Have I given up or am I just too tired to fight anymore?

I have been asking myself this question while lying in bed suffering from a cold. Sometimes I think it's that I've just given up. Other times I think it's that I'm too tired to fight anymore. I have struggled to make sense of things, weighing the options and trying to see the big picture. I could give myself an "out" now. I have been pushing myself lately trying to fit in and not succeeding. Then I punish myself when I feel I can't do it anymore.

Is it wrong to want to walk away from it all? I do want to walk away, but I don't. Instead I continue to dream. I know God has something planned for me. I want to be ready to receive what he has for me. Yet I'm also frightened by the unknown. What if I fail again? Would I be willing to pick myself up and start over? I know that is what I really need to start thinking about now. Holding a pity party is not going to help me or anyone else. I need to emphasize my strengths, not my weaknesses. I need to grab opportunities and not wait for them to come to me. I need to deal with threats head on....even when I feel I can't move on.

I don't have time to wallow. I don't have time to get depressed and not do anything. I do have to fight the time wasters in my life...those things that suck the life out of me. I need a plan of action. I need to get back in there and fight.

Stepping forward to face the New Year....a few weeks late

I've had some time over the past few weeks to reassess where my career is going.as I regroup after the loss of yet another job. I know that I need to step forward and face my dwindling finances due to the limited opportunities I've had to work. I also know that I have to stop this "pity party" that I've allowed myself to have. It's not helping. It's actually hurting me and no one else.

I took a brave step today and signed on to a freelance site. I don't know what will happen with it. I just know that I'm not getting anywhere "spinning my wheels" hoping for that elusive administrative assistant job. They are just not out there for me, and the fact is that I'm not sure I want to go back to the corporate "rat race" either.

Pressure is on me to do something...yet I've already made two bad choices in regards to my current job search. I am finding that I really do have to find out about the company culture before accepting the job. This is key...because if you hate where you're working....you're not going to last long. I didn't.

So what do I do now? Continue to press forward with my research....finding both for profit and non-profit companies I can work with...and try out this freelancing stuff. Who knows? Maybe I'll find my niche with it.

Pushing Forward and Researching Prospects

First week of moving forward with two projects that may or may not pan out. As I may have mentioned in this blog, I am finding that my tendency now is to look at what I call "time wasters" and not at the whole picture. When I do weigh in the human factor, I find that most organizations have a tendency to either overwork the poor souls left in the company or give them meaningless work just to keep them on the payroll. Most organizations also are fiercely protective of their brand, their processes and the bottom line. Even though the people within the organization pride themselves in their workers, some don't really value them.

Analyzing workflow often reveals the importance an organization places on their workers. Do they allow them breaks? What are the time restraints and what tools does a person have to meet deadlines? Time wasters are those tasks done to no one's benefit. They could be printing and storing reports that no one reads or re scanning material that should already be in the system. One of the things that I noticed that I can do is analyze workflow, particularly document management workflow, to see if there are any flaws, improvements and/or breaches in the current workflow. I am now researching prospects to see if there are companies interested in an outsider analysis of their current processes-specifically document management processes with an emphasis on cost containment and productivity analysis.

Resolving issues with connecting one group to another group in regards to both historical resources and sites is the second project. I am finding that there are connection issues that are now being resolved, but more needs to be done. Time is unfortunately running out with this project as the one group's members are disappearing and the other group's members are becoming more and more alienated from the core due to a number of factors. There has to be a "marriage" of sorts between the old and new technology to reach the latter group before its too late. So I'm pushing forward and researching what I can do, what resources I'll have available and reaching out to others.

A New Year, A New Challenge

Yes, I finally "bit the bullet" and let my supervisor know what was going on. The result was very predictable. I was told that there was nothing they could do and offered to "let me go." I accepted. There was nothing else I could do. So now my challenge is to find that elusive job that utilizes the skills and abilities that I have acquired over the past almost two years that I haven't had gainful employment. The very first thing is to stop the negative "I just wasn't good enough" charade right now. I did an adequate job, but it just wasn't something I wanted to do for a long period of time.

I also know now what industries I don't want to get involved with any longer. Insurance and telemarketing companies...both bad news as far as I'm concerned. This still leaves quite a few industries I might want to try my hand in. There is the sad but true fact that I'm still in a financial crisis with no money coming in. I can't dwell on it though. I must take up the challenge of exploring my options and praying for something to come along that will engage me enough to want to work full time.

I can't believe that there are only part time jobs available for someone like me. I refuse to believe that, even though this is what I've been getting the past two times.