Not Your Average Gal

Copywriter. Content Creator. Constant Sassypants.

Archives for April 2020

Here’s Your Permission to Change Course

By

A completely unstaged photo in Sydney, Australia.

Updated February 2022

So many of us grew up with this notion banged into our heads that we should find a career path, maybe switch positions or be promoted on it, but above all else—stick to it.

This idea is certainly ingrained from our parents, who had the opportunities to stay with a company for 30-40 years, earn a pension (what’s that?) and retire. I get it; it’s easy to rail against a generation ahead of us for what seems like cushy way of doing things. But let me gently remind you with the advent of the interwebs, we have plenty o’ opportunities too.

I remember the first day of my first-ever corporate job well.

Cue the old-lady sitting in a rocker moment.

Walking around in my big-girl pantsuit and Target heels (because entry-level-ish corporate jobs don’t exactly pay the big bucks). I was excited to have a laptop bag because it meant I got a company laptop! I could actually take home my work and proudly power walk to my nearly-paid-off car, casually holding said laptop bag.

Who me? Oh yes. I’m taking work home. So much work to do. So, so much. I’m important.

I was pumped I got to work in a cubicle! I wish I were kidding. You guys, this is how much the notion had been beaten into my head that if I worked for some big corporation, I had made it!

Insert life plan here: Work my way up, coast into my 60’s and retire with a nice party thrown at 3pm on a Friday so people don’t get annoyed they are wasting their limited lunch hour to celebrate a good 40-ish years someone had put in. Plus, then they could leave for the weekend afterwards and that makes everyone at least fake a smile, right? Maybe I’d even get a little plaque with my name on it…

Cue to early fall in 2008.

The financial crisis heard ’round the world.

The Big Three (automakers for those who aren’t from Detroit) were near bankruptcy or days away from declaring it.

I worked for one of them.

In a matter of weeks, the entire make of cars that my marketing team worked on, dissolved. Boom. Done. Over. No more.

20% of us lost our jobs in one day of mass layoffs.

I turned in my badge. My oh-so-exciting laptop. Was escorted to the elevators. And made my way to my nearly-paid-off car. Empty laptop bag in one hand. Cell phone, holding back tears telling my now-husband, in the other.

This corporate getup was bullshit.

That slap in the you’re-laid-off-what-the-fuck-are-you-gonna-do-with-your-life-now face gave me the necessary time I needed to stop listening to the noise and evaluate what I really wanted.

I didn’t exactly have much time either, it was early on in my career! There was a 3-week severance package, barely a savings account, lots of student loans and now a really expensive COBRA to pay to keep the benefits I needed. (This was before ACA.) If I wanted to keep my benefits, I paid and paid big time. For me, it was to the tune of $850 month.

It was daunting.

I listened to that barely audible voice which told me to go back to school and get my video broadcasting certificate, something I regretted not doing while in college.

I pushed the voice down and told her that she was silly. The appropriate thing to do was to put my head down and get another big girl job.

But this time, I had another chance to listen to her and she yelled at me.

Go and see what happens!

So I did. I went back to school. I added on more student loans. Worked at part-time jobs that (barely) made ends meet, questioned myself the whole freakin’ time, and stayed in a holding pattern for a few years while the now hubster applied and waited to get into medical school.

It sucked.

You know what sucked more though? Being at a job that crushed my soul simply because it fit some stupid notion that’s what good girls and boys do to make their way in the world.

I made my way into a copywriting job once the hubster started medical school. Part of the reason I got it, is because I put up a website to showcase my work as a video producer, which had a little ol’ section with a blog that displayed my writing prowess. Combine that with my degree, previous work in the ad world and—BAM! Hey ma’, look made I made it.

From there, I worked my way up, fell a bit into climbing the corporate ladder again, BUT learned this time to leave when it turned into something I didn’t feel-in-my-bones was good for me anymore. That’s when I dove head first into to starting my own copywriting business.

How many of us stop at the previous step though?

NONE of this would have happened if I kept my head down like a good little girl and found another job pushing papers when I got laid off.

The last decade could have easily been spent bopping around from agency to agency wondering if I should do something else.

We stay at jobs we hate because we convince ourselves of the myriad of reasons why it’s a good job, even if coworkers have caught us crying in the bathroom stall, our cars or over our half-eaten Taco Bell because we’ve been too busy trying to complete the task of fulfilling another madman’s request?

The benefits are good. The vacation schedule is better than my last job. They’re nice to me sometimes. It’s better than my previous boss/team/manager. If I get to 10 years, I’ll get 3 weeks vacation! People keep saying I don’t know how good I have it.

Maybe because they’re “good enough” isn’t good enough for you?

Here’s your unwavering permission to change course.

That doesn’t mean flipping the bird to your boss or telling your schedule manager to shove it because you’re heading to the Bahamas to sip on Pain Killers, learn how to play steel drums and find yourself.

It does mean giving yourself permission to explore that something that is nagging at you. That voice you’ve quieted in return for security.

If my story has taught you anything, know that jobs aren’t secure, no matter how lovely the benefits are. This is especially relevant now.

You can fail at what you don’t want. So you might as well take a chance on doing what you love.

-Jim Carrey
  • Take out a notebook and do a long brain dump of all the “silly” creative ideas that fill your soul. Yes, even the papier-mâché making class!
  • Take that hobby you do once every blue more and prioritize it for one freakin’ day a month. No excuses, clear your morning, 2 hours in the afternoon, and tell your partner they are takin’ the kids—then do it.
  • Use those 20 blissfully quiet moments in the morning to investigate the class you’ve been wanting to take.
  • Map out what your next 6 months to 1 year could look like if you quit your job and did something else. (I did this.)
  • Small, incremental steps add up quickly. If you notice you enjoy certain things in your daily like (like cooking or listening to a podcast or singing at the top of your lungs while in the shower), see how it would feel if you did more of that, even once more a week, or took it to a deeper level. Maybe a new cooking class? Maybe a new recipe once a week from that cookbook with all the crazy ingredients.
  • What did you like doing as a child? I love coloring. OH MAN, I LOVED IT. Guess what? I added a coloring book page into my monthly planner that I get to color at the end of every month. Silly? Yes. Worth it? Yes.
  • Piggyback off an already normal habit in your everyday schedule. If you take time to eat at any point in the day, use that time while eating to journal or explore a country you want to visit or finish your meal with a daily 5-minute meditation.

When you start doing something you like, with purposeful intent, little cracks in the made-up system begin to open.

It could look a whole lot like going back to school for 8 months, tossing it up on a website that includes writing about stuff you love and, well, look where we are now, my pretties. I run my own biz pantless in Hawaii.

Now this goes without saying, I also think a lot about how I come from a place of privilege. I qualified for student loans that I’m still paying to this day, but are manageable. Annoying, but manageable. I’m married and that means I fall into that wonderful club of: the spouse with the better benefits gets to add one of us on the plan. I could have totally crap months of income when starting this biz and still be okay because we saved a lot and he has a job.

If you think I don’t often wonder what more I could be doing with my current career, you’re bonkers. It’s doesn’t work like that. You don’t start your own biz and live happily ever after, full stop.

It is always evolving! It always looks like a hot mess of brain dump, after brain dump across note pages and Asana tasks and webinars. I know in the future, I want to prioritize my time to edit more videos and photos. I’ve thought about starting a YouTube channel or podcast for years. I think I’d like to put my writing talents into more charitable routes that include traveling and children.

None of this may make sense with my current copywriting trajectory. It may not be on-brand for Not Your Average Gal. It may be an idea seemingly out of left-field. But, you know what, it could also give me more opportunities.

Go and see what happens!

I have so many ideas mulling around that make me think maybe I haven’t chosen the forever career path and it’s somehow wrong. And that’s where they getcha!

What if your career path isn’t one straight highway of formalities? What if the detours are where you find not only what you like, but what you love?

Keep exploring that!

The key is to set up your life to allow it. It may look a whole heck of a lot like saying no to the things that aren’t serving you—is it that god-awful job?—and yes to the things that melt your butter—is it that photo editing class you keep finding yourself going back to on the interwebs?

The only person who can decide is manning the ship.

I’m giving you full permission to change the course, captain. Everyone else can adjust their sails.

His Name is Tom

By

If you're an OG reader, you remember a time when I referred to my husband as My Main Squeeze. After our wedding—nearly 7 years ago!—he got an upgrade to The Hubster.

I did this mainly to protect him from my entertaining wit and marketing shenanigans around these parts. He has one of those proper, button-up jobs. I felt very protective over him too, it's one thing for me to run a copywriting business that encourages dropping F-bombs or maybe even participate in a lip sync battle in my IG Stories; it's another to drag him into the fray with my antics.

Giving him a pseudonym provided anonymity.

Humanity gets lost in anonymity though.

As we watched the death count slowly tick up, then rapidly pick up at a heartbreaking pace, it's important, vitally important, to know there are names and faces behind these numbers.

Names behind the lives lost.

Names behind the bravery.

Names behind those heading in when others are staying home.

The Hubster is an ER physician in the last few months of his residency. We certainly didn't imagine the glorious end to 13+ years of hard work would look like this. In the final months, we were supposed to be celebrating and packing our home to move. A hard-fought move; one that brought about equal parts panic and excitement.

A move I had already written about to be published on here. A move that may be delayed or on hold, like the rest of our lives.

It all seems so trivial now, even if my heart pangs a bit thinking back to our light and fun celebration as the job offers for after residency started rolling in. That little notch in my gut yearns for the innocence of not knowing what the next few months would look like for us. We were robbed in so many ways.

Including not being given the proper time to grieve over seemingly inconsequential things.

Over the course of a few frantic days that turned into weeks, The Hubster went from typical 10-12 hour shifts in an emergency room to epitomizing the phrase, “All hands on deck.”

Non-stop conference calls lasting all morning and afternoon on his days off.

Hours spent sourcing PPE for himself and fellow residents.

Late nights reviewing the latest statistics and how that may impact his hospital.

Unending changes to procedures, shifts and scheduling.

A constant barrage of calls, texts, group chats and emails from worried residents looking for some semblance of structure or comfort.

And then he went into work.

For the last month, I started a new tradition where I watch him leave for shifts from the front door and wave as he pulls away. Some days are harder than others. But every day I feel like I'm watching him go into battle with an invisible, cruel, ruthless enemy.

If there's anything I want you to take away from reading this, it’s to believe things that may be hard to understand. No matter how hard that reality may be to wrap your heart around. No matter how much you want to stick your head in the sand. No matter if the truth is a sick certainty.

When you doubt what doctors and scientists are seeing, when you question what they are saying, you are carelessly telling them what they’re experiencing isn't accurate. It's a futile mission created simply to comfort your own mind during this uncomfortable time.

The Hubster was meant for the Emergency Medicine specialty. His cool-as-a-cucumber mentality is the one you want with you in the stark, sterile confines of an ER. The guy who puts his head down, mitigates trauma and rallies the troops. As much as I don't want him there right now, I know he's the person you want by your side.

There are a few patients over the course of the last 4 years that The Hubster will never forget; some who have impacted him so much he's even gone to their funerals, a cruel by-product of choosing emergency medicine.

When he speaks about his patients, he does so with a slow, methodical and clinical cadence. He doesn't mention them by name, but will walk through what he did for them and how it helped.

In the early stages of this pandemic, he spoke to me about a woman who needed to be intubated. Her lungs had become so cruelly squeezed by COVID-19 that not even the oxygen given to her was helping. She needed to have a machine breathe for her in the hopes of saving her life. They needed to give her lungs a fighting chance to battle the vicious virus and hopefully someday breathe on her own again.

Intubating patients is an uncompromising procedure with little room for negotiation.

Patients need to be sedated. It can be a frightening process for those of us not in healthcare and lacking the ability to whip out medicine acronyms with abandon.

She was nervous and painfully alone. Families are not allowed in hospitals.

She asked my husband to hold her hand after he discussed the need for her to be intubated and how it would work. They talked for a while about their lives, sharing different stories, in an attempt to make her comfortable, my husband holding her hand the whole time.

She was successfully intubated that afternoon, eased into a slumber, allowing her body to give a fighting chance.

He came home and told me how he desperately hoped his face wasn’t the last face she ever sees.

I asked him to tell me her name so I could think about her, take care of her family in my heart. For weeks, I'd ask how she was doing and he'd dutifully check on her when he was at the hospital.

He seemed cautiously hopeful.

She seemed to be getting a bit better, a fickle side-effect of a merciless disease.

He opened her chart at home one evening on a day off, wanting to check on her.

She had died earlier that day.

To her loved ones, her name was Auntie.

His name is Tom.

I'm forever mindful that the verbs in those sentences are different.