New worlds and old patterns
Let me just state from the beginning that the fundamental need to have a job really kinda sucks. The near symbiotic relationship between survival and servitude starts to come across like a cruel joke if you think about it long enough. Unless you’re one of the rare few whose job doubles as your passion, there are going to be things you would rather do than get up in the morning and go to work.
Since it’s inescapable, it only makes sense to make the best of it. Working somewhere that makes you miserable (read: more unhappy than having to go to work in the first place) is a first class ticket to mental and emotional dissonance. I recently learned that lesson the hard way.
If you’ve been paying any sort of attention to the posts over the last year, then you pretty much know the score by now. However, for the benefit of those who haven’t been keeping up:
• 12 months ago, I was laid off from a job that I loved after seven years.
• About 9 months ago, I started a job that I would wind up hating before the end of the first week.
(Now, perhaps it was my fault, and I had somehow poisoned my own thoughts against the company and the work. My wife tells me that I was “in mourning” for my old job. Whatever the reason, it wasn’t my ideal place. The work itself strummed the chords of every aspect of software programming that makes me grind my teeth and while the people were not unfriendly, there was just a vibe I didn’t feel. My initial plan to give it a year scarcely lasted six months.)
• 5 days ago, I started my newest job.
Oh yeah, I’m feeling the vibe now…
In order to be impartial in my judgment, first I have to strip away some of the shinier surface aspects, like the new laptop or that I finally once again have my own freaking office. I have heard it mentioned many times in the past that things like this are the proverbial carrot, before being brained by the stick.
The core of this job and the company itself appears to have just the right mix of challenge and atmosphere that doesn’t cause me to lament spending 8 hours of my day here. When I think about what I’ve seen and experienced thus far, it makes me feel confident and pleased with my decision to accept this position.
When I add back in those “shiny surface aspects”, it kinda makes me want to giggle with barely controlled glee.
I feel like I’ve just been welcomed home.
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I’m glad you feel that way after five days (actually I guess it’s been longer now). I just hope it’s still as good in five years.