Good question…

At the moment, apparently of magically getting a job in something I’m more interested in before I even properly start my ‘fun’ (temp) job as a localisation tester, and of letting them down since they invested time and money in my induction. Although to be fair I’m the one who’s sort of living in limbo at the moment in case they need me to work at short notice and before they get round to telling me when they want me to properly start. On the plus side I at least get paid weekly though so I’m guessing I also don’t have to give much notice to leave either.

Other than that, of going into interview mode the way I’ve now experienced secondhand twice through my flatmate – and it wasn’t pretty. The first time she just generally didn’t deal with the initial rejections well and sometimes her mood affected her manners, so to speak, and the second time there was much more pressure since it was for real jobs as opposed to internships so although she was used to the process from the previous time it was still stressful even for me. So I guess also of all the rejections yet to come :p

As well as that, dumb as it probably sounds, of losing my freedom.
At uni I had a part-time internship and that was a nice break from lectures, whereas my course was also a nice break from work, so I got the best of both worlds (and an income!). If it wasn’t for exams and essays (and, you know, the fact that masters degrees a) cost a lot and b) seem waaay more intense if they aren’t integrated into the undergrad) I would love to keep going that way. And even though I had to book holidays quite far in advance, most of the time it didn’t feel like such a big deal because either I would have had uni then anyway or I would still have been working mostly part-time except for very busy periods over the summer. Now, having newly been reinfected with a mild case of the travel bug*, even though I only have a temp job where I’m hired on a project basis (aka a zero hour contract with a prettier name) I’m already wondering how I’m going to fit things in. I’m trying to visit my grandparents in Germany as much as possible, plus I eventually really want to make New Zealand happen and see my grandpa while I still can. (I had this plan when I first got my internship to save up and visit my grandma there because she wasn’t able to fly anymore, but sadly she died about a month after I got the job.) This summer my Dad is already planning an Ireland trip and I’ll probably be visiting a friend in Northern Ireland for a few days too, TBC if it’ll be at the tail end of our family holiday, which would be much easier, or later in the summer. (It depends if her sister is holding a birthday ceilidh or not.) I’ve been invited to visit my flatmate’s family in Romania again (i.e. to see the country in summer when the weather is nicer), and I’d like to make use of the Wizz Air membership I bought so that I make my money back, by going on a short trip to a pretty Eastern European location sometime. Then there’s all the places I haven’t been to before that are beckoning, plus I still really want to try skiing in (on?) actual snow someday. This sounds like a huge list of “I want”, it’s just now that my freedom is on the verge of being taken away they are suddenly materialising apparently. Although kind of true, viewing a job as losing your freedom is probably also not the greatest mindset to approach it with. So I guess to add to the “I wants”, a job that I enjoy enough to actually look forward to it, as a rule, would be great.

Because I kept working all summer (partly part-time, but working nonetheless), I also just wanted a break. It wasn’t as relaxing as I might have hoped due to the uncertainty at the back of my mind, even though I wasn’t consciously freaking out about jobs or anything, but I still had the freedom to be as unproductive as I wanted for a bit (it is truly amazing how much more you get done when you’re busy with a million other things compared to when you have almost nothing specific to fill your day. I had all these vague grand plans of doing an online course, building my website, revamping my blog and loads more I’m sure.)

When I last visited my grandparents, my grandpa was under the impression that I was really struggling to find anything (mainly due to lack of searching) and trying to get me to look for something in Germany, whereas my grandma was telling me I should try different things and not be afraid to quit and change so that I can find a job I actually enjoy – she didn’t like her first jobs and kept looking too. My mum once sent me a cartoon video that explained the mindset of millenials, how we’ve been told from birth that we’re all unique and special so much that we now expect everything to be perfect. There seems to be this big divide in mindsets between “follow your dreams” and “the only thing that will get you anywhere is hard work and hating life”. Now I’m all for hard work, but people that think you have to hate life or you’re not working hard enough definitely grate on me.

I can’t remember the exact quote/saying, but the whole “If you really want it, you make it happen and if you don’t, obviously you don’t want it badly enough” is also lingering in the back of my mind. I do want it, but I guess I have to get past all these ‘objections’ that my mind keeps trying to throw in the way. I think I’m really going to enjoy working (I liked my old job a lot and found it fulfilling, and having a more structured, purposeful, and perhaps most importantly useful life again will be great, not to mention having that certainty of knowing roughly what’s lying ahead in that respect.) A small part of me is worried that I might not enjoy working in an agency (or not even get to try it), but I have to remind myself that I can try other things if that turns out to be the case, just like my grandma said. I personally tend to feel like I made a commitment and that I can’t back out of it, but after giving it my best shot, if my happiness is at stake, I need to remind myself that that’s what actually counts. People change careers at all ages, so at the start of mine that’s perfectly acceptable while figuring out what to do with my life.

**Update – so the day after writing this I found out that I need to sort out a new flatmate and find a ‘grown up job’, aka one with a minimum salary to keep my flat. The metaphorical kick up the backside has arrived – watch this space!**

* = (perhaps I should have just gone travelling for a bit. But I don’t know who I would have done it with, going completely solo for extended periods of time doesn’t really appeal, and my main issue – though now thinking about it perhaps I could’ve dealt with it somehow, perhaps by sub-letting my room for a while…hah, I should have rented it to my brother while he was flat-hunting! Oh hindsight – you suck! – was that I really wanted to keep my current flat, and felt I couldn’t exactly justify spending all that money on travelling while also paying rent and, you know, that tiiiny little matter of not earning or having a job lined up.)