I suppose one of the things I have to confess to in all this is that I tend to be someone who'd like an outcome that "makes as many people as possible happy."

I do think we're talking about pretty similar things here. For example, I do love my mandala painted rocks; they are my creative outlet, my meditation and my "mental health program." Would I love to just be able to paint, sell the rocks and not worry about anything else? Absolutely! However, in reality there probably aren't enough people walking around on the planet willing to buy a painted rock that I can do so. So just because I WANT it do be so, doesn't MAKE it so. So I have to "modify" and still go to work at something I can actually get paid for.

OR I can make the conscious choice that if I just want to be an artist, the "price" is that I get to live in a tent on the outskirts of my neighbor's land.

And so, I am actually doing a variation of what you suggested, in "lowering the bar" from where I'd hoped to place it, some 15 years back.

That's the funny thing about dreams: so often they are really not practical!