, I don’t have to make money to be happy or stay alive or healthy.” I’m a lot broker now than I’ve ever been, but I was working enough to get broke. After bills and everything else. I was still broke when I had a job. If you’re going to break even anyways you might as well not get up and go to work everyday. I learned in the end no matter what you do, like I said once I realized I was broke with a job, it didn’t scare me to quit my job. I was like wait, I’m figuring it out now and I’m still broke. Now I can get up when I want to, go to sleep when I want to. It’s a matter of going on your own clock but at some point during the day you have to get your shit done. 106
HAS BEEN TELLING PEOPLE TO QUIT THEIR JOBS. INTERVIEW BY ELIZA TRONO & NATASHA BRITO
You give up knowing you’re getting a paycheck every other week. I’m a super worry guy. I worry even when I shouldn’t. Not having that for sure for sure money scared the fuck out of me. However, I gained being free. I can do shit like this. “Yeah, I wanna paint in the morning and I wanna paint in the evening.” I don’t have to worry about a work schedule and scheduling things around. If somebody comes in tomorrow and wants to fly out wherever, I can do that. I don’t have a job tying me down. I realize my job became more of my side hustle rather than my actual side hustle. Me sitting at my desk forty hours a week was taking away from the stuff I needed to be doing in my life. I was like, “this shit isn’t working anymore.” I gave up the financial freedom, but I gained actual freedom. It’s the scariest shit ever. While you’re still physically able to, you should get out there. Don’t worry about huge bills. I would definitely, if you can make it work, do it. The worst thing that could happen is that you go back to a job that’s paying your bills.