For much of my life I have put my self worth and validation around my career. I have tried to lessen that as I added a husband and added children, but over the years I have found myself still drawn to jobs that require that I have more "work" and less "life" balance. I constantly struggle with the two and rarely feel like I have actually achieved my blog titled "Equilibrium."
I don't really talk about my job on here partly because I would bore you even more than I normally do (How is that possible you ask yourself? Don't tempt me to show you) and partly because I don't want to be fired (Dooce, anyone?). But I'll share with you where this mid-life crisis is coming from. For starters, for the money that I get paid, it generally comes with strings attached. Things like taking conference calls at 5am or 10pm or pulling all nighters during a big release. It also seems to come with a lot more stress. Stress that I don't seem to handle well with a lack of sleep and priorities pulling in all directions. I don't get paid to make a mistake or to not have an answer. My job is to double check to make sure I don't make mistakes and to find someone who has the answer if I don't. Sometimes I would really like the option of saying, "Oops, my mistake" or "I don't know the answer. Please help me."
There was a time in my life when I would have happily done all those things. That was a husband and two kids ago. Now I want a job where I can go in an office, leave at 5, and never think about that job again. I want to spend more time with my family. I want to put less responsibility for the kids with Bill. I want to have more time to clean the house and do the laundry (ok, let's face it...all the time in the world isn't going to make me get laundry done). That's what I say I want, but here's the dilemma:
- I haven't found any jobs that meet that criteria that pay my same pay. So what are we willing to sacrifice for me to make less money? A smaller house? A longer commute (counter productive to the goal)? Cheaper childcare?
- I'm not sure I can be an Indian and not the chief. Again, counter productive goals. I want a job where I am in charge but I don't want to deal with it after I leave there. Most chiefs carry Blackberry's for a reason. And I'm pretty sure I see more gray hairs on the chiefs than the Indians, purely from stress.
- I actually don't even care for the field I'm in. I've been in IT my entire career. I'd rather be picking out sofa fabrics and paint swatches. But that field doesn't pay much when you are starting out and I don't know how to get into that field without going to school. I'd want to be an interior designer, not just a decorator (designers can move walls, a decorator can just paint them). All the classes are during the day around here and are terribly expensive.
I was kind of hoping that once I laid all this out, by the end I would know what I needed to do from here. I think I've been too busy looking for all of the answers for my client because I don't seem to have any answers left for me.
