I Quit My Job of Six Years to Become a Writer

I will say that I’m not the best at decision making. I’m not saying this was a poor decision, but it was probably the dumbest thing I’ve ever done. But would I admit that to my friends and family? And risk them saying the dreaded “told you so”? Gosh no! I might be dumb in my decision making, but I’m not dumb enough to give them the satisfactory of being right.

It’s weird because even though it wasn’t the greatest decision, I still don’t regret it. Honestly, I probably should be worried about my future, but it’s hard to be worried when you only have yourself to care for. I’m not trying to sound bleak, but the way my life has been going this past decade hasn’t been great. In theory, I shouldn’t be complaining. I have these amazing friends and a loving family. I would never change that for the world. Despite everything, they’re always there for me. I owe them so much and I don’t even know where I would start.

My fundamental problem, and this has been a problem my entire life, is my self-esteem. I lack self-esteem in the worst possible way. It’s the reason I don’t put myself out there. I have it in my head that people don’t like me, or I’m not good at what I do. I felt like that for as long as I could remember. Maybe I could have pursued this writing path a long time ago if I really tried.

I knew I wanted to write since middle school. My reading teacher got me into reading and from there, I knew I wanted to be an author. It started off with me writing little short stories. I never showed many people my stories. I kept my writing private until recently. Except in the 8th grade, when I took a creative writing course. I excelled in that class; it was my favorite. I won most of our little competitions. I won certificates, stickers, and at one point I won a gift card for lunch. Looking back, I think that was the only time I was ever really confident in myself.

That changed, of course, once I got to high school. We were supposed to “buckle down” and start thinking about our futures. I thought writing was my future until that point. I was told that it’s not a proper job and that I needed to do something that will make actual money. But I didn’t know what that was. I was discouraged because it seemed like everyone around me knew what they wanted to do. All of my friends had these incredible talents that they loved to show off.

I dated this guy in high school; he was on the football team. He also did baseball; this guy was amazing at sports. But he was even better at welding. We went to a tech high school, and that was the program he chose. He later went to college for it and did exceedingly well. However, we ended up breaking up a few months after high school. It took us a while to get to this point, but we are currently still friends. He’s actually one of my best friends. He’s now married with a child and they just recently bought their first home. I’m extremely happy for him. However, I’m envious that he got his life together and I still haven't. If it were a competition, which it’s not, he definitely won the breakup.

I, on the other hand, did no tech program. I did mostly academic classes. I honestly didn’t know what tech program would be suitable for me. It’s not like I had any actual talents besides writing. Writing wasn’t even an option for a course to take in high school. Maybe that was another thing that discouraged me. If high school was about preparing for our futures and figuring out what we wanted to do with our lives, then why wasn’t writing an option? I think that was what made me realize maybe everybody was right. Maybe writing wasn’t a proper job, and I needed to grow up and figure something else out.

I was engaged for almost 2 years. We were only dating for about a year before he proposed to me. If I’m honest, it was kind of loveless relationship. I wasn’t that attracted to him, and some of his habits bothered me. Attraction is only a small part of what I like in a man, but I didn’t have any attraction for him. He also never had money, so I paid for everything we did and ate. Not that money is important, but that also means we hardly did anything as a couple. I like Netflix and Chill as much as the next person; but every day? Let’s be serious.

Before we met, he spent five consecutive years homeless. He moved in with his friend shortly before meeting me. They lived, with his friend’s mom, in this small 2 bedroom apartment. The apartment always smelled like weed; I’ve never been much of a smoker, so I couldn’t really handle the smell. I hated hanging out there. So, we rarely did. He also had no license; his excuse was, “I had no one to teach me how to drive.” Which I guess it’s a fair reason. Even so, it annoyed me that I had to drive everywhere, and pay for everything.

He worked at the Dunkin Donuts inside the shell station I worked in. I worked as a cashier. Real power couple. Am I right? He only liked me because I was a female who liked video games. I enjoy playing them now and then; I know some of the new releases and watch some streaming. But I would hardly call myself a gamer. However, video games were his life. He had this massive PC with thousands of dollars of games. Yet I still paid for everything we did and he spent five years homeless. Are you seeing the pattern? He’s always broke and doesn’t have enough money to take care of himself, but at least he has the latest video games.

During the early stages of our relationship, I really did like him. He easily became my friend, and we had a bunch in common. Yet, looking back on those times, I think I only liked him because he was available. Plus, he gave me attention, and as a female, I ate it up. I even helped him study for his permit test, paid the fee for the test, taught him how to drive with my car, and paid the fee for him to take his driving test. After he passed, we went to the dealership to get him a car. Thankfully, he paid for the down payment. Unfortunately, though, his credit was terrible; he needed a co-signer. That’s when I came in to play. Being the “loving” and “supporting” girlfriend that I was, I co-signed for him. Have I mentioned I’m not great with decision making? A year into our relationship, we ended up getting engaged. I’m honestly not even sure what provoked me into saying yes. In my opinion, a year is way too soon. Plus, I wasn’t even sure if I loved him at that point. The honeymoon phase was long over and the spark was practically dead. Maybe I just didn’t think I’d get the opportunity for marriage again. Maybe it was because all my friends were engaged, married, and having babies and I felt like I was behind. Perhaps it was all the above. I couldn’t tell you.

But for 2 more years we stayed engaged with no actions or plans for an actual wedding. Mainly because we had no money. But also, I think we both subconsciously knew we didn’t want to marry one another. He was actually the one who ended the engagement. A week later, he was dating someone else. I’m sure she wasn’t remotely the reason he broke it off.

Oh, yeah… And that car I cosigned for? He got it repossessed a couple months after our breakup. So I got stuck with a $2400 bill. Again, I’m not the best at decision making.

This isn’t supposed to be a story about my failed relationships, by the way. Let’s get back to the story at hand.

So you might remember that I mentioned working in a gas station as a cashier. I worked at a shell gas station chain for 6 years. I cashiered for about 2 years and then I eventually moved up to a management role. Honestly, it was an excellent company to work for. For the amount of work I did, they paid me pretty well. I grew to know and, oddly enough, love the company. However, I wasn't really cut out for management. I knew how to handle any problem and take care of any customer concerns. But I was hardly a boss; I was more of a friend. I couldn’t assert myself properly. The problem was, I didn’t want my associates to be upset with me. I didn’t want to create a hostile work environment. I cared more about what they thought of me than being a boss.

I bounced from store to store; mainly because I enjoyed helping the company when needed. But I also enjoyed starting anew. I enjoyed being in a new environment with all new people. Somehow, it made me feel like I could be the manager I needed to be. The new employees didn’t know me, which meant I could be whoever I wanted to be. Sounds good, right? Well, I never really changed. It was a nice thought, but I could never bring myself to be a boss. I made friends at every store I went to. Once I found my last store, I absolutely loved it. I mean, I still didn’t feel like a boss, but this store was so easy. It was so slow compared to some of the other stores I was in. I was practically getting paid to do nothing.

If my old boss ends up reading this… L. I’m sorry!

My assistant manager actually felt like my boss, even though I was supposed to be her boss. We got along in theory, but she didn’t take me seriously. We butt heads a lot, and she proved to be way more assertive. If I’m honest, she discouraged me. I knew she wanted the store, and I already believed I wasn’t meant to be a manager. Because of some heavy conflicts, it ended up pushing me over the edge to quit.

But of course I couldn’t just walk away from a company of 6 years. It was also around that time that I realized I had completely given up my dream of writing. Throughout the 6 years of working for the company and playing the role as a manager, and feeling as though I’ve been left behind by all my friends from high school, I realized I lost myself. I lost sight of who I was and what I wanted. I allowed people to discourage me from my goals, and I didn’t want to live like that anymore. So I put in my notice.

Now I have no official job, but I have been getting a lot of writing done. I’ve been doing side gigs, like Doordash, for extra money. I started a blog too; I’m basically throwing all of my faith in the universe at this point and hoping everything works out the way it should. It’s a struggle and I’m still trying to find myself during this process. I feel like I spent 6 years in my comfort zone and afraid to take risks; I lost myself during high school and I stuck to that identity until recently. I was discouraged from my goals and I refuse to allow anyone tell me what I can and can’t do. I’m going to be 30 years old in November. I don’t want to waste away my 30s like I did my 20’s. I don’t want to be stuck in a position that I don’t feel comfortable in.

Now that I’m out of a job and doing my writing and side gigs, I feel almost embarrassed to tell people I’m a writer. I think it’s because I still have it programmed in me that it’s not a “real job”. I allowed years and years of false information persuade me not to continue working on this goal; and now it’s something I’m going to need to undo. Going out, I’m always afraid of the dreaded question, “What do you do for work?” I never really know how to answer that. I’m afraid if I tell them I’m a writer, they will look at me confused and be thinking “That’s not a proper job.” I’m afraid if I tell them I do side gigs for extra income, they will look at me and say, “You hardly make any money.” I don’t want them to think down at me, so it keeps me from saying anything. My usual answer to their question is, “I don’t really want to talk about it.” Of course, they usually spend some time trying to convince me to “spill the tea”, but after I insist on changing the subject, they get the hint and move on to something else. It’s always awkward and I hate that.

I read somewhere about manifesting your dreams. I’ve been on this big spiritual path the last couple of years and manifesting is something I’ve been studying and practicing. I’m still learning and not very good at it, but I 100% believe that the universe is working for us and not against us. It wants us to succeed and will do everything in its power to aid us and allow us to see our true potential. As humans, we comprise energy, just like the universe; our energies are constantly communicating and working together to create miracles. I studied manifesting for a while, but it wasn’t until I read the book, The Quantum Mindset in a Nutshell by Rick Thompson, that I really understood what manifesting was all about. At one point, he says that in order to manifest your dreams properly; you need to own it. Be the person you want to be and not wish you were that person. Instead of saying “I want to be a writer” or “I’m trying to become a writer”, I need to be saying, “I am a writer,” or “I have recently become a writer.” I realized I couldn’t properly manifest my own dreams because when people ask me what it is I do for work, I can’t even admit it to them, let alone admit to myself. By allowing myself to feel embarrassed, and telling them I don’t want to talk about it, I’m also telling the universe that writing isn’t something I want. But writing has always been the only way I can truly express myself in an open manner. It’s the only thing that really makes me feel like myself. Yes, it’s a scary and new journey, but it’s my journey. It’s only been a couple months since I left my job of six years and it’s terrifying to think about what my future is going to be like.

Even though it was probably the dumbest decision I’ve ever made; I’m pretty sure it was also my best. I’m finally thinking about myself and my own needs. I’m no longer worried about falling behind because I now know that we are all on our separate journeys. It’s not about the end of the journey, it’s about the process. As I write this, I’m sitting outside and having a drink, something I wouldn’t have the energy or time to do a few months ago.

This is the beginning of my journey and I’m so excited to see where it takes me.

So, as my final thought, I would like to introduce myself to the writing community…. Hi. I’m Kellie; and I am a writer.