Focus: Do you feel fulfilled with your job? Why or why not? THIS job? Fuck this job. Even though the manager just handled up on the Cunt situation, fuck. this. job. There's NOTHING fulfilling about this job. There's no light in anyone's eyes. There's no passion, no happiness, no...anything beyond here do this now do that now do this now make sure that is like that. And, fuck working with animals in this setting. These animals are coddled bastards and their owners are assholes who can't conceive that their asshole dog may have actually bitten one of us. I don't hate it...I guess. But I sure as shit don't CARE about anything except making sure MY part of the job is done right. That has more to do with my own work ethic than it does any passion for the job. Alt Focus: What job or career would you rather be doing instead? I miss coaching. I miss it so much. I miss seeing people light up. I miss seeing people discover things in themselves they couldn't imagine were real. I miss people showing me things about myself that I'd never considered. I miss having a purpose. I miss looking forward to waking up and seeing my people.
I got a kick out of those videos until I realized it's the same motherfucker who made this: Fuck that guy. Fuck him with a white hot iron dildo.
Focus: I work in marketing for a smallish healthcare tech company. It pays the bills. This is my first full-time job since graduating college three years ago and I didn't seek out working in this industry- was looking for whatever I could get. Out of everything I've marketed and sold, this is by far the most boring yet profitable and I started out just doing sales via cold calls on the phone and that sucked the life out of me for over two years. Thankfully in December my job just significantly improved, or at least what caused me the most stress and anxiety was cut out and replaced by what I wished I could be doing in my situation. I'm good enough to make a living at it, but I don't love it. Could be a lot worse. I didn't realize when I graduated how much I'd appreciate stuff like eye insurance and a high 401K matching rate too. Alt-focus: At the moment, I wish I were sitting at my workbench making custom guns. I still have a lot to learn and talent to build up and that means more time and effort, but I'm curious what I am capable if I did it full-time too. I'm on the verge of being almost good enough to make real money at it, but it still wouldn't be a high paying profession either and I don't feel like being a risky entrepreneur, so I choose to keep it a spare time thing for now and not depend on it for income- that means it can still be fun and lets me decide what projects to do. I wouldn't mind working at a shop in my home either. Doing it full time would also further enable me to explore other related trades I'm interested in like knifemaking, welding, forging, and general machining (lathe and mill stuff)- plus I'd maybe get more time for photography too, if anything for fun. Some day...
I teach high school English in bumfuck nowhere. I need to preface this by saying that I'm very lucky that I have a job and health insurance. I didn't do myself any favors post high school, so I shouldn't feel entitled to anything better than this...but I do. Teaching is billed as one of the most fulfilling professions. And I suppose it could be, if I thought that I was really making a difference anywhere. I don't think I am. It's almost impossible for me to do so unless I am so fully and wholly dedicated to the cause that there is nothing left of me as person. The education system is so screwy for so many different reasons that I am left with a job that is for all intents and purposes impossible to do. For my effort, I am not rewarded very well, and in my state it is likely that I will have to do much more with much less in the coming years as Common Core aligned tests are instituted alongside heavy cuts to education budgets. I teach in Kansas where tax cuts have gutted an education system that was already ruled by the state's Supreme Court to be underfunded. I don't get the sense that it is much different anywhere else. But even if I were paid better and had more resources, I'm not sure I'm cut out for this line of work. 30% of my high school reads at or above grade level. There simply isn't enough time to get these kids where they need to be in the 180 days that I have them. It's impossible. My biggest problem though is that teaching becomes consumptive. My mind is always half in the classroom, and I can never fully shut it off. That's probably true for other professions, so I shouldn't complain about it. But when this isn't the field I want to be in forever, I desperately need some time in my head to look at other things. I need to be figuring out how to get a different teaching job right now. Instead I have been trying all day to improve my lesson plans for next week. I spent today trying to figure out the best way to allow my students access to an audiobook as it might be the only way to get them through the next unit. I bought the audiobook earlier for $25. I then plunked down $80 for adobe premiere elements because Window movies maker fucks with my computers audio for some reason and I couldn't tell if I was actually creating a movie with sound. So now I'm going to go ahead and upload these movies to youtube, so the students can access them. So I spent over $100 of my own dime and am going to break copyright law for my students benefit. The kicker is I will look at these videos in a couple weeks and I'm sure that they will have no more than 2 views a piece, so what is the fucking point? I do all of this shit, and ultimately it is just so that I can tell myself that I did "enough." But I can never do enough as the system is so broken. And then I start to think about how others perceive me and my profession. Teaching doesn't exactly garner a whole lot of respect. Teaching is a lose, lose, lose. I have no fucking idea. There isn't a single thing that I can think of that I can do with my current skillset and going back to school seems like a bad idea. Part of my problem is that education is the family trade. I have no idea what any other kind of job looks like really. Like a few others on this board, I have this niggling dream of being a writer. But writers write. I haven't written much of anything in the past 5 years. I need to find the wherewithal to devote a lot of time and mental energy to that. Right now, I'm too good at using my day job as an excuse. I'm too tired, I have too much to do, I blah blah blah.
Focus: Do you feel fulfilled with your job? Why or why not? Yes. Unequivocally yes. I am an administrator (technically Director of Development) at a private preschool. (Private being the key word there.) My job is mostly implementing things which directly impact the learning experience for our students. I've been doing this long enough that some of my former students have come back as teachers with us, which both makes me feel really old, and proud. Though insurance and other benefits from the job suck (outside our 401(k) program, which is great), I make enough that me and my family can afford outside insurance. Alt Focus: What job or career would you rather be doing instead? I've always said if I ever won the lottery I'd be a carpenter. I grew up woodworking and building boats (I built a wooden sea kayak before I could drive), and with my job I'm able to do a little bit of it once they realized what they had in-house. But I'd love to make it a full-time profession. It's already a hobby.
Yesterday I got called in to work an hour early because the chef wanted help breaking down a whole elk. And when he said whole elk, he wasn't fucking around. I arrived just as him and the dishwasher were hauling in this monster, loosely packed in a plastic sheet. We butchered it in just under 75 minutes between the two of us. Just in time for the dinner special to be written on the board. So yeah, I really dig my job. Everyday is a little bit different from the last, I learn new things on every shift, even if it's just a minor tweak to a technique, or something like better organizing the grill station to get shit rolling out more quickly. I work alongside people who live a rock and roll lifestyle, and while I no longer take part, hearing their exploits and stories of excess is a great way to pass the time and make a shift fly by. My job keeps me active, as I'm on my feet all day getting a surprising amount of exercise. I'm able to walk to and from work each day, which is a most excellent way to unwind and recover after a shift. And last, but not least, my food is paid for, which is a massive relief on our household budget. Could it be better? Probably. But if you jot everything down on a pros and cons list, I am most definitely better off than most, because I want for nearly nothing.