You will be told over and over again that it's good to have a job. You can hate your job, but people will tell you it's better to have a job than not to have a job. As someone who has held rewarding but underpaying jobs, jobs that caused me nothing but heartbreak, being fired from jobs for being short-tempered, just plain not having a job at all points in between, you need to ask yourself a simple truth: What is this job costing me?
This is not a question to be taken lightly. Many people have good jobs. Perhaps you're one of them. But you have to ask yourself, what are you gaining, and what are you losing? If your job is costing you fun time with your friends, then you're missing the point. If your job works you to the bone and leaves you tired and feeling hollow, what do you get in return? Do you get a big fat paycheck? That paycheck is nice, but there's a part two: when you've got those Beatles-style blisters on your fingers, will it pay off? Or when you stop, will it all go away? It's an admirable goal to work hard for your future, but you have to make sure you're actually doing what you think you're doing. Working for the present moment is not the same. It's up to you if that's what you want, but you absolutely have to ask yourself the question, not just devote yourself to an unappreciative boss, or pay dues in the wrong direction “because it looks good on a resume.”
A resume is not you. It is not your experience. It is barely a summary of your experience. It is a concise highlight reel of where you have been. You are your experience. You carry it around with you everywhere you go. Your resume will not tell anyone what you really learned from a job. Use enough fancy language and you can make getting coffee and putting a bunch of files in alphabetized cabinets sound like you really contributed to the success of the company, rather than just be just another in a line of disposable interns.
What you really learned you will never put on your resume. You won't make any check marks next to what jobs gave you the most shit from customers and coworkers, or how you learned to put up with it. Your resume won't say if you take personal calls or check your email at work. Your resume won't say what job taught you to tune out the stupid music you had to listen to over the PA. Your resume won't say if you really have the drive to make sacrifices, or if you don't; only you know that.
Which brings me back to the question you have to ask yourself: are these sacrifices a worthwhile gift to your future self, or are they just made in vain? There are sales jobs where they literally pay you nothing unless you make them money first. With gas, tolls and lunch, you might be out thirty dollars before you get out of bed in the morning. There are jobs where, as lucrative as they make it seem in the interview, you're just part of a big pyramid scheme, or some other scam, and you might realize it, and you might not. We're not talking about petty principals like “working for the man” or “having to wear a suit,” we're talking about jobs that literally will not reward your hard work, or are morally reprehensible. Remember, they don't have to give a shit, because they can find ten people just like you in a day, but you can't take back whatever you give up for that job until you quit, and you have to weigh the consequences of quitting too.
Not easy questions are they? But when someone tells you, “it's better to have a job than to not have a job,” well, they're talking about a different time. Jobs today aren't like they were thirty years ago, when you could work your way up in a company for decades, get good medical benefits, and all those other relics of a bygone era. A job either makes you money, or makes you lose money. And I'm not just talking about not being reimbursed for gas and tolls, either. If a job doesn't have enough hours and high enough pay, and it's costing you opportunities at better jobs, you're losing. But, if a job that works you too hard, and isn't in the field that interests you, and ends up taking away not just from hobbies, but from your real passion, or costs you opportunities to further the career you really want, you're losing. If you're losing, you need to get out, and get out fast. Other responsibilities are going to pile up fast. You're gonna look at that fat bank account and buy a big screen TV or a fast car; you're going to start dating, get marries, have kids. You're gonna have to pay those bills, or, even worse, have people depending on you, and you'll be more entrenched.
I'm not talking about giving up dreams to have a life of humble accomplishment. God loves the common man, that's why he made so many of them. I'm talking about not believing in bullshit that passes for common sense. Maybe once it was common sense, but it's not any more. It's not bullshit to hit the eject button when you can't get ahead. Stop pushing yourself further into the big muddy. Find a different path. Take what you've learned, write it in a stupid blog, and move on.
No comments:
Post a Comment