It was another normal Tuesday night and I returned home from work in a huff to go to my karate class. I quickly said hello to my roommates before stuffing food down my face, making a quick change into my uniform, and leaving within 20 minutes. I got in my car and embarked on my misadventures of absently driving down the wintery I-90 highway to go to my karate class; I missed the exit ramp. I was too busy spacing out to my blasting electronic music in order to notice the location to the exit had moved due to construction. While I could sit and complain about how annoying construction is, I need to realize my mistakes instead.
While being everyone’s “never give up” advocate, I have some work to do of my own. During college, I studied to be a web developer; whenever I’d run into significant enough difficulty on a programming assignment, I’d gather enough help from any source to where my entire bucket of water was full before I got up to fill it up myself. I knew I was going to be pretty late to class and was wondering if I should pick up the phone and call one of my roommates freaking out or just keep driving and accept the fact I’m not going to make it class on time. I had never completed a programming assignment without getting most of it spoon-fed to me and now I am getting paid to do this. Meanwhile, I‘ve been putting on a façade with my leadership skills and a pink personality type in a grey world. My peers saw me as this successful, driven woman who had recently been promoted, earned her black belt, lost a bunch of weight, and tried out for game and cooking shows. Behind the scenes, I’ve been climbing down the rabbit hole with a 1 way ticket to China. I don’t want to turn into Mr. Jetson! I decided not to call my roommates and enter the address into my GPS to find a solution to arriving at my karate class.
I was given my first “big programming task” at work in May to be completed by June; it is January and here I sit typing this story wondering what I’m still doing here. When given a programming assignment, you’re given a list of requirements, which are generally vague, and then sent on your own to do the assignment. I’ve placed doubts in my programming abilities for many years and told myself, “this is it, this is what you’ve really wanted, and you can do this!” The assignment was handed to me and I was more ready than ever. I had my ticket to becoming a real programmer and returned to my battle station to solve this puzzle. I tried to decipher what I was supposed to do. Since I was nervous and wanted to make myself seem intelligent to these people, I defaulted to asking tons of questions. Several weeks and plenty of help from my friends and boyfriend at the time later, I completed about 80% of the assignment, and still had a couple more questions.
The deadline was approaching and I was eager to get my questions answered. Instead of spending lots of time researching and trying more than 3x before giving up for awhile, I freaked out about the deadline and flipped through my contact list to try getting some help. On my quest to attain assistance, I was either given a solution that didn’t work, turned away and told to go to Google, or the person was stumped by my predicament. I forced myself to exert as much energy as possible into this project until I corrupted my workspace. The deadline passed. A few more months passed. Finding my way to my karate class wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be, but I wished I could say the same about my programming assignment. I luckily had a few motivation spurts, but my desires to complete this task were rapidly diminishing. If my parents ever asked me why I’m screwing up this golden opportunity, I’d tell them I’m not happy and want better for myself. The more my motivation escaped down the toilet, the more my climb down the rabbit hole turned into a fall. I found the solution to get to my karate class safely, but that didn’t take away from the fact I missed the exit ramp and was going to be late.
When heroes are searching for their successes, they have to take plenty of shots and miss. As I sit in my grey box, writing this story, absent from this world I should be immersed in, I am waiting for people to respond to my emails with questions. I realized I am not where I belong. I have been sitting here for over 2.5 years without being able to move past square 1. The more my career remained stagnant, the more the emptiness turned into a pit of despair. I’d walk in the door after work and my roommates would come home to the daily rain cloud above my head. There’s no use in telling myself I should have put more effort into the assignments in college and even now because the past is only a lesson to be learned from.
The days continued flying away. As I’m sitting in my cube, writing this story, when I should be programming, my friends told me how I’m ready to take on the world instead of being in this chokehold ready to tap into submission. I safely arrived to my karate class and wasn’t late because the earlier class ran an extra 10 minutes. For one of the exercises, the instructor asks people who can do a hook kick to the head to go to one side of the room. I knew I was able to do that, but walked over to the other side very shyly; several other members in the class seemed to believe in me walking to the other side a lot more than I did.
When the beginning of 2016 arrived, I didn’t realize how bad my confidence was truly hurting. The monster inside me has been telling me how incapable I am of success now has a formidable foe. After cleaning up from the New Year’s Eve party at my apartment, I was on the couch one afternoon talking to my roommates and was them how large the professional void I’ve dug for myself is; my managers have been taking notice at the lack of contribution and attendance struggles from me. I decided to try this assignment a few more times and left each day with a corrupted coding environment.
My career expires in 15 days and I am still here. Sitting in this grey box, I listened to the other voices who told me I was able to walk to the other side. I can’t spill the water from the glass if I haven’t even gotten up to go look for the water. Even if I spilled, I’d get a paper towel, take notice to how I spilled, and keep moving forward. Everyone believes in me except for me. One of my roommates suggested I drive for Uber and take some time to figure out how I’d best make a difference my way with my services. It clicked. I knew what I had to do and where the stars told me to go. Everyone is right. I am now ready to walk to the other side, but this time with my head up, knowing I didn’t need to follow Mr. Jetson to the rabbit hole!
