The thing about working for a company like mine is they reward you for loyalty. If you do whatever they want, whenever they want you to do it and never complain, and you do this for a number of years, then the rewards they give you are really quite spectacular.
The problem with this is on the way there, you have to do exactly that, you have to go as far as they want you to go, for as long as they want you to be there and when you’re there you have to do whatever they ask. And the whole time you’re doing it, you’re waiting for this big pay off that you’re supposed to be getting, and you’re waiting 3, 4, 5 years.
I suppose that’s the price you pay for working for a large corporation, you’re one of hundreds of small fish in a very large pond, where the big fish are few in number but great in size and invariably have the two things you neither have nor want – a penis and a golf handicap.
The questions that are troubling me at the moment is, when do you say enough is enough, when do you decide that you’ve waited long enough and it just isn’t worth it? When are you justified in quitting? When you have kids that you never see? When you’re so exhausted from it all that you’re suffering recurring migraines? When conversations with your boss about the annual pay review always end with “but as with everything in life, I can’t promise anything”? When is it time to jump off the ledge and try something else? Can you ever go down the ladder without feeling and looking like a failure? Can you quit this job that was meant to be your big career and just wait and see? I mean could you look your mother and your best friend in the eye and say “I tried, but you know what? I’m not like you, I haven’t got a vocation, I don’t know what I’m doing and maybe I’m just a bit lost right now, but I need something that means I can wake up in the morning feeling good about the day”.
I’m 25 this year and it feels like a watershed year, I’m still young enough to change my mind and mess things up but I have too many commitments to just abandon everything and start again. I now you’re probably reading this and thinking ‘doesn’t she think this every couple of months and she looks around and then gives up?’ and you’re right, I absolutely do, but this year is the year that I’m going to figure it out, one way or another this year is the year I stick or twist.
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3 comments:
Why should going down the ladder be a failure? Why do you need a vocation? Why not just find something you enjoy doing?
It comes down to your definition of success. If you think that a high-powered job and crazy wages constitute success, then you'll just have to keep plugging away at the corporate life until you get a break.
If you want to do something a little less meaningless, you'll have to take a risk.
I'm doing the corporate thing, but I really don't see it as any kind of success. In fact, success for me would be finding a nice girl and spending my days writing and composing, so by my own standards, I'm failing miserably.
Even having the courage to jump off the ledge is a kind of success. What if you look back on your life when you're on your deathbed, and all you can think is, "Why didn't I at least try?"
The thing that really gets me about corporate life is that's it's such a big waste of time. You'll spend your life (the parts of it where you can still walk/see/hear/go 15 minutes without wetting yourself) doing pointless, repetitive tasks to make someone else richer and his life better. Why? If all you're going to do with your life is arse around in an office, what was the point in being here in the first place?
Anyway, I'll stop there before I get too engrossed and this turns into a rambling epic. Let me know if you come up with any solutions, I could probably use them too.
How long? For me? Seven months.
And that cliched line 'best move I ever made'? Holds true.
My word for 2006? Go.
For God sake! You tell someone they look A BIT like Claire Sweeney one time....
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