Speaking of My Quarter Life Crisis...
I'm still waiting on the whole, floodgates-of-opportunity-bursting-open thing to happen. I don't mean that to be as passive as it sounds. I've been working my hoo-hah off trying to get a job, and I only have about thirty days before I throw my hands up and contact a temp agency (which might be just as well). The worst part is when you follow up with an application and they still don't call you back. My sensitivity gets the best of me in this case, when I have the hardest time, why can't people just help people?
My relationship with Best Buy is calm now that we've arranged for a divorce. Kind of like I've already moved my stuff out and we give each other forced smiles as we pass in the hallway. After working there for two years, I've learned only in the last month to say "no," and to say it to everything, because I owe Best Buy nothing and vice versa. I spent a good part of those two years hating the store, hating myself for not acheiving better for myself. Now? It is what it is, and what it is, is not me. No matter what way you shape it, it's not gonna fit. I will always want to create, and emote, and, oh I don't know, show empathy, and that will never be rewarded at my current place of employment. Square peg, round hole, much? Okay.
It's fascinating to watch the dynamic of new management attempting to blaze a trail, motivate the masses (burnt out and bored college students). I may not go along with it, but I understand sales and buyer behavior. I just think it's stupid. Sales, to me, is stupid. I recognize that it's integral to the economy. In some sense, necessary for civilization, even? Yeah. I get that. I just don't feel like doing it. [This also may have something to do with my current checking account balance of $3.53.]
Everything is sales. (As Rent immediately comes to mind, like "Sales, sales, sales, sales, sales. I'm not gonna do sales. But eeeeverything is saaaaaaaaales.") Anyway. My point is that even if I got into advertising or marketing, it's all about maximizing sales for a client, but I'm somehow okay with the psychology/creative piece of the whole mix. It's less smarmy, somehow. Still, there is a residue of smarm, and it makes me wonder if I could ever be passionate enough about something to get swept up into goals, budgets, and motivational metaphors. For now, I'll just throw this on the "WTF is my Purpose?" pile, which has now reached debilitating proportions!
I have been reading Jack Canfield's The Success Principles, which is a pretty good book for kind of mapping out what you want. It has also amplified any of my hippie tendencies because it uses a lot of affirmations and law-of-attraction theories. Like recently, when frustrated by my life, I had said aloud, "Everything is getting better." Not missing a beat, Damon responded, "It can't get much worse," because we are the fucking Lennon and McCartney of Apartment C2.
The most refreshing thing I have experienced in the past month have been my friends who have encouraged me to pursue my passion for writing. You expect them to support you going after what you love. It is perhaps the most beautiful when they mean it so intently, it is like there is no other option, like there is no other way.