You may recall back in November when I had freshly started my brand new career-based job I wrote a post about breaking out of comfort zones. I opened that post with the rather direct statement "if you're not happy in your job, find a new one", and as is the case more often than should probably be considered normal I have found myself following my own advice. I was in that position for roughly 8 months, and about a month ago it became pretty clear to me that although that isn't a huge amount of time it was time for me to move on. I won't go into things (no huge drama, my sincerest apologies), but the easiest overview of it is that my workload and level of responsibility were semi ridiculous, completely disproportionate to how much I was being paid and also moving further and further away from what I was hired to do, and that was having a pretty massive knock-on effect throughout the rest of my life.
At age 24 I do not need to be swallowed alive by a career I don't particularly intend on pursuing long-term. I have a huge amount of ambition, but very little of it lies in a corporate environment, so while I did find aspects of my job interesting my real priority has to be ensuring that I have the resources and time to pursue the other things that are really important to me, and it was extremely clear that that's not something I was going to get as long as I was in that particular position. So I got a new one.
I know that seems very simple, but honestly it was. If you're familiar with me as a rounded person you'll know I'm very into the law of attraction, and this was a big ol' dose of that. I put it out into the universe that I wanted to leave, I started picturing my future with that adjustment and this job literally came to me. Genuinely, one day I just got a message on LinkedIn asking if there was any chance I would be interested in it, had an interview about a week later and was offered it the same day. Starting there on Monday.
As ready as I was to move on by the end of my time at my old job, it ultimately was a case of just outgrowing it and needing to take the next step. I learnt an insane amount during my time there (essentially running an entire company with zero experience'll do that for ya) and because I had such a massive range of responsibilities it's put me in a really great position for pretty much anything I could conceivably want to do moving forward. It was like the ginger shot of the employment world - super frickin intense and a bit overwhelming, but beneficial overall and ultimately leaves you with a subtle sense of smug superiority.
Full disclosure, being a perfectionist control freak I'm finding it hard to let go of certain aspects of my old job - particularly the online features, because I really built those from the ground up - but that's probably to be expected. Especially considering the extent to which work and the rest of my life combined to become one (very stressful) singular entity.
It hasn't been easy to leave, and the idea of starting in a hugely different, completely new environment next week is freakin me right the heck out, but I know instinctually this is what I'm meant to be doing. I feel like if taking the next step is completely easy you've probably left things a bit too long. My new job is going to take a lot of very quick learning and adapting all over again, but I know I can do that now, and one of the key differences between this role and my last one is that by all accounts the work there really does tend to stay during work hours. As I've said a thousand times, my old job took over my entire life, and as someone who needs to be putting energy into creative projects in order to actually work towards my #lifegoals that just does not fly w me.
Another major reason for leaving is that I was being hilariously underpaid, so I'm keen af to be earning a legitimate human salary and finally able to fulfil my undeniable spiritual calling of bailing to Italy on the weekends. After I get back from Melbourne. Where I am going in 6 weeks. Yeah. There's been a lot going on. I'm so excited to go home, and slightly concerned that I won't want to come back after I have been reintroduced to Calvin and Australian Nando's, but that's a conundrum for a different post. For now, I'm over-caffeinated and not particularly eloquent or coherent, so I am going to go and continue my scheming. Please keep me in your #thoughtsnprayers next week as I journey forth into the brave new world of Not Accidentally Running A Company.
Bless us all. x0x0
