I’m OK.

Negativity sucks!  I mean everyone is negative sometimes and it’s to be expected and it’s OK, but constant negativity sucks.  I have a lot of negativity in my life, much of which I can’t control, so I try to control it wherever I can.

My work environment really sucks.  There are five people in my office suite and for the most part we all dislike and barely tolerate each other.  There’s constant negativity, often thinly veiled, sometimes completely blatant.  I try not to take it personally.  I try not to let it effect me.  I try not to participate in it.  I try to stay above it, beyond it.  But it gets to me, a lot.

The negativity and sheer misery that my job brings has really begun to take its toll  on me.  I used to be able to block it out.  I used to be able to leave it at the door.  The awfulness that surrounds me at work sucked, but when I walked out the door  to the office, I put it behind me and went about the rest of my life.  Lately, I haven’t been able to do that and it’s really beginning to take its toll.

I’m trying to find a new job.  I’m trying to find something that will satisfy and fulfill me.  I’m coming up empty and I’m realizing that the seven and a half years that I’ve spent in my current job have been wasted.  I have learned nothing.  I’ve gained nothing.  I have a title that doesn’t match my experience and skills.  I have a salary that will be hard to duplicate, especially in this challenged economy.  I need to make a change and I honestly just do not know what to do.

I decided I needed to look for something different from what I’m, well, what I’m not doing now.  Six years of progressive advancement in Project Management when  I’ve only managed one, very small project the entire time has prepared me for  absolutely nothing.  I’m expected to have experiences and skills and abilities that I simply do not possess because my job has never really given me that  opportunity.  I’m willing to take a step back.  I’m willing to take a lower salary  (though I don’t know how I’ll manage).  I’m willing to start over, if I could just get the opportunity, but people see “Associate Project Manager” and expect me to be able to hit the ground running.  People see that an “Associate Project Manager” is  applying for, say, a Project Assistant position, or a Project Analyst position and  they can’t understand why someone who is “clearly over-qualified” would want it  and then they move on to the next resume.

So I sit in my chair, staring at my screen, desperately wishing I knew what to do,  begging and pleading God for some sort of direction, a sense of what I should do.  I’ve got nothing.  And I’m trying so hard not to be a negative person, but my  defenses are down and I’m being bombarded, it seems, from all sides.

I’ve eliminated as much of it as I can.  I’ve un-followed nearly 100 People on Twitter, many because their negativity has been too much for me to handle.  I was spending (wasting) way too much of my life on trying to stay up to date on my  twitter feed and I finally realized that is just stupid.  So I cut the list way down.

I’ve been reading a bunch of people’s blogs, many of which I can’t relate to.  I’m cutting those down as well, not that I don’t find value and enjoyment out of reading the blogs, but I’d like to be reading more blogs that are things I can relate to.  I’m not a parent and I’m almost guaranteed never to be, so why am I reading  Mommyblogs and Daddyblogs?

I spend so much of my life feeling like no one in my life really understands me. I  spend so much time feeling like I have nothing in common with the people in my  life but instead of finding people I do have things in common with I continue down  the same path and hope for things to get better.  That is not working.

Lately, my life has been sucking quite a bit and I can’t seem to figure out how to  change that.  And when things get like this, I find it really difficult to concentrate,  difficult to sort anything out or find a solution or plan.  I tried to write yesterday.  I wanted to come up with some sort of post because I hadn’t written anything in  several days.  I started three times and this is what I came up with:

Mediocrity

How does one learn to be OK with…  A dozen words are going through my mind for what should go here… insufficiency?  Lack?  Ineptitude?  Less than?  Mediocrity? I’m not sure.

I’m surrounded by it though, and it’s becoming apparent that it’s a problem for me that is a big contributor to my own unhappiness.  I just don’t know how to accept these things as “OK” and go on about my business…

Teenage Lament

There are days I really miss being a teenager!  I miss the lack of responsibility and accountability that comes with being a teenager.  I miss being able to make irrational judgments and decisions and knowing that there would be no lasting effects from those actions.  I miss knowing that I was going to be provided for, no matter what I did.

When I was a teenager if I hated my job, I quit.  There’s another one waiting around the corner.

At A Loss

Focus.  Concentrate.  Think Straight.  Be rational and coherent.

This seems to be a list of things I’m not able to do today.  Not really just today but lately.  I’m feeling very overwhelmed these days with all the  things I’m not able to manage.  I’m so tired of trying.  I’m tired of trying to  be what other people seem to need me to be.  I’m tired of having other people impose their expectations on me.  I’m tired of having oblivious  people in my life who just take over my life and expect me to comply.

I’m tired of coming to work everyday just to sit at my desk and not have anything of value to do.  I’m tired of trying to find a way to occupy my time when I know that there’s nothing for me to do.  I’m tired of making the effort to find a new job just to realize that there’s nothing out there for me.  I’ve wasted the last seven and half years of my life working in a position that has given me no real practical experience and a job title that comes with more expectations I can’t meet.

I’m tired of trying to find a solution when I don’t even fully know the problem.  I’m tired of …

There are three, because I started one and a different thought popped into my  head.  I started another and the next thought popped into my head.  I couldn’t sort it out.  I couldn’t make things fall into place so I could coherently express my  feelings… So I gave up and played a computer game.  That’s always easier.

Besides, I don’t want to be negative.  I don’t want my blog to be a place where people go and read my negative feelings and get tired of dealing with it, and take me out of their line up.  And then this happens…

Maybe, just maybe, there are people out there reading my blog who actually really do care about me, and not just the laugh I may or may not bring.  Maybe some people reading this blog actually notice when I’m not around and have concern.  Maybe this is about more than just words on a screen, and laughs that are  conveyed (I hope).

So here I am.  Yes, Jody, I’m “OK” by a relative scale.  I’m well aware that there  are a lot of people in this world, a whole lot worse off than I am.  That doesn’t change my unhappiness, but then again…  I suppose it does put some things into perspective… a little.