I began my journey with the Learning House about 12 years ago. I bounced around a lot from job to job back then, looking for my niche, someplace I could call home. I kind of, sort of found it when I landed at Learning House. And then I stayed there for 11 years. It changed hands in that time, and I moved around a bit within the organization, but I had a stable, steady place to work. Like the Hobbit I've always been, I stayed where I was comfortable. That, unfortunately, all came to an end when my business unit was divested from the parent company and I was subsequently laid off. For the first time in more than a decade, I was out of work. Most people may not realize how difficult a situation that can be. I didn't even understand it myself until I was a few weeks into a state of unemployment. Coming to grips with it and finding a path forward present significant challenges.
For a long period of time, I changed jobs somewhat frequently. Tolkien said, "Not all those who wander are lost." Well, John, I was lost. I had been lost for some time. I had pushed myself, the proverbial square peg of a liberal arts background, into the round hole of various technology positions: technical writer, quality assurance analyst, technical journalist. It wasn't a direction I'd planned, but I let the current take me where it would.
After landing at the Learning House, again, without any real thought to my trajectory, I moved forward from quality assurance to release management to Scrum Master to Product Owner and, finally, if it really counts at all, Technology Project Manager III (don't even ask about the III because I don't know). If you'd asked me a decade prior where I would be at this point in time, none of those roles would have sprung to mind. Ten years ago "scrum" and "agile" did not exist in my vocabulary.
Unlike many people who pursue careers and make career plans, I didn't have ambitions or aspirations. One goal drove me on a day-to-day basis: making ends meet. I just wanted something steady that would pay the bills. I had long since given up on whatever childhood and young adulthood dreams I might have pursued. As the cliché goes, those who can do; those who cannot find steady work that pays the mortgage and puts food on the table. For ten-plus years that's what I did.
When I spoke with friends and colleagues about what the next step would be, well, let me tell you, there were plenty of dreamy thoughts about living off the severance, taking time off to travel, relax, read a book, write a book, play some video games. It seemed like a wish fulfilled: Take the money and finally live stress-free. Slow down. Take some time to pursue interests. But it just didn't work out that way.
You see, the amount I netted from the severance was significantly less than I'd expected--not that the gross amount wasn't made clear up front; it certainly was. But after various parties, including Uncle Sam, took their slice of the pizza, well, it wasn't exactly enough for me to feel comfortable whiling away hours playing Xbox or writing some trash horror paperback.
So now I find myself falling back to that place of looking for whatever will pay the bills. I saw a social media post recently about "settling." It was, of course, a sales pitch for some guidance on how not to settle, but it nevertheless stuck with me. On the one hand, my initial reaction was, "Yes! You're right! I should not be settling! I should be looking for the square hole into which my square peg fits!" The secondary reaction, and the one that sticks with me, was simple discouragement. It was a long mental sigh of resignation. I have resigned myself to making the peg fit where I've wedged it.
One could say that I have to some degree altered the spaces into which I've inserted myself, pushing at the boundaries. I'd like to think that I've had a positive impact on the environments and people with whom I've come in contact. But one can never be sure, really.
So how do I spend my days now? I literally spend 6+ hours a day submitting job application after job application for positions that seem to fit what I've been doing these last several years. And when I'm not doing that, I'm taking online training and reviewing materials to add more certifications to my resume. All this to make me a more attractive candidate for positions in the current round hole I'm jammed into.
The road goes ever ever on. What road is this, though? I cannot help feeling I've wandered off the main path and gotten lost in a side quest, satisfied that stopping at random inns for shelter and sustenance is good enough. Wandering until the end. Wandering until the end.
Comments
Post a Comment