There are many ways of saying that fate has brought to you a specific place at a specific time, as the title of this episode suggests.
It has been a little while since I last wrote but in that intervening time I have made a few changes – and brought onto myself a few stresses that I had not fully anticipated the effects of – but I KNOW FOR A FACT that what I have left behind was toxic for my mental state and it wasn’t making me feel physically great either.
I left behind a job where I was earning nearly $30k in shift penalties on top of my normal salary so the pay was pretty good, but I had 2 levels of manager above me that did not give a crap about the welfare of their staff. It was always a case of getting the job done, completing the numbers of jobs required and stuff you if you couldn’t take it. I have been through enough crap in my life where I can take a lot but sadly for them – or maybe not – I got to a point where I felt wholly unsupported and indeed felt victimised by my manager’s incompetence in dealing with people and the human aspect. It got to a point where I had to tell HIS boss that I had lost respect for this person and could not longer work with him and was actively seeking a move to another area of then organisation. When I said thi s I was told by his boss that “he is not a people person”. That was the last straw for me. I had to get out.
Almost immediately on starting to seek jobs in other areas of then organisation, I came upon an advertisement for a position as a trainer. The job description sounded awesome but it had been 25+ years since I’d done any similar kind of work so did not hold out any hope but I figured nothing ventured, nothing gained.
A month went by and I was stuck in the job I was doing, hoping each and every day that I would not have any run ins with my supervisor, when I received a missed call while getting a tattoo on one of my days off. I returned the call as soon as I could and it was from the manager of the training unit that I had applied to about 5 weeks beforehand. I got the job!!
To say that I was rapt to know I was leaving a job I no longer enjoyed because of someone I no longer respected filled me with enormous optimism for the future, despite this being a short term opportunity initially of 12 months duration. I figured that the worst that could happen would be that the position was no longer required and I would return to “the crappy job” but I was willing to give the new position my best shot.
I started the new job 3 weeks ago and I felt more supported and valued after one day in the new position than I did in the 19+ months I spent in the previous position. That to me is the essence of humanity. I tell my 2 teens that it is not hard to be nice. The managers and staff in the new area are accepting of my life story and as such they are grateful to have me and my life experiences to call upon and allow me to use those to train the new breed of staff coming through, all of whom are young and impressionable.
I will be eternally grateful to myself for not spurning the chance to find a spot in life where I could actually be happy going to work and despite losing a large chunk of money as a result of the new job I don’t think I need to say that I am much happier now than I was 3 weeks ago!
Another piece of life’s puzzle has fallen to the metaphorical floor this week, when my ex wife started working in the same building as me, where my new job is located. I knew that I would eventually have to run into her – and her new guy whom she happened to be working with when she and I separated 4 years ago – but to have it happen on her first day in the building was a surprise. I ended up calling it BandAid day and you know what – I survived!! Seeing her waiting for the life and me getting out of it probably took her more by surprise than it did me. The encounter was merely an exchange of “hey” but it was over in a flash and I didn’t die from it!
So, from these 2 things I have come to place 2 more pieces of my life’s puzzle into place. I am now in a job that I love to do, I am amongst people who appreciate my human frailty and I have proven my strength against emotional obstacles that might otherwise have derailed my completely.
I like where my life is at.
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