Starting from scratch
Is this back to square one… or?
I have so many mixed emotions about this decision and most of them are on the negative side. As a glass-half full sort of person, I can’t help but feel like I’ve ‘failed’ this attempt to launch myself into a different sort of working life.
Essentially, real life kicked me in the ass. After the 1.5 year stint, I have slowly but surely exhausted my savings. Horticulture doesn’t pay well and especially not when you’re trying your hand at starting your own business.
The growing season comes to a close and though I’m provide my year-end financials are in the black, the actual income was not enough to pay the bills.
Out of nowhere, a temporary contract opens up with my first career. Oddly enough, it’s in an area past me would’ve picked as an ideal role. So coupled with the need to replenish my savings, I applied, interviewed and subsequently got the job.
By now you would’ve guessed I angsted the hell out of this. Honestly, it was really hard not to feel like a total failure. Due to the temp contract being a full-time (if not more) commitment, I really couldn’t hold onto many of my regular horticulture clients I’d amassed the last year. There wasn’t a chance I’d be able to make a regularly scheduled weekday morning visit.
It felt like a blow, giving up what shreds of a business I’d managed to built all to go back to something I doesn’t quite feel right anymore. I’m worried I’d fall back into that dark place at the beginning of this journey.
Reframing it with my counsellor, it boils down to these points:
there’s a reason for doing this and frankly, you need to money to live
the other reason being that this is just a good time as any to do another experiment — how does the present me feel at a role that was past-me’s dream job
if I do start spiralling again then she will point it out, but until then I will try not to anticipate shit hitting the fan
keep an open mind; there is as good of a chance that I might actually settle back into my first career and feel good about it vs. not. The goal is to gather observations without forcing it either way
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-S
Note: if it’s not already apparent, the time of my writing is delayed from the experience itself. To pin this post to the approximate date, this would be in beginning of 2023.
Image credit: Pixabay - Camera-man