It's been a while since I posted anything here so I guess it's time to catch up first.
After june '18 (after my first burn-out bore-out month) a lot went by in my life. I started re-integrating into my job which made me feel sick at first. Going back just didn't feel right. I struggled along. After a while the company doctor arranged an intervention for me with a company called "the healthy business" where I went into a six week trajectory of being two days in group sessions with other burned/bored-out people and two days work. The program was amazing, the people were amazing and I learned a great deal about myself. One of the biggest eye-openers was I have a tendency of wanting to get all my problems out of my way before I can make a new/other move. That's an illusion, of course... Another insight is that you can't build up if you can't stabilise first.
During and after the six weeks my working hours slowly went up again and I felt more stable along the way. I was back at fulltime working weeks by the end of January '19. Things went pretty well but in hindsight, as soon as my working hours went over six hours a day, I could feel the ever-so-old bore kick back in. That gave me a hard time.
Since I was told I wasn't in the right place by the company doctor when I went into sick leave at first (which of course I knew but for some reason I couldn't get out) and since the six week program showed me it also had a lot to do with how I cope with life situations I just went right back into the "hanging on, holding on, undergo" mode. I was making the days even though I had most of my work done in a couple of hours. I just couldn't say this out loud because I was so afraid of getting more of the same things to do or someone getting mad at me for not telling this sooner (hello vicious circle...). Slowly I came to realise that the things I was doing just didn't interest me anymore. I knew I could do different things, other things, things that made my brain crack some puzzles instead of being on auto-pilot nine hours a day while killing time reading just about anything I could find on the internet.
I took a lot of personality tests, job tests, intelligence tests, whatever I could find. Conclusion was I'm pretty intelligent (can you imagine the stupidity in just undergoing my life in that job all that time?! doesn't sound that intelligent to me...), I am pretty good in solving complex problems, working with my hands, creating things, working alone and in teams and I am much more social then I ever thought I was. This whole process also just makes me feel so completely different and strange compared to the family I came from...
Anyway. At some point the switch turned and I knew: I had to get out. Somewhere last year I started a basic module in coding which was fun. Then I found out about a trajectory to be retrained into a web developer. That sounded like fun to me. Programming, computers, I always had something with computers all my life but for some reason I never took that path. It kept me thinking, what if... and could it still be possible? Doubt, all along of course. I would give up a pretty decent paying job with no deadlines what so ever and some pretty nice colleagues. But on the other hand, I don't need that much money to live on, I can't quite deal with no-deadline situations since I'm a Master Procrastinator and nice colleagues are to be found everywhere and that also mostly depends on my own social behaviour, isn't it?
It kept appearing and disappearing in the back of my mind but it wouldn't let go. I was just afraid (there we go again, fear...) to quit and take a deep dive into a new thing.
Time went on and on and at one point a couple of deadlines (hehe, I really need those things...) came up. I had to choose if I would make an entry test for a retraining course in programming. I had to choose if I would go and study business administration. I even applied for a new job at two different companies. I just knew I had to get in motion. The job applications were fine but I could feel in my heart that it would be exciting and new for the first couple of months, maybe years, and then it would be more of the same. I am just done with mechanical engineering. Maybe it's part of a bigger process in leaving my past life behind and really starting to live my own life since the choice to switch over to mechanical engineering was highly motivated by self-rejection for not doing some kind of important study at the time while my at the time girlfriend was doing important things (biological research). Overly silly, I know, but I guess my self-reliance never has been very high.
So. Done with mechanical engineering. Deadlines on weather or not I would apply for tests. Uncertainty if I could make it into the program. Yet I took the tests (mostly intelligence, logic, personality) and a week later I heard I passed the first round. Whow. The energy that gave me was amazing... But now the stress really kicked in. Because...
The program would start in September. Full time back to school for five months without pay. But to get in the program there are going to be speed date sessions with possible future employers who are connected to the program. I need to get job interviews out of those speed dates and out of those job interviews I need to get at least one declaration of intent that the employer is willing on offering me a job for the second half year of training. Without this declaration I can't start the program.
And then, for the grand finale, I needed to quit my job before it's even certain I'll make it into the program because I have got an cancellation period of three months with my current employer. And that's quite a risk I'm taking there... if I fail, there's no social security, I'll be culpable jobless as they call it here.
But, in the end, to make this thing happen anyway, I really need to be available full time from September 1st, so I had to take the leap, had to dive in face first and so I handed in my resignation letter yesterday. I've always imagined that would be a moment of great relief, an intense climax or something like that. Instead it was just a little bit exciting but nothing more or less. Maybe it'll still kick in one day (and of course I do feel scary because I still have a couple of months to go before I know if I'm getting into the program for real) but until then I guess I just have to cope with three more months of my boring job...
During and after the six weeks my working hours slowly went up again and I felt more stable along the way. I was back at fulltime working weeks by the end of January '19. Things went pretty well but in hindsight, as soon as my working hours went over six hours a day, I could feel the ever-so-old bore kick back in. That gave me a hard time.
Since I was told I wasn't in the right place by the company doctor when I went into sick leave at first (which of course I knew but for some reason I couldn't get out) and since the six week program showed me it also had a lot to do with how I cope with life situations I just went right back into the "hanging on, holding on, undergo" mode. I was making the days even though I had most of my work done in a couple of hours. I just couldn't say this out loud because I was so afraid of getting more of the same things to do or someone getting mad at me for not telling this sooner (hello vicious circle...). Slowly I came to realise that the things I was doing just didn't interest me anymore. I knew I could do different things, other things, things that made my brain crack some puzzles instead of being on auto-pilot nine hours a day while killing time reading just about anything I could find on the internet.
I took a lot of personality tests, job tests, intelligence tests, whatever I could find. Conclusion was I'm pretty intelligent (can you imagine the stupidity in just undergoing my life in that job all that time?! doesn't sound that intelligent to me...), I am pretty good in solving complex problems, working with my hands, creating things, working alone and in teams and I am much more social then I ever thought I was. This whole process also just makes me feel so completely different and strange compared to the family I came from...
Anyway. At some point the switch turned and I knew: I had to get out. Somewhere last year I started a basic module in coding which was fun. Then I found out about a trajectory to be retrained into a web developer. That sounded like fun to me. Programming, computers, I always had something with computers all my life but for some reason I never took that path. It kept me thinking, what if... and could it still be possible? Doubt, all along of course. I would give up a pretty decent paying job with no deadlines what so ever and some pretty nice colleagues. But on the other hand, I don't need that much money to live on, I can't quite deal with no-deadline situations since I'm a Master Procrastinator and nice colleagues are to be found everywhere and that also mostly depends on my own social behaviour, isn't it?
It kept appearing and disappearing in the back of my mind but it wouldn't let go. I was just afraid (there we go again, fear...) to quit and take a deep dive into a new thing.
Time went on and on and at one point a couple of deadlines (hehe, I really need those things...) came up. I had to choose if I would make an entry test for a retraining course in programming. I had to choose if I would go and study business administration. I even applied for a new job at two different companies. I just knew I had to get in motion. The job applications were fine but I could feel in my heart that it would be exciting and new for the first couple of months, maybe years, and then it would be more of the same. I am just done with mechanical engineering. Maybe it's part of a bigger process in leaving my past life behind and really starting to live my own life since the choice to switch over to mechanical engineering was highly motivated by self-rejection for not doing some kind of important study at the time while my at the time girlfriend was doing important things (biological research). Overly silly, I know, but I guess my self-reliance never has been very high.
So. Done with mechanical engineering. Deadlines on weather or not I would apply for tests. Uncertainty if I could make it into the program. Yet I took the tests (mostly intelligence, logic, personality) and a week later I heard I passed the first round. Whow. The energy that gave me was amazing... But now the stress really kicked in. Because...
The program would start in September. Full time back to school for five months without pay. But to get in the program there are going to be speed date sessions with possible future employers who are connected to the program. I need to get job interviews out of those speed dates and out of those job interviews I need to get at least one declaration of intent that the employer is willing on offering me a job for the second half year of training. Without this declaration I can't start the program.
And then, for the grand finale, I needed to quit my job before it's even certain I'll make it into the program because I have got an cancellation period of three months with my current employer. And that's quite a risk I'm taking there... if I fail, there's no social security, I'll be culpable jobless as they call it here.
But, in the end, to make this thing happen anyway, I really need to be available full time from September 1st, so I had to take the leap, had to dive in face first and so I handed in my resignation letter yesterday. I've always imagined that would be a moment of great relief, an intense climax or something like that. Instead it was just a little bit exciting but nothing more or less. Maybe it'll still kick in one day (and of course I do feel scary because I still have a couple of months to go before I know if I'm getting into the program for real) but until then I guess I just have to cope with three more months of my boring job...
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