My gut feeling
Every now and then, you gotta listen to your gut feeling.
There were plenty of times in my life when I didn't do that, and I should have.
Letsee.... like sticking with Jenny in a long-term relationship. That fiasco-in-the-making lasted wayyy longer than it should have. (Fuck you, Jenny and Stacy!!)
And then there was that time way back when, when I went in for a job interview for a Sales Insurance position. I just told myself that the interview was for experience. But TBH, it was a goddamn waste of time. I knew deep down that I wasn't really interested in the job, nor was I qualified for it.
And for that time when I went in for Protiviti.... really, I just accepted that role for the 50% pay raise and the hot recruiter at the time. I lasted there for about 6 months. Yeah, I really didn't care much about that gig either.
Fast forward to more recent times. In summer 2019, it was announced that BSC would be closing our site here in the Bay Area. My dad's preference was that I didn't stick around for my severance, even if it was a big one. He would've been perfectly happy had I just jumped ship and found a new job right away. But I was like, hell no! I wanted my severance! It was a big one and I fuckin' earned that money!! And I also wanted my retention bonus. So I stayed till I was laid off in May 2022. I listened to my gut feeling, if that makes sense.
In addition, I was pretty set on taking a work break. For how long, I didn't know. But a break nevertheless. Both my parents finally accepted that even though as time went on, they got worried, especially my dad, because of all the fuckin' doom-and-gloom recession news. Even my good friends Alberto and Darren were acting like my old man which drove me nuts. And there's my BIL, who recommended that I take no more than 6 months off.
I mean, these are all smart guys. Don't get me wrong. What they said made sense. But TBH, my gut feeling was that I still wanted to take a long break. This is despite what Thomas and Blake said, that it's easier to find a job while you're already working (and you have more leverage when it comes to negotiating your salary too). And that IS true.
But still, I was like..... I want to take a goddamn break from work. I have the rest of my life to work. I worked straight for 15 years. Will it be the end of my fucking life if I take a fucking year off??? If people think I'm a loser for doing that (and I 100% know for sure that there are such rigid squares like that in this world), then screw them.
So guess what? I listened to my gut feeling and took a long break off work.
Another example where I listened to my gut feeling. Since I was laid off, I got a complimentary career counseling service. My coach was a guy named Geoff, who is a good guy. He's smart. I learned some good tips from him. But when I told him I was thinking about making a career change, he was like, "You should get a job first. Even if you don't like it. THEN make the career change."
........ sure, that makes some sense too. But I was like, "Uhhhh, if I start a new job, people expect me to stay there for the long term." Sure, it's a free country in such that there's nothing preventing me from switching jobs. But that's more trouble than its worth. Plus, if there are more people in Quality who're the likes of Giannina, Raul, and Stef (yes, I'm fuckin' calling them out here! But who the fuck cares, no one reads my LJ anyways), then I don't want to get in another shitty hole like that in the first place. What I wanted to say to Geoff is that, if I start working a job that I don't like, guess what.... I'd get sucked in so fast in such that they wouldn't make it easy for me to leave (especially since I have a heavy guilty conscience with the "Rescuer" mentality). But I didn't tell him that.
So during my work break, I hardly responded to allllll these recruiters contacting me for Quality role positions. My gut feeling was.... do I really want to get back in a Quality operations role again? That did NOT make me jump in excitement. And when it comes to NPI shit, I have no luck for those types of roles b/c I don't have any fuckin' experience in NPI. Sure, I told previous interviews that I'm open to learning and I'm a hard worker, but nope. They don't listen to that.
Thus, when people (including Geoff) were like, "Just interview anyways!", I was like... look, for Quality NPI positions, I'm wasting their time, and they're wasting my time. I've been thru all that several times. So no. No thank you. Forget interviewing for them.
The only Quality positions that I actually Zoom-interviewed with were Quality compliance jobs. But even then, my excitement level was not high. It was higher than how I felt about Quality operations roles, but still nothing that made me jump in joy. That was my gut feeling.
Then there was the EH&S Specialist position for Shockwave. As I pondered it more and more, I was like... huh, this could be a good job for me. Even though I'd be taking a 20%+ paycut because of changing careers, it still seemed like the right opportunity for me.
In fact, I didn't take the EH&S job because of all the doom-and-gloom recession news that my dad, BIL, Alberto, and Darren were all so obsessed with. I was able and willing to go on a few more months on my work break. But like I said, Shockwave's EH&S position was the right opportunity for me. That was my gut feeling. So I fuckin' went for it. I, perhaps unwisely, put all of my eggs in one basket. Because overall, I had confidence that I'd get the EH&S position and frankly, that was the only job role that I was actually excited about.
(Months earlier, when I was having an informal chat with Suma about switching to EH&S, she kinda discouraged me. But I didn't let that linger on in my head as I was going thru the interview process. I wonder how surprised she was when she found out that I got into EH&S without her help.)
I think all of this are examples where I established boundaries for myself. This has been something I've been working on with my counselor. Which is great, because since I'm such a goddamn people-pleaser, I don't always successfully set boundaries and let other people walk all over me. Now, some of the examples above may not 100% have to do with setting boundaries.... but they're interlinked, nevertheless.
So I gotta continue doing that more.
Set my own boundaries. Listen to my gut feeling.
It's my fuckin' life. Not anyone else's.