The kid in me wants to tell you all about the late night antics of my Alpha Eta Tau Delta fraternity outing last week, but the grown-up can’t focus on anything but the stress that work is causing right now. Let’s see where the stream of thought goes…
When I was 16 and my parents came home miserable every night after another bad day at work, I’d tell them “quit”. Of course they would respond with “it’s not that easy.” No, it’s not, but as I find myself in the same place, I can’t help but wonder if there is something I can do.
A friend keeps saying “well, do you know anyone who likes their job?” Unfortunately, the answer is no (which unfortunately is close to how I would respond when asked as how many people do you know that are truly in love…but that’s a blog post for another day). I think this is akin to jumping off a cliff because everyone else does. I believe work is work, but from the very fortunate position of two months shy of an MBA, I feel like I shouldn’t be this grumpy. I should be able to look everyone in the eye and feel respected for my endeavors.
So if I tell myself to leave if I’m not happy and it looks like I’m not happy, what do I do next? Do I revive Sugar by Maggie? Do I sell fabric wedding bouquets and wreck veils across the land? Do I hole up and write the biography of my grandpa that would be so ridiculously interesting a screenplay couldn’t be that far behind? Notice that none of those include having a boss. I think that’s the problem. The entrepreneur in me needs to just go off on my own. Ah, if only bills paid themselves…
Dear reader – how do you feel about your job? Do you go home with a smile on your face? If you didn’t need the money, how would you fill your day?
(P.S. Bummer that the grown-up won out, but I promise the Coeur d’Alene nightlife report isn’t that far behind. It was so unique!!)
I have so much to say but only because I wish someone would ask me what I think, how they can make it better, and actually cared. But I know nobody who actually could make a difference will ever ask.
How do I feel about my job? I like to tell myself I love it. And there are many things about it that I do love, but it seems like with the way the economy is and the way we have ‘cut back’ that those of us left have done nothing but get overburdened with more and more work. I do a job that 2 people used to do. I have an employee who does a job that 2 people used to do. I have 2 employees who do jobs that 3 people used to do. And so on. Everyone has so much shit to do that nobody does the best job they can. We all fly by the seat of our pants just to get by. It’s 8:30 pm and I just ‘finished’ getting ‘caught up’ for the day because I spent the actual time in the office putting out fires due to overworked employees who are doing a shitty job at keeping customers happy. Is that their fault? No. Is it mine? No. But we are the ones who deal with the fallout. Sorry you asked? 🙂
Do I go home with a smile on my face? I can’t remember the last time I did. I would say I go home feeling a sense of accomplishment 1 day out of 30. I would also say I go home crying 10 out of 30. Yet I ‘like’ my job.
If I didn’t need the money how would I fill my day? My current desire is just to work at a dog day care or in a shelter. I could never not work at all, I’d be bored out of my skull. But I’d love to work with animals. That would truly make me happy.
I wish we could just quit. That would make life so much easier. Being a grown up is a lot harder than all of the kids ever think.
H-I hear you! And from those I heard from offline, you are by no means alone!
I have a theory… We all need to shift jobs. Nobody’s job is 100% hateful, its probably just not what they signed up for. If we all traded, we wouldn’t know the difference when handed 3 people’s work load or that the mailroom used to actually do mail-related stuff where now we pretty much go to the post office ourselves.
I don’t like to hear that you get to the crying stage that often though. Maybe you do need more time with the pups. They’d probably agree. 🙂
Thanks for writing. I wish I had better words of wisdom. I don’t, but I’ve definitely got support for you. Feel free to come here and bitch at any time…