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> Do any of you have any experience with this? Um, YEAH. And just started seeing a counsellor about it. I don't think there's anything wrong with me (or you) but I want someone to talk to about it. I disagree with "Efforts taken at this point to turn things around would be futile." I'm living proof. I bounced from job to job for 10 years, then lost a job in finance in 2007 at 33, went back to school, got out in 2010 at 35 and now have a job as a software engineer. Yeah, I'm competing with young turks 10-15 years younger than me. Yeah, sometimes they're better... but a lot of the time they aren't. It turns out I actually did learn a few things bouncing from one job to another, and people do see that. Is it the best job I could have at this point in my life, am I as rich as I could be, as if I had done everything "right"? NO. I threw away a bunch of fucking brilliant opportunities earlier in my career. But is it a good job that will give me a platform to build a satisfying career in the next 20 years? Absolutely. The really hard thing for me at this point is figuring out where I really do want to go. In my case, a lot of the bad decisions were to do with "grass is greener" feelings -- I'd see one job that looked cooler than my current job, go out and get it, then decide it wasn't that cool and bounce to another one. So now that I've finally recognized that, where the fuck DO I want to go now, and how do I figure that out? I think that's really important. Calling it "finding your passion" is bullshit, though, because it's not really about passion -- it's about making a sensible decision, taking everything into account including financial situation, family responsibilities, and the realities of various careers, as well as, yes, what you like to do. I'd love to be an astronaut, always wanted to, but -- life sucks -- it ain't gonna happen now. Not that it is 100% impossible, but I'm not willing to make the sacrifices it would entail. But there are great, exciting, satisfying things I can still do. Another thing that's hard is making sense of the past while still keeping my focus on looking ahead to the future. That's what I'm trying to do now. I don't want to keep repeating broken patterns, so I feel like I need to think about what I've done in the past and understand it, to some extent, so I can see what I did wrong and how I can make sure not to do the same thing again. I think I've identified some of those things, but that's the main reason I'm seeing the counsellor -- I want to talk out my analyses of my past decisions and try to understand them and use my "lessons learned" for the future. I don't think completely ignoring everything that has gone before is right -- I did that for a long time and ended up making just the same mistakes 10 years later. But obsessing about the past is (obviously) not helpful either. It's a hard balance to strike. So, you aren't alone. Very much not alone, I think. Hope you're able to make some sense of things. You can ALWAYS turn things around. |