A few years ago, I would’ve never thought that I’d be sitting here today writing something like this. Especially not this time, two years ago when I was so burnt out of my mind trying to make my self-absorbed manager like me. Was I right in that case? No. If I was me today, I would’ve paid everything no mind and just continued on my journey without sparing as much as a second thought for everything that was going on in my career life. It’s just a job after all. But back then, I still believed something could happen of that. I still thought that companies care about your wellbeing, HR was there to ensure employee happiness and eventually, my company did change the role to literally include the word “Happiness”, so it wasn’t so weird to think of it that way. The truth is, I was raised by employers and thought that everyone would be the same as my parents — considerate and putting their employees first. Unfortunately, I was way too delusional.
I wouldn’t be wrong to say that experience changes everything too. In the beginning, I was just a doe eyed girl who had just discovered her dream job and can finally write for a living. When I first said I like writing in a room full of copywriters, everyone took it as a joke and that was so endearing. With time though, I realised my strengths like working hard, staying late and doing my best were actually considered flaws. But what can I do when I grew up watching my parents work late nights, weekends and even during family vacations? It seemed fun and normal, and I wanted to do it too. The key thing here is, they worked for themselves. Nobody else gave them a salary and expected them to work for 40 hours a week to fulfill a contract. They did that because they wanted to. So imagine my surprise when I eventually realised that the ‘hustle’ everyone is on about is only beneficial when you’re hustling for yourself.
In the real, worker world, nobody appreciates the hustle. For the people I worked with, me staying until 7pm while they left a bit before 6pm made a huge difference, because it could make them look bad in front of others. And frankly, all that grind never gave me anything to begin with, except maybe stress and anxiety. But I wanted to prove myself so hard! I wanted to be creative and stand out, but the people I worked with were not the people I worked for. In fact, the people I worked with barely had an objective view of what I was doing. So in summary, I overdid it, okay? And as much as they tried to explain it to me I just didn’t want to have any of it. Eventually, when I actually started ‘quiet quitting’ they took it as a huge improvement. But you know what? I was bored. Very bored. Take it to my brain wanting stimulus. In my mind, I’d rather be caught dead working less and trying to relax on the job, that was meaningless. But here is when I realised something — why should I pour everything I have into a job when I can do it for myself?
To be absolutely fair, I’m still a bit traumatized from copywriting. I don’t feel comfortable doing it maybe because I overdid it. So like everyone with a ‘all or nothing’ mentality, something which I am trying to heal, I decided to drop it altogether. First though, I had to go through some burnout recovery. It wasn’t really the hard work that got me, it was in fact all of the people telling me not to do it and not appreciating the way I truly was. I was also quite shy to push myself on others, which did lead to some missed opportunities and all. But you know what? Life is all about learning. When I went into burnout recovery, which I’m completely grateful for, I realised how the seasons changed while I was working. I started seeing the beauty in my surroundings, something I had missed when I was so busy all the time. I realised there is beauty in the darkness and found new hobbies I could pursue. But most importantly, I found out that my brain was more fragile than I thought. Not only was I consuming a ton of coffee to keep myself awake and motivated, but it eventually turned out that wasn’t nearly enough. My soul was tired.
For the first few months, my brain felt absolutely broken. I couldn’t think at all because my head was full of static and I still have these moments, when I say something absolutely out-of-place just because my mind glitches for a second. It’s a scary thing to experience, especially as someone who found themselves quite the thinker beforehand. In fact, I identified myself with the speed and agility of my brain so much, that when that was no longer available I didn’t know who I was. Honestly, I had to grieve an entire identity in the process. Finally, I ended up becoming a much softer, more gentle version of myself. While extreme exhaustion, defensiveness and living in survival mode made me become edgy and standoffish, the recovery did exactly the opposite. And I’m extremely grateful for that! In the process, I got to meet myself on a whole other level and also realise that it wasn’t all about ‘work, work, work’. Yes, I had fun doing the work but it might be even more fun to not work for someone else.
The thing is, in my contract they had all kinds of things that ensured their power over me. Of course, it was all considered to be ‘fair’ but at the end of the day it depended on their good will on whether to implement it. One thing that struck me though was that apparently, according to my contract, all work I’ve done outside of my job — even on weekends, off-work hours or even during unpaid leave — could potentially be owned by my company if it so pleases. I’m sorry, what? When I initially read this, it sucked out the joy from my creativity. What do you mean that everything I created outside of work hours belongs to you? That’s insanse. Then I started to realise other things. Like, for example, my company was technically paying for a subscription of me. It took my time, energy and skillset, and in return it gave me money which I could buy stuff with. But the thing is, even if that was for just 40 hours of my week, it still didn’t account for my commute time, the time I biked in the rain, the time I spent thinking about work and frankly, all of those times when I actually dreamed about my workplace when I slept. It was taking up too much of my energy too, especially with return to office. I’m someone who works way too well from home, so when I had to return to the office, I could barely cope with the demands.
Hence, burnout. But here’s where time comes into context. It’s now almost 2 years after I burnt out and went on leave, and almost 1 year after I quit my job. From this perspective, I see a lot of things that I could’ve done differently and a lot of moments when I could’ve just aimed for complacency instead of excellence. But the thing is, I like excellence. Therefore, I would much rather just create it for myself than for someone who would barely value me. And is it scary to do something for yourself? Fuck yeah, it is! I’ve been recovering more and more from burnout and now finally have days where I can function quite well. Days, when I’m productive and feel better. Days, when I’m bored and want to do more and more to feel like myself. Days, when I sing and dance. Days, when I feel amazing. Those were quite rare in the past few years and honestly, a year ago I didn’t even consider there would come such a day again. But here we are now! The thing is, I’m starting to think of why I had to quit my job and whether it was fully necessary. From my perspective now, I could’ve done with it but from my perspective a year ago, it wasn’t even remotely possible. The problem was the pressure — they state that you would need to recover in this and that time, do this and that and follow all the rules, which made me feel very uneasy about just taking my time and seeing where recovery takes me. And now, looking at it from this perspecive, it’s not a bad place to be at.
For the past year, I’ve had time to mourn, travel, meet new people and discover new perspectives that I never would’ve thought existed. I had time to reconnect with my family and friends, to build a beautiful relationship with my boyfriend and discover new ways to enjoy life. I had time to be grounded in nature, connect to spirit and meet people who share similar perspectives to mine. And most importantly, I had time to relate to the seasons’ cycles and figure out my place within them all. I also found a cute baby dog, which is now the most mellow fellow on the planet. Life can be amazing if we just let it be. And while I was constantly worried about money in the Netherlands, never feeling like it was enough, I’ve been living off of savings in the past year and it felt better than ever — not just because I’m grateful for every cent, but also because life has allowed me to heal my relationship with my finances. Only time would tell where it brings me next, but for now I’m happy and grateful for everything I have and willing to work more for it. Because you know what? Even if it’s scary to build up something of your own, it’s a whole lot more gratifying than working your hardest and not seeing any results.
Now, time would only tell where life will take me next. Five years ago, I never would’ve imagined the journey I would’ve been to and back to come here. In fact, back then I was working something even less gratifying and had just gotten out of another burnout, which I might share more about later. But at the end of the day, what will surely happen is that I will be happy and satisfied with it. Like a wise person once said, we should run towards what scares us, because that’s the thing that would help us grow. So here I am, running straight towards it. You can surely join me and run towards it too.
Love,
Alex
