I'm not dead, just evolving.
Dear lord it has been a long time since I have posted anything. In the past I used my blogs mostly for the purpose of talking about technical things I've discovered or accomplished but thats changing. I feel like I have so many conversations in my head about ideas or choices I need to make in life that I kind of just want to muse about them out in the open for all to see.
Could that wind up having terrible consecuences? Sure, probably. Then again I don't have a comment system in place so internet trolls be damned. I think at this point I would be more flattered than angry that someone would spend their time being a jerk than anything else.
The Last Year (or so), Professionally
I'd be lying if I said it has been the way I envisoned it especially after that vision was altered from spending two great years essentially interning for Mozilla (sort of, kind of... it's complicated). Since then I have worked with four different companies for varying lengths of time and other than one none of them were/are ones that I truly saw/see the employment as anything other than a stopgap. Other than the aforementioned one of four jobs I basically never felt like any of them were enjoyable or things I wanted to do long term and eventually left them for reasons of my own accord.
I don't exactly take my decisions to leave those companies lightly as if it didn't affect their goals as well. Any place of employment that hires you for actual full time work makes an investment in you to be able to help them accomplish their own goals and leaving those companies on your own accord without considering that is a selfish thing to do. Ultimately for me each place I left completely on my own accord had something about the situation that I just couldn't handle anymore and forced me to move towards looking elsewhere.
Sadly I find myself still in this situation feeling like I'm in somewhat of a tailspin, doubting myself and questioning what I should do next (which, I suppose is actually normal). How do I know that shifting from any current job I have to another in the same field would actually remedy the situation? Have I made the wrong career choice? Should I throw it all away and start again with something else? It's been so tempting to try and get a job in the hospitality/enterainment field with B.A.T.L but when none of those jobs exist with their three Toronto locations I find it incredibly hard to convince myself to attempt something as crazy as that despite how enjoyable it may be.
In the end though I know that staying the course is the right thing for me to do because deep down I know I do enjoy solving peoples problems and helping them the way I do. I have managed to learn a lot about myself and the things I want in employment through introspection and these previous employeers that help me push through the crap. These include:
- I need to be working fairly constantly. I feel the worst about myself and situations when my brain isn't being stimulated.
- I can't work on throw away projects, ideas or quick turn around client work. My work has to hold some sort of meaning.
- I'm a weird guy who to a lot of people I probably come off as brash/anti social. The truth is the opposite if you are someone I actually open up to. Basically I can't work with a bunch of people just like me, otherwise the working dynamic tends to be kind of odd.
- I desperately need to be able to work from home whenever I feel the need to. I don't want to be someone who is 100% remote because I feel as if I would go stir crazy but need the flexibility. It's hard to state the value in being able to recharge like that for me.
- Challenged. Probably the worst part of the last year is that I don't feel like I've picked up many new skills and have just "spun my tires" with things I already knew. Sure this does mean I have a lot more practical experience to show but that doesn't mean I can't be pushing myself to expand my skill set often.
Man, after going through with that I sound like a total prick to work with probably. I promise I'm not but in the end thats just how I know I work most effectively.
One of the most frustrating things I find is working in closed environments and then trying to apply to jobs at all these great startups/companies out there. When I was working full time on Mozilla projects I had a portfolio just sitting there for anyone to check out and see what I've done. Now? It looks like I have done absoleutly nothing for the last year because while I lvoe programming it isn't a consistent hobby so I don't tend to do much of it outside work. I fear this impedes me from even being considered for positions at other amazing companies and it is honestly quite depressing. Is this mostly just perceived by my own doubts? That is way too difficult to say but it's something that weighs on me regardless.
The Last Year (or so), Personally
Not everything is quite so bad. While this section will be shorter (mainly because I keep a simple life) I like to believe that the last year has been great in my personal life. I've delt with the standard self doubting but continued to learn more about what really makes me happy. Most importantly being happy with who I actually am and not worried about the opinions of others who so clearly don't give two shits. That in itself is probably the hardlest lesson anyone can learn.
As said, I would rather do some quick bullet point style highlights in this section so... lets get to it!
- Probably met more genuine and amazing people that I actually consider friends than ever before. Many thanks to the aforementioned community of B.A.T.L and others.
- The fact that I just generally seem to have better control of myself/who I am. Many days in the past it was pretty difficult to contain my own emotions about all the shit going on in my head but I have a far better grasp on things to be certain.
- Re introducing an active healthy life style back into the normal routine. This includes not drinking nearly as much (which sounds bad but it wasn't), a high protein diet and 8 hours a week at the gym with 2 nights a week throwing axes. Okay throwing axes probably doesn't count since we drink beer then but regardless I have managed to drop 8% body fat and 14 pounds over the last few months plus whatever gain in muscle mass I could. Feeling great has its psycological benefits.
- Pet ownership is pretty cool.
- Relationships are fairly cool.
- Making actual more long term commitments. At least, I like to think of tattoos as pretty long term.
How on earth did we get here?
Yeah, I don't really quite remember where this all started. In truth this is something I wrote over a couple of days and just never hit the publish(commit) button but the mind dump feels good. I hope to be posting regularly again with more concise thoughts!
- Tagged in personal and life.