2013 in Review: On the Road to Becoming My Best Self
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Well folks, here we are, at the end of the year of our Lord (or whatever god you do or don’t believe in) 2013. This has been, bar none, one of the craziest years of my short 24 years on this planet. Which is why this post is probably going to be all over the place but I’m going to soldier on and try and cohere my thoughts.
I think the best place may be to start would be with my decision to quit my job to go to film school. There have been many difficult decisions I’ve made in my life and this is somewhere near the top. I realize I haven’t spoken a lot about my job on the blog, for reasons of trying to maintain some source of anonymity from my employer and because I think of my blog as a safe space away from work. But I #minuswell go into it now since this is an introspective piece. I worked for one of the largest EPC (engineering, procurement and construction) companies whose name rhymes with Bechdel up until August 1. Since I have a degree in Civil Engineering, there was literally no better place to be and for the time I was there I enjoyed it. My boss was awesome and the people I worked with were pretty cool. I was in the office in Houston, meaning I was still involved in assisting the various projects out but not having to work a tough job in the field.
However, it wasn’t the best job in terms of activity and growth. Sure I was able to get my Six Sigma Yellow Belt but there were long stretches where I was not being challenged at work or given anything particularly great to do. This was happening while my coworkers were being given incredibly detailed tasks and while I was awaiting word on whether I would get into film school. The desire to be in the film industry was beginning to overtake the need to be in a decent paying job as during the early part of the year I went to several film festivals and wasn’t finding fulfillment in that job other than in my bank account.
But I think one of the biggest reasons I left, at least subconsciously, was because of a situation that arose in April. I had been helping out a Project Field Engineer on a project in Louisiana and was tentatively penciled in to go to the site (which would have made the decision to leave logistically difficult). However, in April, when I had come back from recruiting at NSBE and WonderCon, my boss called me in and told me I wouldn’t be going. She told me that the guy I was working for said my work was subpar and that I had given him attitude. This was an approximation of my face in that moment.
I was so blindsided by this I didn’t know what to say and thoroughly confused. While working for that guy there were many times when I was out of my depth and routinely tried to ask him questions but he was incredibly busy and rarely around, so I did my best. How then could this guy tell me my work was subpar and he was never around or never cared to tell me to my face that he didn’t like the work? What made this even worse is that this guy had told my boss about this and never once spoke to me. At a company like the one I worked at, having a good reputation is very important and that was a big situation. SO what did I do? I just let it go and kept working. Probably my one regret of the year is not talking with that guy and sorting out just what exactly I did that so subpar, but I was so pissed at the guy and halfway out the door mentally that I just let it go.
Given that I only spent a couple more months at the company, I just let the situation pass. I thought the decision to leave the company that rhymes with Bechdel would be more difficult but with film school within reach (and my parents on board) it was easy. I did have to SLAVE that final month cause I was involved with a big proposal, which made the freedom I got when I moved to LA that much sweeter.
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