My sanity or my job
This week I chose my sanity over my job. Oh, it sounds very dramatic, I know. Even more so considering I’m just a webdesigner but still, that’s what it came down to. Five days later I still feel like I made the right choice. I scratched the longwinded rant and made some ranting bullet points instead.
A few points about the job:
- Treating every potential client as a design pitch is a terrible waste of time. At least with a pitch, you get a briefing. Here we got nothing. Very disheartening to know you’ll probably have to throw most of the work away even if it gets sold.
- I’m not comfortable working with non-existing briefings. I need to know what I’m designing for. Some people can cranck out lovely shiny pages just by surfing the web for 2 hours, I am not one of them. Nor do I care to be, it turns out.
- Same with a lack of wireframe or sitemap when the project clearly begs for one.
- Not on the same page with the boss about the way we should be working.
- More chaos and amateurism in this organisation then I’m comfortable dealing with.
- Nice people working there though.
Points about me
- Self-doubt. Feeling even more uncomfortable having to work with a lack of info.
- As was pointed out to me at my previous job, I’m pretty good at front-end development. HTML and CSS I have a natural affinity for. Designing on the other hand, is something I really have to work at and be comfortable with before I get to something good. Unfortunately I can’t do that at this place. At this point I’m not even sure anymore if I want to do either.
- I do know that I need to keep making things. I want to make things I’m happy with but all I get is frustration staying here. Making comics is one thing that’s kept me sane so maybe it’s worth exploring further? I wouldn’t really know how.
- I need time to mull things over and I don’t have that while staying there. Not enough time or energy left in the evenings.
I’d like to say I decided based the pros and cons but ultimately I went with my gut feeling and months of wanting to tear off my skin. That’s not to say I went unprepared. I had thought about this moment of leaving many times before and while I don’t have a plan for the future, I do have a short term plan and a handful of ideas. Some of it inspired by this wonderful article.
- Budget: I managed to save up a bit of money over the past couple of years, so I’m safe for a little while if I keep a good budget. Comes in very handy seeing as I won’t get unemployment of course.
- Vacation: I didn’t do this when I got sacked at my last job, but I should’ve. I’m taking a month of time-out. My notice ends on October 1st and I already had 2 weeks vacation planned in San Fransisco anyway, so I’ll try to make good use of the time to think, talk, read and build something I can get behind. My fear is that it’ll be overwhelming and I won’t get anything done though. So I’m going to make a list and make my way through it at a natural pace. No slacking, but no stressing about it either. Top of the list are 2 comic conventions I’ll be exhibiting at: APE in San Fransisco and ThoughtBubble in Leeds (UK, November). The first time I’ll be doing that and I hope to find out if it’s something I’ll want to keep doing.
- Get out of my head: I need to talk to people about their experiences in finding their way. How did they get where they are, ask for advice, that kind of stuff. There’s a couple of (comic) artists I’d really like to talk to for example. Probably a good idea to start e-mailing.
- Cleaning: I cleared up a lot of clutter when I moved house last year but I still feel like I carry too much stuff with me. So that needs to go.
No plans about where I’m heading with my career of what my next job will be. I’m affraid of never really finding one I’ll be completely happy with but I hope I won’t be uncomfortable or frustrated. I’m even more affraid of ending up broke and on the streets. Or of losing my mind. For better of for worse, I’ll try to write it down and make comics. Maybe someone will be entertained or intrigued by it. Here’s some of the places you’ll see me pop up online: isalso.at, twitter, the comic, my portfolio
