Letting your career define your self-worth

I’ve allowed being a journalist to become my hobby, rule my self-worth and
it has come to define me. I don’t know what else I would be good at, or
most important, what would make me just as happy.

I’ve scoffed at the idea of a 9-5 job in a corporate tower–wearing the same
suit every day, riding the same train, with the same people, and doing
the same tasks every day.

To me the life of a reporter is the only life I want to lead. To me it’s a
sense of freedom and it is the one thing I’m truly in love with.

But for a type-a personality to be jobless at 22-years-old is like mixing oil and water–it just doesn’t mix.

It’s been three months since I graduated college and I’m starting to think about turning into a corporate career woman. But one thought lingers in my mind: will I regret this later?

I could put down roots closer to family, make the kind of money a college
graduate should make and be able to support myself and save. Or, I can
continue to fight for a relationship with a newsroom, which will pay me
enough to survive paycheck to paycheck, but I’ll be content doing what I
love.

It seems rather selfish in times like these to worry about a job that’ll
make me happy over a job that will pay the bills. But I’ve seen adults
punch in every day at a job they truly hate and with each punch they
lose a piece of themselves.

So, as I sit in my parents house, moaning about all my misfortune what I
really know is that I’m blessed to have this time to reflect on my life
up until now and choose a path that will challenge me, inspire me, and
complete me.

Tags: college graduate, jobless, pursuing your dreams

Naked

I’ve recently severed ties with a long-term boyfriend.

He was my first love and I was totally enthralled for the better part of five years.

It was the kind where you promise you’ll be together forever–young love, stupid irrational love.

Some of you will hate my post.

But one failed relationship does not mean that yours will end too.

In the midst of my relationship there was no end in sight.

It was one of those where you swear it’s different from everyone else’s.

“You’re the different couple,” you tell yourself.

It’s the first person you say, “I love you,” to.

You promise each other impossible things.

And for the better part of six months, I’ve been replaying those impossible moments in my mind.

Ever since I stopped talking to you, I’ve sworn that I would not show my true feelings.

So here’s what I would say to you if I could:

I hate that I needed you for so long.
I hate that you were never want I needed for so long.
I hate that you replaced me so soon.
I hate that you live so carefree without me.
I hate that you might be happy.
I hate that I wasn’t strong enough to leave you sooner.
I hate that I spent hours/weeks/years worrying about ending up together.

So just as much as it kills me to watch you with someone else, even though I let you go, I hope that when you see me, you see joy and pain and something you’ll never be able to attain again.

But most of all, I miss you and I feel naked in a world without you.

I hate saying that but it feels good to be in a place now with my feet under me and path in front of me. Even without you on it, just know, I’m fine and I hope you are too.

Tags: boyfriend, boys, break up, first love, girls, heartache, lost, love, naked

Tell me what’s next.

I’m a planner. A planner with a boyfriend who throws plans to the wind and expects to simply remember everything that has happened, is happening, or will happen in his life. It is here that we differ.

Today I read a Marie Claire article titled “The New Male Mid-Life Crisis” about the current fad for men to have a silly “quarter life” crisis (or third of life, or mid-life, or fifth of life —fifth of life? That’s your cue to fill my glass).

The article opens and closes with a man who cannot decide whether or not to leave his very successful girlfriend because he cannot decide if, indeed, he’s having a CRISIS.

IS THIS WHAT I’M SUPPOSED TO LOOK FORWARD TO?

So, I’m supposed to get my first job, then my dream job, then move up the ladder to my dream position, while saving the children, finding a cure for AIDS, and getting in a daily workout before 6 a.m. — while he, the non-planner, type-B personified, stops to smell the roses and has a fucking crisis.

Take my name off that list.

Tags: boyfriends, careers, life, Marie Claire, men, mid-life crisis, planning, plans, Type A, Type B, vodka

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