Behind

I came to a realization today while eating lunch with the girls I work with. It was not an epiphany or something I have never realized before, but for some reason this time it is sticking more with me. I feel I have to take some sort of action soon, before I start to feel like a failure.

A woman who works where I work walked into the lunch room, stayed for a bit and contributed to the conversation and then left.

The ensuing comments were. "Doesn't she always look nice and put together?" and "She's always so professional looking."

And she is. She always looks unrumpled, put together, sleek is a good word to describe her. I on the other hand spend 2o minutes ironing my linen skirt only to get to work looking like I stepped out of the wringer. Sigh.

The last question came from me. "How old is she?" They contemplate the question for a few seconds. "28" was the reply.

"Really!?" I'm incredulous. Not that she looks old, or that I look younger than her. I just FEEL younger, but that's not necessarily a good thing.

"Yah, She's making pretty good money for a 28 year old."

I briefly put my head in my hands, silently bemoaning the fact that I am old and completely unaccomplished and definitely NOT making "good money for a 29 year old."

Now I'm wondering where I went wrong. I like my job, but I know I should not be in this position with my education, potential, skill level and age. I think I was so desperate last year to get A job, any job, that I jumped in with out realizing what the position would entail. Not to say that I'm above the position, I most definitely am not, but all the girls I work with have the potential to do more, we're just not given the chance.

Anyway!

I'm not sure what to do. I'm curious as to what the people I work with think. I'm 29 and decidedly below the levels of the other 29 year old's I work with and I feel a little silly at times. I mean I have my master's for goodness sake! What a waste!

I don't have anyone to blame, but myself. Mostly I'm angry with myself for staying so long at my last job. I atrophied there. I had no job growth, no training, no cultivation. What I had to last year when I left was start from scratch, work my way up again. I was entry level.

There is a four year gap now from that other job where I was in a black hole of misery, with my career standing still.

I'm not sure what to do about it now. Maybe I just don't have the potential. Maybe I'm not quick enough or smart enough or savvy enough to get to that level.

I've never had huge career goals. I don't know why, I just never developed them. I just blindly went through the motions of college, job, graduate school and more jobs, but never really working towards somewhere specific.

Now here I am at 29 and it doesn't look like I'm going have much else to focus on anytime soon (i.e. marriage, family) that I should take more interest in my career. I need to discover how I want to spend my days, what will make me happy, what I am good at.

I don't really know where or how to start, but it is something I've been thinking about seriously lately. I just don't know how to focus my energy there because nothing jumps out at me. I can't sit down and think about what I want to do and get a valid response. Yes, I would love to run a cafe/book store, but in reality I have no idea how to run a business, how to cook for masses, and where to even start. Not to mention I have no money! Dreams will stay just that.

I suppose that should be my main goal for my thirtieth year.

I won't say fine my life's purpose. Goodness, how contrived.

What I want to find is what I can to that will make me happy and satisfied and proud. Is it possible? Is it out there? I'm honestly not exactly sure. Maybe, like a relationship, a satisfying career just isn't in the cards for me.

I've described my life as "vanilla" before, (re. mediocre) and the older I get and the more I see how my life is progressing, the more I see that as true. Maybe that's the life that has been laid out for me. Nothing impressive or remarkable. Just a steady, boring, vanilla life.

Everyone wants to be extraordinary and to spectacular things, but there has to be a yin to that yang.

It's quite possible that I am part of the yin.