On Wild Dreams and Wishes

Lately I'm struggling to get a good grasp on the reigns of my life. After the last post, I still went on considering these things that are changing and need to be changed in my life. In a way it's like living in the center of a flower and that flower now is blooming, and though the blooing is good, the very opening of the petals fills you with the feeling that not everything can be controlled, and if you know me, you know that I always need to be on top of my business.

AT WORK I'm getting pretty much on top of things, though I recently realized that some details may have slipped last time, which are no biggies, really - nothing that can't be fixed and nothing really, that can't be written of as an honest, human mistake (I may have not sent the last updated file, which is odd and makes me doubt my files, because I'm so anal about that). Regarding the changes I've been thinking about (and this odd slip also gets me thinking more about the need to move, how my brain isn't happy with my current work and might be acting up on me), I had it on good source that I may want to wait a little more as big changes are to be made and it wouldn't be convenient for me to be caught between the moving forces and politics. The "agression" have been waving, truth to be told. One day hot, then there's a piercing icicle here and there, spicing the days. One of the arguments I hear the most about not making the move go about the concept of the "integral professional". This "Integral Professional" is the kind of professional that knows about many fields, not just one, specialized area.

Personally I'm a bit more old-school in this sense and prefer a different approach as to what makes a professional or a scientist a good professional/scientist. I don't think that "knowing about everything" is actually good, specially not the way it's usually managed around: the professional that tries their hand at everything, regardless of their studies. Yes, stepping outside your field is good and enriching, as long as you do it with the purpose of adding to your field. However, trying this and that, getting a feel of the ropes and gathering a whole bunch of information without an actual, deep knowledge (the type you get at the University), doesn't really add up to anything.

I know I'm needed here, but this is no longer the place where I could grow professionally within the line of my field.

AT UNIVERSITY I had some of the hardest, most brutal weeks recently. Though this four-month period (the University  works on four-month periods, not on semesters) I've taken only two subjects (I wanted to take more, but not all the subjects I wanted to enroll for were being offered, and some got filled quite fast), the amount of homeworks, forums, virtual activities and then final papers had me crashing down. Not to mention the tests. It doesn't help either that the level of chaos among teachers is simple appaling. You couldn't possibly get on track with most of the work even if you wanted to, when the teachers upload material and instructions late.

Thanks Hyne we had off the whole Holy Week, (the week before Easter), because that way I could use all those days to get THREE homeworks and the FINAL PAPER done. Oh, are you doing the maths and thinking, how can you have for one week four things to do for two subjects? It's called "lack of organization".

I'm only 5 subjects and a final seminar away from my Accounting diploma. Just what remains of this year and the next.

The sad thing is that I'm actually considering the possibility of continuing and getting my Finance and my Marketing diplomas. Well, Finance first, if I get through Accounting and don't end up too traumatized.

ABOUT MY PENPALS, I'm still on record as the most hideous penpal of history. I'm carrying their letters, but can't really get to write to them.  I read their letters, speak to them in my head, but when I were to land it on paper I'm overcome with guilt because "I should be studying" or working or something of the sort. And when I do have the time, my brain seems so void, like I can't even spoon a single word, a single sentiment to tell them.

Girls, I haven't forgotten you, I'm just going through a crappy momentum.

AT MY PERSONAL LIFE things are sort of split. Generally they are well. Good friends, plenty of series, loving boyfriend, but there's also this thing about what would our future bring and whether there is actually a future somewhere in there. I like to have definition, but then there are things that can't be defined as clearly and perfectly as I like them to be. Thus there's a big haze right now in the box that says "INSERT LOVE LIFE FUTURE HERE".

For sometime I had all this questions in my head, whether this was going anywhere, whether this is healthy, whether this is what I want, whether this will actually become a long term thing or if this is the moment when the thread breaks and things come to an end. I needed to know in order to prepare for any and every possible outcome. Then I realized something important: I don't actually put my whole life on hold for a relationship. Kari has his agenda, and his issues to sort out. I don't have to sit put and wait, but carry on, and so, now I carry on. Honestly, my life is so full of all sorts of things, that the last thing I need is to worry about things I can't change. Eventually something will come out. I put my cards on the table, but the ball is on his court, and there I can't do a thing.

As result of all that, at one point there I decided that I need a break, I want a break, I CRAVE a break, and so a crazy idea started to form: I want to take a trip to Salem, Massachusetts (yes, the Salem of the Witches of Salem). It started like a wild thought that you may not think all so seriously, like "oh, if I do this I'll award myself with five gallons of ice cream". However, the thought stuck with me and I started considering it more and more and more, until I found myself making plans, researching, looking at prices and fares and drafting up a potential budget. I do want to go to Salem!

Yes, I'm currently saving quite hard to buy a house or an appartment - we shall see when we get to that point - and I have other expenses, including my car related expenses and my University related expenses - which don't come cheap - so squeezing in a trip to Salem might not come without effort, but now this is giving me something to look forward, to do, to dream with. It would be actually much longer than my not-Hungary related trips (the average period of most of my trips is 3 days), for I plan on staying a week. For Halloween. Ok, must make sure that I won't have any tests programmed for that week, but I do want to do this, I do want to make this trip, finally go to the States for the first time in my life and get myself a break. I can do it, right? It's ok to dream this big, right?

Going Through Some Changes... Again

I knew it had been a long time since the last time I wrote, I just wasn't aware that it had passed such a long time! Which is bad, because if I think of all the penpals I've neglected, it means that I've become a legendary Bad Penpal. Of course I won't go here whining about how all of them took their time and effort to write to me, and what a meanie I am for not writing back to them, not letting them know how things are... please. Delays in replies are one of the many, many risks all penpals take when they step upon the path of Penpalhood. Plus, I send postcards here and there to let them know I'm alove, though not enough to sit down and write to them.

So, what has happened since I was here last? Well, I came back to Costa Rica, as you all know, since I was in Hungary for the holidays with the family. This trip offered me a unique chance to gain some perspective on a lot of things about life and life choices and got me thinking about the next steps I should take regarding my future. No, I did not came up with a plan for total world domination. Geez, I would never do that! Too many tasks, too much hassle and the responsability alone! No, no, no I don't want to build my very own Panem. No, the decisions and plans I came up with actually are falling more in the line of the expectations I had some six or seven years ago, concentrated mainly on procuring ease, leisure, fun, stability and professional growth - the way I understand it, of course, not the way the world understands it, which is wrong, by the way. Sorry world, I'm the one who's right, as always.

One of the most important lessons I re-learned was that Integrity should always be above everything. Altruism is overrated, and sometimes you have to stop being good, stop being understanding and stop trying to help others out of the fucking shithole they dig themselves into. I learned that, as ugly as it soulds, Altruism isn't in my nature and shouldn't be in my nature. I'm just too good at what I do and at what I can achieve to afford any altruism. You see, when you are good or you are doing well - be it in life, at school, at work, or whatever project you are in - it may happen that people who are doing less than well ask for your help or start relying on you to get their own load on. Sometimes then, these people - counting on your help or support - start taking more than what they can affort and keep piling on your "because you can help them". Perhaps you helped them but where also expecting to get on with your own program, your own projects, and that stops happening out of the blue because these other people are stopping you from moving forward. I know a penpal of mine with whom this happens more often than not. Well, believe it or not, this happened to me too. Yep, world known Wicked Witch Me. And believe it or not, I actually was wondering whether I should continue helping them in any capacity or leave them in the crap. Honestly, I wished to leave them in the crap, just drop the weight off my shoulders and look at them and tell them: "You wanted this, now you have to shoulder it. I have my own life to live and my is way to amazing to miss out of it". My life is amazing, actually, and I would hate missing a single minute out of it. As usually, I ran a Consulting with some of my friends, just to make sure I was covering all of my basis, getting other P.O.V.s, and then reached a decision: it's time to dig myself out of the situation.

And this is how change begins.

After pretty much a year working at the Legal Department of my company as an Economical Adviser, I've realized that this position doesn't really fulfill my needs. Yes, it is exciting, I love my cubicle in the Central Building overlooking the city, with my ceiling-to-floor windows, kind coworkers (even though they are weird, too "Christians" to my liking, quite close minded, give much to appearances, and tend to be back stabbing, attention whores and their shabbiness in certain aspects that mean a lot to me is getting to my nerves [like why can't they drop the flourish-peppered language when their grammar and spelling SUCKS big time]), and some parts of the job are truly fabulous, BUT there's no maths involved, and after a year, I realized that I'm still a Finance-girl at heart, my mind goes that way, and it's disgusting to try and make me think like a lawyer when that's not what I learned, that's not what I should be doing (understand this: one thing is to learn the laws and how they work, and yet another to give an opinion as if I were a lawyer. I can understand the law and see that as my frame and make my economical analysis considering that scenario, and yet another is to see an economical scenario and give my opinoin about which laws apply and how should a lawsuit be issued. I am not entitled to do so. By Law.), nor is what I want to do. I am an Economist, and that's what I love being, what I love doing and what I want to continue doing.

Las year, when I moved to the area, everything was about getting settled. Things were strange to me but I thought that with time I would settle into them, find my niche in things and be happy. However this year, as my perspective changed, I realized that I was fooling myself. Just because I'm friends with my boss and I love the location of my office, it doesn't mean that what I'm doing is satisfying. I actually felt my brain shrink due to the lack of mathematical thinking. It hit me as a bucket of cold ice to realize that the only type of maths and Excel sheet working I was doing was for my Accounting homework. In the few price-related cases I received, I realized that I was trying to do the analysis of the calculations, the cost construction evaluation, not reviewing whether these were legally regulated or non-regulated services. More than once I was scolded for "butting into stuff that don't belong to us", namely the financial analysis, so in the end I didn't quite understand what they wanted me to do with these documents that a lawyer couldn't do. Yes, it's most upsetting. The style is also completely different, though that's a mostly management question (at one point I was actually asked to say the least possible. It seems I make too many observations for the liking of the others. In plain English, I was asked to do a more shallow work, instead of my bone-cutting disecting style of analysis).

On the other hand, ever since I moved to Legal, my old boss - whom I love to madness, as you all know - has been asking me to go back to him, now that he's in the Financial Management Area. Also, from the same Area but in different departments, people has been asking me to join them. What can I say? People, whatever you go and whatever you do DO ALWAYS A GOOD JOB, BECAUSE PEOPLE WILL ALWAYS NOTICE IT! Never, never let anyone - no boss, no directive, not anyone - drag you into doing a lesser job. Even if you have to swipe the floor, do the best floor swiping you are capable of. That's why I get the requests, that's why departments want me with them, that's why not one of the bosses I've ever worked with (including Moron Lady) has ever let me go willingly. I stand out because of the quality of my work. So, after receiving offers, and also after knowing from the Director of my current department that the new politics for this Area include a need to cut the budget, thus anyone wishing to leave can do so freely with the fix postion we have, I started thinking harder about this whole thing. And so I did a Balance.

I Would Move Because:
1. Working in the Legal Department isn't adding to my career. I had the experience but now my skills are suffering. I know what I am good that, what I'm perfect and top-notch at, and that's not something I can do where I am now. My mind doesn't work the same way with laws as it does with numbers. I can't remember and interpret laws the way I do accounts and costs and figures. That many words and changing rules and illogical fixings and even that "it doesn't matter if it's mathematically or logical wrong, if we can use it to win, we should"-kind of thinking irks me.
2. Going back to my old boss (if I can manage so) would help me continue improving my experience, knowledge and skills in Fees, Costs and Economical Analysis of Service Projects, which happens to be a passion of mine.
3. I don't want to become one of those people who gain some haphazard knowledge of a career they have no paper to prove, and yet loose all their experience and skills of the career they have papers of. Many people agree into that, and consider it becoming "experts in many areas", and never stop to consider the kind of professional suicide it becomes. If I were to look for a job, could I apply for a post as an economist when my working experience is in law? Or could I look for a job as a lawyer when I haven't passed the Bar (the only bar I've ever passed is the Pub kind of bar), and have no diploma that says I am a lawyer? See my point? I am an economist, and I want to put a lot of experience behind that diploma. I believe I have earned enough insight in the law to continue my job as an economist, anymore iddling around would become a waste of perfectly good time.
4. This job doesn't make me happy. I have never before realized how much I need maths and Excel sheets in my life to feel accomplished. I need to put my mind to work in numbers, to find the logical connections between numbers, reseach costs, find the ways to make numbers fit together and get a good result.

I Should Stay Because:
1. They saved me when I needed saving. Yeah, except that I don't do "gratitude" that costs me my personal growth, so fuck that reason.
2. If I go my boss won't have enough people to tackle all the tasks they have to shoulder. Yeah, except that that's my boss' problem, not mine. I am not HHRR, so the lack of employees isn't mine to solve. I'm not Finance to manage their budget problems, and I'm not her boss to manage the workload issues. In other words, yes I know it is a freaking bad situation, but you know what it isn't? My Problem. So fuck that reason too.
3. They do work with two topics I love. Yeah, except that my boss gave those two topics to my other coworker (who has bad spelling, grammar and does a sloppy job compared to me). So that reason also gets fucked.
4. I really like the building.
5. Staying in Legal I'm sure I would never have to work with Moron Lady again.

So, after my balancing of my reasons to stay and to leave, I realized that the only reason for me to stay is the building, and that's the worse reason of all! Yes, I hate the building in which my dear boss - okay, former boss - is located, and the parking there is a nightmare, but isn't it worth it to suffer a little for it in order to do soemthing I really like? The fifth reason, though, is one that really gets me thinking, that really has me considering the whole thing, and I wonder if it is powerful enough to ruin my whole career for. I've been investigating, for as a new change comes to our Government, and thus a change in our Company (we are a public company after all, and the President of the Country always handpicks the people who would manage us, and their friends get to all the power places, thus chips change and fall as result of it), I believe that Moron Lady would be shifted soon, and I would really not want her in Finance in any capacity.

On Monday I'll talk to my old boss, lay the cards for him, and talk it over. I'll be honest and tell him that I had to realize that he's not God, I can't expect him to protect me always from her, and I can't work with her, so if he can give me a fair certainly that we will be away from her, and if he still wants me in his team, he can count on me as fast as HHRR can arrange the move.

I want to go back to Finance, and one way or the other, I will.