I Finally Quit My Job
The Timing Is Never Right When You're Asserting Boundaries
Happy Valentine's Day to Me!
I'm excited to lose all of the weight I gain from stress eating.
Before you throw me virtual high-fives, let me preface this with saying that I am still "working" at my school.
What I simply did was leave the organization that I worked for and officially joined the Department of Education.
It was a move I never expected to make and am grateful for doing.
I've been covering passion + values in my class. I don't shy away from sharing. I'm very upfront about how I value loyalty. From a macro-perspective, it's totally a trauma response.
For argument's sake, one can say I how I betrayed my own value by quitting a job - to which I reply "why do you assume my loyalty was to a toxic employer instead of myself?"
Learning to prioritize my own well-being has been a life long challenge. I lasted longer than I should have and yet I still feel bits of guilt for walking away.
I am not walking away from the students though. I am walking away from carrying the burden of responsibility, the consequences of having both a strong work ethic and desire for purpose.
People will revel in your misery when it benefits them.
I carried the weight of my program because I wanted to. I participated in self-exploitation for a number of reasons. I was willing to carry the weight of making decisions. I was willing to accommodate so many people before focusing on how that was negatively impacting me.
I didn't just gain weight. I gained a lot of resentment.
I was miserable and what bothers me, to this day, is how many people were content with my misery as long as I was making them look good.
I was drowning in overwhelm and no one, outside of personal friends and my therapist, checked in to see if I was OK.
It became harder to lie because students, who are well versed in hiding their emotions, could see through my fake smiles.
And I never wanted to get to a place where my depression would become a barrier to the work I am proud to do.
So I quit and chose to be the villain.
I quit with little remorse.
I quit unapologetically and yet I still remain diplomatic as fuck, sensitive to the working dynamic I still need to participate in as someone on the other side.
But this weekend, I will celebrate. I will honor how far I've come in advocating for my own sanity. Because sometimes advocating for one's self is not just verbally.
It's deciding to remove one's self from situations that no longer serve a purpose in your growth.
Cupid didn't strike me with an arrow. He gave me the crossbow to aim for a target that is more aligned with who I want to be.