The times are changing my love….
As I walked home from my shopping lunch date on Magazine Street, I felt like a southern Carrie Bradshaw. I had a morning doing my own thing around my apartment leading into an afternoon of shops and tacos followed by an evening of writing. Maybe I’m romanticizing my life, but I’m so damn proud of where I am, I can’t help but be this happy about it. Granted I don’t have the style of Carrie, and my shopping is not as high end either, but my life feels amazing. Even with the events of this past week.
This past week, I returned home from a wonderful much-needed decompression weekend away to start a new challenge in my life and a new job. I became the assistant to a Stay-at-Home Momma. I say assistant because my title is…maid/nanny/tutor/errands/phone calls/ordering/etc. Anything she can come up with, and I can do. I get done. It’s tough and hectic, but it makes me feel good especially after 4 months of not working. I feel like I’m doing something again. I know I’m truly making an impact on this woman’s life. Maybe it is just one life, but that’s what we do. Make one impact on one life at a time.
The best part of this while walking home from my afternoon date, I realized I chose this. I made this change in my life. I made this happen. I am happy again. Like truly deeply happy.
Maybe it has to do with the options I know I have. Maybe it has to do with my change in mentality. Maybe my mindset has truly shifted to a happier more positive one. Whatever it is, I know 3 years ago I was not this person.
Three years ago I had lost the ability to be happy. I didn’t remember how to be truly and utterly happy with my life daily. Minus all the little things that upset you…I didn’t know how to wake up and be happy anymore. That was one of the scariest moments I’ve had in my life. Mainly because I was so scared, I was making a terrible mistake. Also, I feared what everyone else would think about my decision to leave a perfectly successful career behind.
I know that was part of it. I knew I could be a marine scientist and be successful. I didn’t have to prove that to anyone anymore. I knew I was smart enough and driven enough to get my Ph.D. I knew I could sacrifice my life for my career. I also knew that’s not what I wanted. I knew that life led me to the greatest unhappiness I knew, my depression.
It was easy making the decision. It was tough telling everyone else. It was tough facing all the:
“Okay, what will you do instead?”
“Are you sure you won’t go back?”
“Will you change your mind?”
Every time I got asked those questions they became that much stronger in my own head as if they weren’t there in the first place. It was easy for me to answer with uncertainty because I could say:
“I don’t know, but I don’t want to go there again.”
My problem was I couldn’t explain “there” to anyone. My sister slightly understood when I opened up to hear about it, but to the people at my church who had watched me grow up and watched my career unfold. Who asked me every Christmas visit home what was next or how was graduate school going. I couldn’t explain my failing mental health to them, and the career path that had led me there. All I could do was answer as positivity as possible and say not sure, but I’ll figure it out!
The first major change. The first step back to the positive happy person everyone always knew me as…the first step back to be my true authentic self, started with that one decision and a whole lot of change!
On this path to happiness, I found my second failing career choice…yachting! I always thought it sounded so fun. I loved being on the water. I loved the hospitality industry. What wasn’t to love?
Freedom. That’s what! It’s an awesome job. It truly is. Amazing industry to see and experience, and I’m truly happy for all who find their calling there, but it was not my cup of tea. I don’t enjoy being someone’s entertainer as a profession. I enjoy entertaining or being entertained, but I want to be a part of the group enjoying life not helping others enjoy their life. I realized I wasn’t happy about 4 months into that job position. I decided to leave.
I didn’t know where I wanted to go. Somewhere South? Somewhere I loved. Charleston was my first instinct. Until a friend of mine needed a roommate here in New Orleans. It clicked. Just like that. The picturesque life in New Orleans. Streetcars, Jazz, Coffee, and Beignets….with a whole lot of booze on the side. A place I’ve always loved, and once I moved here, I knew I’d always call home!
That’s how I find myself today as happy as I am with my own life. By making having the realization I wasn’t happy, and the decision to change my life. I wrote before about how others called this bravery, but how this never felt like bravery to me. It felt like survival.
Then I had a convo with an old friend about an ex-girlfriend he acquired. In the conversation we had on what went wrong with their relationship, he explained:
“She was always competing with my job. I love my job. She hated that I had to pick my job responsibilities over her at times. She hated her job. She wanted us to hate our jobs together. But she wouldn’t change her job to possibly love it down the line.”
“Didn’t you say she got a new job recently?”
“She moved to a new office yes, but not a new profession.”
“Uh. Weird.”
The conversation went on to I’m not sure what but looking back on this conversation I realized how brave I was. I had spent 12 years purely dedicated to marine science, and I left it behind with the final straw of the last phone call.
I left it behind when I had no idea what I would do in its place. I left it behind simply because I was unhappy doing the job. Making that change is Bravery. Making that change has led me to a life I love. Making that change has led me back to happiness. Making that change has led me back to someone I recognize on a daily basis. That above all else is what truly matters.
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