Last night was my last day with Denton Bible Church Student Ministries. It was very difficult to make the decision to leave, but once it was made, I realized that it was the best decision.

After almost 2 years of working part time for Denton Bible Church I learned a great deal, but now I want to focus more on Seminary and my own web design business.

Working part time at the church for 29 hours a week unfortunately did not pay the bills and with school and 2 other jobs it meant that I had to work around 60-70 hours a week in order to successfully run my businesses and do well at student ministries. I realized that something had to give. I think ministry should be challenging, but it should not always leave you feeling burnt out and overworked. As Christians and ministers we should be serving joyfully from the overflow that God provides – I was no longer doing that.

What I will miss most is the students and seeing their bright smiles and watching and as they mature and learn to love Jesus. I am thankful to DBC for allowing me to serve in such a large capacity and I learned so much about what it means to work for a church.

So What’s Next…

I plan to start working more on my creative goals. I’d love to get more invested in an art-based ministry in Denton, TX. Maybe I’ll start my own, maybe I’ll join one that already exists, but either way I definitely see my life moving more toward art and design and how that impacts faith, culture and religion.

I also have written two books. One is fiction, the second is autobiographical. I’d like to work on them, fine tune them and then try to get them published.

I run a DJ business that has been booming. I’d like to figure out a way to make myself Denton’s Best Event DJ with a bunch of cool props and lights.

Lastly, I’d like to learn more in the realm of video editing with After Effects and brush up on my InDesign and Illustrator skills to accompany what I already do with Photoshop and Dreamweaver.

It is a simple site really with an integrated shopping cart but it has stumped me in terms of design. The client wants a mixture of rugged and organic and that has been a hard blend for me to do. When I think organic I think greens and orange and rolling hills and when I thing rugged or rustic then I think more barns and grunge textures. Either way I’ve come up with something right now that I like, but I still want to make more of the site. If you have any suggestions or some sites that you like that feature organic beef, then I’d love to hear your feedback.

Here are some of my latest works:

http://www.lovenotescolorado.com/

http://www.miguelitosmexicancuisine.com

http://www.ksanalytical.com

http://www.thealternativehotline.com

http://www.firemenlawncare.com

http://thomasgreenwalker.com

Sites that I created that have been up for a while:

http://www.gotothehub.com

http://www.dbcstudents.org

http://www.sportsworldcamp.org

http://www.iheartdenton.com

1. Never count on your clients to pay on time.
2. Operating cash is a necessity so scale back on all unnecessary spending so you have more to invest in your business.
3. Social Networking is good for business, but perhaps not as impactful as you are often led to believe.
4. Competition is a mean bitch.
5. There is never a time that you can coast and there is no such thing as a holiday or a day off when you are self-employed.
6. Word-of-Mouth referrals are still the best way to get new business.
7. Never underestimate the power of a good website, but don’t overestimate it either. Just because you have a brilliant website doesn’t mean customers are going to start flocking to you.
8. In all areas of business you will have to work with people you don’t like.
9. You must always be looking for ways to improve and to gain market share on your competition, but remember, they are doing the same. So improving your services and finding your niche early on is important.
10. There is nothing more rewarding than making it as your own boss, but there is nothing more frightening than having bills due and having no idea where the money is going to come from the next month.

I’ve got lots of great ideas for 2010. I sure hope to see them come to fruition.

Happy New Year!

Five times a week there is a group of us in Allen, TX that play Wallyball at Lifetime Fitness. It is one of the most fun games I have ever played and one of the most educational.

When it comes to sports, many people play at their peak performance and they are so focused on their own skills that they neglect to pay attention to the skills of their opponents. This is what separates the Average Joes from the Pros. I think instinctively you need to be aware of what your opponent is going to do before they do it. You have to constantly be understanding their strengths and weaknesses and instead of constantly trying to improve your core set of skills – exploit their weaknesses!

This same strategy can be applied in the business world. When you understand your opponent you can better align yourself for success.

Another important part of success is surrounding yourself with people who are skilled and to fully understand their strengths as well. If you have a strong fat guy on your team he would be used for power moves where a more agile person would be used for speed moves. Both are often necessary, but when used inappropriately both can be worthless.

For me, working alone I don’t have a set of team members to help me bump and set – which are crucial when playing  a skilled team in Wallyball or Volleyball. Spiking it is great, but hard to do without a perfect set. So I often find myself just spiking it and sometimes it works, sometimes it don’t – but for now I’m still in the self-employment game and I’m hanging in there.

I want to move to be closer to family and friends, but will that really help me change my life? Shouldn’t I be able to make new friends and start my own family here in Plano?

So I decided that what I need to do is go back to work full-time or at least find a part time job that is flexible and brings in some stable income that will help me to feel a little more secure. I don’t think running from my problems is the answer, however, I have to find balance between being responsible and being delusional.

So I’m stepping out in faith. I’m going to try to stay here until I’ve got a solid reason to leave. Yes, family and friends are a solid reason, but I have friends who are like family here in Plano too.

I’ve successfully isolated myself into a world that is filled with only the exact people I want in my life, but most of those people live in Denton and if I don’t move I will continue to drift alone out here in this big brick box that is as empty and hollow as my love life.

Selling a house is such a big decision, especially after just two years of owning it. But, I only bought it because I thought I would be working at Texas Instruments for the rest of my life. Now that thought seems depressing. Working for someone else for the rest of my life? No thanks. But… what if I can work for myself for the rest of my life and start now by investing in me? Cut my overhead, simplify the excess, and just take care of myself and a handful of responsibilities instead of two hands full.

Say a prayer for me. This is a big decision and I have no idea where I will live in Denton.

This is what people do at DJ events. They request songs that they want to hear not realizing that their requests reflect on me. No one realizes that I am playing a song to make someone happy, instead, they think “Why is this DJ playing the Chicken Dance?” – because your mom requested it.

I’m not complaining about my work at all. I FREAKING LOVE IT. But… I spend hours downloading music and putting together playlists. I have to make follow-up calls and meetings in person with wedding clients to go over details and reception flow. I have to constantly stay up on the hottest trends of music: Frat Rap, Emo, Alternative, Country, Rock, Reggae, Oldies, Motown, New Age, the list goes on and on.

But on the upside, I get to learn about new music, I get to spend hours listening to new tunes, mixing together great songs, looking at beat counts and knowing what song will flow well to the next and how to transition a party smoothly from a rocking bump and grind fest to a slow romantic waltz.

I think this is where the art of DJing comes in – knowing how to mix a set of music that keeps the party ever-escalating while still keeping the dance floor packed.

What you do is play songs for each group in the room. The single dancers, the kids, the rockers, the old lovers who want to cuddle and the hip-hoppers.

As someone who LOVES to dance, every now and then even I need a break. If you play hit after hit after hit then I want to dance to all of them and I just get tired. Instead, I like to have a few hits and then a few slow so I can take a break between my hip thrusting and gyrations.

So this is my life and I love it. Even the part where I tell people “No, I can’t play that song”.

DJing is harder than you think, but it is better than any other job I’ve done in my life.

This morning I received a certified letter from a client that wanted documented proof of hours spent working for them. Granted, the invoice that I sent them was dated August 3rd and so I haven’t received payment for that work and now they want to hassle me about my hours.

My first impulse is to rain fire and brimstone down on their heads and make threats of how I am going to do everything I can to ruin their business because they are ruining mine – literally.

When you are self-employed you obviously rely on your paychecks to pay your bills, but even more than that, you need money to make money. When you work for a company you just show up and use their resources, not your own, and so you just get a paycheck and call it day. For me, I have to buy software for the computer work I do. Flash, Dreamweaver, Photoshop – these are the tools of my trade for my day job. But then there is my DJ business as well that requires me to purchase music, lights, tablecloths, speakers, microphones – the expenses just keep adding up.

So when I don’t get paid not only can I not pay my bills, but I can’t make more money – or as much money as I could have made.

Also, when you can’t pay your bills on time you get incessant phone calls by automated systems that call your phone twice a day. Citifinancial Auto likes to call you twice a day, every day, from two different numbers asking you constantly, “When are you gonna pay? WHEN? WHEN!!!” and I keep telling them, “Just as soon as my 6,000 arrives from my clients”.

This type of stress makes me very emotional and I have to do everything in my power to control it, to stuff it down and to make it go away. I have to be professional and courteous and instead of getting upset, I can be the one to make phone calls and send emails and write letters to customers who don’t pay me. If it works for Citifiinancial, then it should work for me right?

In the end, I have to wonder what other people do in these situations. If you are self-employed, what steps do you take to get your money from non-paying clients?

When I was laid off in January 2009 I didn’t know exactly what I was going to do with my life. Since I was 12 years old I have been working at some sort of job – for someone else. I always had dreams of owning my own business one day, but taking the giant plunge was just too scary.

In the Renz household you worked for a living – sometimes two or three jobs. Our motto was “If you want something, work for it.” That meant 2 a.m. paper routes, cleaning churches and schools, working for a horse ranch, being a bank teller, driving a special ed school bus, running the register at a gas station, cleaning houses, cleaning the post office, working for Boeing, Custom Food Group, Texas Instruments, Ericsson. Yep. Those are all the jobs that I have had and they weren’t short term, many of them I had for years and some of them I worked while working another job and going to school full-time.

So when I was suddenly out on the street looking for a job I decided that after doing all of those jobs and none of them being really what I wanted to do that I wasn’t going to take another job unless I really enjoyed doing it. So I’ve now been unemployed/self-employed for 7 months and I’ve been doing just fine on my own.

Now I still work 2-3 jobs to make ends meet, but they are things that I like to do and they have amazing flexibility that allows me to live a non-traditional life. I don’t work 9-5 days or 80 hour weeks. I don’t sit in traffic or rush through my lunch, but there are trade-offs as there are to everything in life.

I don’t have any co-workers and there isn’t much opportunity for advancement unless I bust my butt and make it happen myself. Clients don’t always pay on time or pay at all. I’m home alone a great deal of the time and that can get old.

But that upside is that being your own boss is the best thing in the world and worth every sacrifice. There is also the joy that comes from making it on your own. There is also that little twinge of fear that keeps you motivated to keep working hard and busting it so that you can still pay your bills.

If you are looking to start your own business then I say do it. Start small, start networking, get a website, do some small jobs to get your feet wet and start building your network of friends while you still have full time work. This is probably a good idea even if you don’t plan to start your own business.

And lastly, I never could have gotten to where I am today without the support of great friends and family. And if you are looking to keep up with more of my work life, then check out my business sites: http://www.soundandshow.com and http://www.eddierenz.com