Finding Your Happy

I had a dream that I was offered a really cool job in Washington DC that would pay me $100,000 more per year than my current job.

And I ...

... didn't want to take it.

Which is how I know -- really know -- that I'm living right.

While it would be nice in both my dream and my reality to make that much money, and it would be completely glorious not to have to worry about money, the bottom line was -- and is -- that living in DC would not make me happy, and the job, though cool, would not make me happy. What does make me happy is where I'm at and what I'm doing.

That's the important thing.

I've said time and time again that I don't need to love my work. I don't think loving my work is a prerequisite for a life well lived. I do, however, think it helps if you enjoy your coworkers, if you like the company you're keeping, if what you do makes you happy on some level.  I don't want to live my job. I want to work at my job and live the rest of my life outside of it.

That's where I am now.

And it doesn't suck.

I think though, even as I write this, that there are people who would be super happy to have a cool job in DC and who think that turning that down -- even if it was only in a dream -- is insane. I get that. I also get this: what makes me happy might not be what makes you happy. So -- when you have that dream? Take the job, if that's what your heart tells you to do. Have at it. Go nuts. And when you wake up, if you're happy that you're in your bed and going to the job you have when you're awake? Sweet.

But if you wake up and you're sad because the dream wasn't real?

Make it real.

I woke up from that dream and I was happy that I was here, in this place, going to this job. That's important. It tells me that I'm on the right path. (Which, finally.)

Find yours.

Find it in your dreams, and find it in your life. Find your happy.

Monday Madness

Five things that are less than ideal on a Monday morning:

1) suddenly remembering that you never did get to that thing you went to into the office on Saturday to do, and it needs to be turned in first thing today.

2) booting up your computer and discovering that you didn't turn the volume down after watching Netflix yesterday so the welcoming chime is DEAFENING.

3) cat barf

4) uncooperative, flippy hair.

5) running out of coffee.

Hope your Monday has a more promising start!

Friday Randoms

I

 

"It's super humid in here."

 

"I know, my weather station says it's about 55% humidity."

 

"That's ... like, halfway to being a pond."

 

II

 

"Peace out."

 

"Did you just say, 'Spanish rice'?"

 

"No, I said peace out. But that could be a thing. 'Oh hey, gotta go. Spanish rice.' "

 

III

 

"Am I better at this job than the girl who used to have this job?"

 

"Yes. But to be fair, she was useless. A tree would do her job better than she did it."

 

 

IV

 

"You should have anticipated that accident."

 

"The thing is, though, that accidents can't be anticipated, really. They're like the Spanish Inquisition. They come upon you suddenly."

 

"..."

 

"Or, yes, you're right, I should have anticipated that."

 

 

V

 

"I sat in the sun for like five minutes and started to burn."

 

"You're a ginger. You're lucky you didn't burst into flames."

 

"I KNOW!"

 

 

 

 



Minutes

Doing that thing this morning where you set your alarm because you know you have to get up early and then your need for nine more minutes of sleep overrides your good sense and you hit snooze because there's a part of your brain that's juuuust awake enough to rationalize "No, I can totally get everything done and out the door in time even if I don't get up right now, despite the fact that I timed the morning to the minute" which you will only realize is completely untrue AFTER you finally get up. Stupid, lying, sneaky brain. So then you get up and you have a bajillion things to do before you can get out the door -- coffee, clothes, shower, hair, food, computer -- and you sit down at the computer and get sucked into a photography website where you find yourself looking at photos of celebrities taken by a photographer who has become a celebrity and thinking, "Boy, some of these celebrities sure are attractive" and "how is this guy a famous photographer? I could take these pictures" and you scroll and you scroll and you're scrolling the minutes away and then you realize HOLY CRAP I AM RUNNING OUT OF MINUTES HERE and that, unlike running out of minutes on a phone plan, life minutes are minutes you never get back but, also unlike minutes on a phone plan, you have never once bitched about "wasting" minutes of your life the way you do the minutes on your phone, though the minutes in your life are worth infinitely more and are equally limited. First that strikes you as funny -- not teeheehee funny, but interesting funny -- and then it strikes you as sad because people are more invested in the minutes they're paying for out of pocket than the ones they pay for with their hearts and minds, when it seems it should really be the other way around. You have seven minutes left to finish a blog post and brush your teeth before you have to get in the car and go to work but you take time to think, am I enjoying these minutes? Am I enjoying, appreciating, noticing the minutes as they pass? Or am I spending them in negativity, only focusing on the things that use the minutes sadly, stressed out, and in grumpy, sad space? And you realize that, even if you can't spend all of the minutes of your life doing amazing things, you can spend them making the average amazing, and be a person who finds joy in regular living, and that's not a bad notion to have in the space of a busy, oversleeping morning. Not a bad notion at all. You sip your coffee and sit back, pleased. You should write a contract for yourself, you think, like a phone contract, where you vow not to let your minutes slip past you. And then you think, maybe I just did.

I'm a Wizard

... I'm not actually a wizard. (Aren't you glad I put that in here? What a WEIRDO, right? Like you were thinking, "Hmmmm, I had NO IDEA she was a wizard, I'm so glad she mentioned it.") But at work, where there are multiple running jokes, one of the jokes is that my friend J is the Queen of all Things and I am a wizard. I don't even know how this started.

But it's funny. So who's going to argue?

This is the busy season at my job, so there's been no real time to get trained to do things. It's more of a "watch and learn" deal. As a result, there have been long stretches of "OMGIDON'TKNOWWHATI'MDOING" followed by the sense of "HELP!!!!"

As you can probably imagine, this makes me uncomfortable. I don't enjoy the feeling that I'm clueless. I do very much enjoy being -- cluefull? -- and having the sense that I'm on top of things. I spent six years running the company for my previous employer. I knew how to do everything. And then -- nada, zip, zilch.

Stressful.

At the same time, though? Really very awesome. Because if there's one thing I know, it's that struggling to learn something new is good for you. It's good to be taken down a few pegs now and then. It's good to stretch your brain around new concepts. It's good to learn to ask for help and to work through new challenges.

I like it. Mostly. I don't like the days I feel dumb or useless or "dammit why don't I know this!" but I like it.

Yesterday, a coworker asked me for help with something and I showed him "here's how this works, here's what you do, then do this thing, now do that," and I realized -- I DO know what I'm doing.  At some point in the last 9 weeks, I internalized some of the stuff that's been thrown at me.

If I like the challenge, I LOVE knowing that I actually -- after all is said and done -- have learned what I'm doing enough to help to train other people. It's glorious.

And it kind of makes me feel like I might be a wizard after all.

Getting There

A friend and I were talking about being in our twenties.

"If I could go back to being in my twenties..." she said.

"Not for a million dollars."

"Nope."

"I mean ... No. Just no."

"Agreed. I mean, I wouldn't redo anything? Because it got me to here and here is pretty great. So I don't have any regrets."

"Exactly. Although, if I could have told myself one thing, it would have been to trust my gut."

"That's a good one."

"I know, right?"

But that made me think about the things that I wish I'd learned when I was in my twenties that I'm only just figuring out now. Things like:

1) The bloody mary is the most delicious beverage on the planet. Try one.

2) Credit cards are not your friends. Your friends are your friends. Stop using credit cards to fill the spaces in your life that you won't let your friends into.

3) Happiness -- the best happiness, the most glorious levels of joy? -- is derived from fairly simple things.

4) Listen to your gut. That great guy, the one everyone likes but who sets off alarms in your soul? That's because he's not good for you. Believe those alarms.

5) It's okay to walk a path that is different from everyone else's. We're not all meant to walk together forever.

6) Keep the people who make you smile close to your heart. Let go of the people who make you cry.

7) It's okay not to be good at everything. It's not okay to give something up because you don't think you're good at it.

8) You are not as awkward as you think you are. You're awkward? But no one is that awkward. You're okay.

9) Some people are going to think you're lovely. Some people are going to think you're not. They don't need to be your yardstick for self worth. Believe in the face you see in the mirror and the heart that lives behind it. That's important.

10) The lessons you learn are subject to change. Change is good, both in your life and in your pocket.

11) You will never stop figuring it out.

Great Expectations

Tap ... tap ... is this thing on? Does it still work?

I guess we'll find out.

Before I do anything else here, I would like to thank all of the people who checked in with me to make sure that I was (and am) okay during my -- hiatus -- from my normal nattering. You guys. You make a girl feel loved, you know that? And I missed you too, every last one of you.

Here's what happened: as you know, I took a new job (which I love). I took a pay cut when I took the new job because I figured that less money was an acceptable trade off for more happiness (this is true, though occasionally difficult). As you may not know, I also had some friends move in at roughly the same time (which was very cool, and which is a story for another day). All of these things happened at about the same time.

Overwhelming.

Processing all of the stuff that was going on started taking up most of the real estate in my head. I was (and, as I say) am happy and okay, but in the interest of needing the day to contain more hours just to get everything else done, I stopped writing. This, I must say, was incredibly dumb because, as I've noted before, this is HOW I process things.

Life: 1

Danielle: 0

Oy.

But.

If I was good before, I'm better now. One, because I'm back here, doing what I do. Two, because I'm making some additional changes in my life that are going to make a good thing a better thing. Three, because I understand -- finally -- that the best (and maybe the only) way to really define a successful life is through the joy that you experience and are able to bring to other people.

I get it now.

So. Thanks for reading. Thanks for looking out for me and asking after me. I'll be here again tomorrow, and the days after that... and if I see you in person? Don't be surprised if I give you a hug and thank you again.

Every last one of you deserves it.