What's your Title?

What’s your title? Are you a Lawyer? Senior Associate? Maybe you are a Sales Assistant. Whoever you are, whatever your title is, it definitely defines your life. It defines your salary, which means your budget and what you can afford. What clothes you buy, what car you drive and how often you are able to eat out. Very often it even defines how much time you spend with your family or where your kids go to school.

Until a week ago I was a Marketing Content Manager for a Real Estate Company. Sounds important, right? Since I’m a 24 -year-old immigrant with no college degree (yet), I thought I did pretty damn good when I got this incredibly fancy position. Like many of you these days I worked from home. I spent all day on Instagram, Facebook, Canva or editing photos. I was able to walk my dogs 5 times a day while responding to emails or posting from my phone at the same time. It was a good job. At least I was able to convince myself it was.

The truth is I was willing to put up with a crazy boss, who’d text me notoriously late at night on any day of the week after ignoring all of my texts and emails for all day, sometimes even longer. Most of her texts were TikToks she wanted me to copy. Since our content had to be based on her and her work, my options were incredibly limited without her participation. Numerous times I’d ask her to record a short video for me, send me a picture, or literally anything but outside of recording random angry rants on her personal Facebook account she never seemed to have time to help me with the work she hired me to do.

She hated almost every single design I proposed and then we would spend an hour on zoom calls while she was explaining exactly what I should do.

Move it to the right

Move it to the left

Make it bigger

Add more photos

No, I hate that photo. Choose a different one

At the end of each call the projects would look entirely different. They were overcrowded with too much detail and loads of writing that people would probably never read. Every single time I asked myself a question: Why am I here?

Clearly, she had a perfect idea of what she wanted and it wasn’t aligning with my clean and modern style. I liked minimalistic posts, she liked busy ones containing as much detail as possible. I’m not saying that either of us was right or wrong, everyone likes something different. However, what’s the point of hiring a Marketing Content Manager if you hate every single thing they come up with?

The company was struggling. I knew that because many times she mentioned it during our morning tag-ups. She always complained about people clocking-in too much and she constantly made comments about how she didn’t have money to pay someone for doing something “stupid”. She basically kept on looking for ways to make us work for free but at the same time expected me to always be available and ready to drive to random places without covering my gas.

In the last months of me working for them she would ghost me for days, constantly cancelling our meetings. One day she even requested to approve my “hashtags” before posting and that was the day I knew I needed a new job.

I had zero creative freedom and I was not allowed to post anything without permission. Still, I was a Marketing Content Manager so why couldn’t I be just happy?

Soon after I started a casual job search I got an email that the company couldn’t afford keeping me full time anymore and if I decided to keep my position I’d be working only “per request”. It wasn’t a surprise. Of course, she made me feel like it was my fault by saying the work I was doing didn’t justify them paying you for a full-time position. It stung a little but I knew it was for the best.

I knew it was a push I needed to look for better opportunities. I was excited to start something new but the excitement faded very quickly when company after company viewed my job application and rejected me.

Not Selected.

Viewed by Employer

Not Selected.

My Indeed profile (and my ego) was hurting when I’d be going through all the jobs I applied for and wouldn’t even get an interview.

I mean, I get it. I don’t have a degree (I’m currently enrolled in a community college), I worked in childcare for 90% of my adult life and I’m a freaking immigrant so of course the first question I hear each time I talk to a potential employer is “where are you from?” instead of “what’s your previous job experience?” Oh, and my spelling sucks.

I realized that with so many perfect candidates these days and with literally almost everyone looking for a new job due to COVID… I might have had to change my title to something a bit less “important”.

So I started babysitting again. No matter how many times I promise myself I won’t come back to it, I always do. This time I found a 2-hour morning job that pays incredibly well and is so early in the day it allows me to work somewhere else full time if I wanted to. Of course, suddenly I had to get used to getting up at 5 or 6AM and actually getting dressed properly but it seemed like a great opportunity to get some extra money.

Shortly after that I volunteered to cover for a pet sitter in my dog’s doggy daycare and I also kept on agreeing to other pet sitting requests. Soon enough I started making real money on hanging out with all those adorable pets and my daily step count doubled!

Finally, a high-end boutique opened right next to my apartment building and since they were hiring, I ended up getting a Sales Assistant position there.

Before I realized what I’ve gotten myself into I had 3 jobs. Three awesome, incredibly enjoyable jobs with incredibly nice people. Every day I wake up at 5 or 6 AM. I drive for hours between babysitting and pet sitting visits. I walk over 20,000 steps a day. Thanks to Virginia humidity I’m sweaty and gross most of the time. I’ve never been so busy and exhausted in my life. Still… I enjoy every second of it.

You might wonder why I stick for so long with such a terrible boss. Well, the answer is easy. I was a Marketing Content Manager. It sounds way better than a Dog Walker, Babysitter or a Sales Associate. It sounds like I made it. Like I was only 24, had no degree but still achieved all of my goals. Plus I was working from home!

Funny thing? I always thought I’d be great at marketing and that it would bring me so much joy. I’m a creative millennial, ready to conquer the world! I love social media, writing, creating... what could ever go wrong?!

Well, what I realized is that I love working on my Instagram, taking my own photos and sharing my passion for life with all of my 675 followers. But… the truth is I hate doing that for other people. I get so stressed out about other people’s opinions about my ideas. I get anxious and extremely (unnecessarily) hurt when they give me any type of feedback. I can’t imagine dealing with that on a daily basis. And you can say what you want. I know I should grow a thicker skin and accept occasional failure, even embrace it! But I’m just not that person.

Was it cool to be a Marketing Content Manager? Yes! I’m sure after I repeated this title about 10 times already, you believe me it was. However, in real life it wasn’t even half as fancy or important as it sounds. I actually never felt more useless and insignificant in my life. All that time I was afraid to pick up my phone and see another message about what I did wrong.

What’s your title? A Doctor? A Teacher? Or maybe you’re a Construction Worker.

These days I’m a Dog Walker. I am a Babysitter. I’m also a Sales Assistant. And today… I’m a writer. I’m writing for God’s sake! Do you know when was the last time I wrote a Vocal article? 4 months.

4 months of being so uninspired and mentally drenched I wouldn’t write a single thing besides one short poem about being unhappy and feeling stuck. 4 months of promising myself it was worth it because

Marketing Content Manager would look good in my resume.

Don’t get me wrong… I’m still very far from being proud of my current job situation. Society's pressure to have a “real career” is definitely working. I feel bad for having 3 part time jobs and no fancy title. Sometimes (most times) I feel ashamed… but as I’m writing this I’m taking a deep breath and realize that each time this shame is overshadowed by how happy I am with the jobs I’m doing. How I can see that I help people who trust me to take the best care of their loved ones.

Call me naive but I do think I’m important. People appreciate me. They respect me. They value my time. They are happy to pay for it. Within the last 3 weeks I’ve gotten more gifts of appreciation (and tips) than in my entire “career”. When last week I shook my head, got red all over my face and said I couldn't accept a very expensive gift a wise lady responded:

Why? Do you think you’re not worth it?

Life is too short for toxic jobs, toxic bosses or a toxic work environment.

You don’t have to hate your job.

Your time is important.

Your happiness should always come first.

Just about two years ago my husband and I quit our jobs and went to Hawaii for three weeks not knowing what’s next. My husband had an opportunity to come back to the job he hated and I told him not to. While I was petrified of the possibility of not being able to pay our bills I also decided not to be the wife who prioritizes money over his mental health. I let my husband do the job he loved and that paid very little at that time. This week he starts as a Manager of that exactly same place. The fact I was a person who inspired him to reach for his goals no matter how it could financially hurt us… I think that is the best and most selfless thing I have ever done.

Do me a favor… be proud of who you are even if society tells you not to. What’s your title? That doesn’t matter. Do you believe in what you do? That’s a better question.

So… do you?