back to the start.

As I approach 29, I've been doing a lot of thinking about my job, my life, and what I want the next 10 years to look like. There's really only one thing I know for sure - I don't want to work for "the man" for the rest of my life. I need to find a way to make money for myself, for a business with my name on the door. Now, if only I knew what I wanted that particular business to be.

I've been poring over some old personality tests and thinking about what made me happy as a child, and it always comes back to the same two things - reading and writing. Those were the things I loved to do the most when I was growing up. I was super bookish and nerdy and refused to go anywhere without a book or two. I'm pretty sure my extended family thought I was nuts because I would never dance or play or talk to anyone at family gatherings. I just sat in the corner reading. I loved to write, too - there's something about language that is so fascinating to me. When I'm bored, I like to look at random signs around me and jumble up the words to spell out different things (yes, I'm fucking weird... I'm aware). I don't write nearly as much as I used to and not even at the level that I used to. I've somehow let that piece of me die, which is sad as I'm pretty sure that's where most of my creativity and joy lie. I want to commit to more reading and more writing. That's why I've been trying so hard to get myself a job on the communications team, because even if I'm writing corporate fluff pieces or answering Q&As from employees, at least I would doing some kind of writing and maybe that would fulfill me in some small way.

I've grown a little too complacent and way too comfortable in my current job. I love the salary, the perks, and the people I work with, but I'm slowly starting to see that it's not enough. I'm not sure what the answer is, but I know that I don't have it yet and I have to push forward for some kind of meaningful change. I've been putting a bunch of irons in the fire - signing up to take the Foreign Service Officers exam, looking into going to grad school, trying to improve my event manager job, and looking into other opportunities at my company. I'm just hoping if I throw enough shit at the wall, something will stick. Maybe the answer is that I stick with what I'm doing and where I'm doing it and I use that money and those perks to do something outside of work that makes me happy. I have no idea where this road is going to take me, but I know that something has got to give and change needs to be made. I can only hope I'm up to the challenge.