I've always wanted to quit my job, I'm finally doing it tomorrow

Tomorrow I am going to quit my job.

It is such a millennial thing to announce, but just thinking of it now is already bringing a lot of joy to my heart.

For years, I have been imagining for that ‘one day’ where I could muster enough courage to do that, and now it is literally less than 24 hours away to the day that will become my “Day One”.

As much I did not want to admit previously, I have a pretty standard life. This is my first company since I graduated from college and I have been with them just shy of 4 years to date. It is a typical 9-to-5 desk-bound job, on top of which I have to check my emails and attend to calls 24/7 given the nature of the industry.

This job and industry was exactly what my degree had prepared me for, and most of my course mates have also started their careers in similar role as mine. It was something that, for a period of two years, I really enjoyed doing and the job itself was the source of my intrinsic motivation to keep wanting to improve myself from the day before.

But somewhere along the years, I started to lose that fire.

The days seemed a little longer each day, they began to blur and the weeks all threaded together, weaving into a big looming dome hanging over me as I felt increasingly lost and unable to find any greater meaning at work, other than merely clocking in the hours and checking off the daily routine tasks.

Even though I started to notice the change in me, I couldn't find a reason big enough for myself to call it quit. I reasoned to myself that I was in a good place in life. My colleagues were fun, like-minded people and they were my friends; the work hours were very healthy and I could knock off on time for most days; and my salary, albeit not jaw-dropping crazy, could pay my bills sufficiently and fund my life more than comfortably. It's as if I was in a relationship that had very evidently fizzled out, but both party just couldn't find a reason substantial enough to justify for a breakup. So it was reduced to merely a waiting game - waiting for that one last straw to come.

I thought waiting to have a good reason to quit is the responsible and right “adult” decision to make. It took me a long time to understand that it is in fact the exact opposite.

You see, like yourself and everyone else, I have goals, dreams and endeavours that I envision achieving one day. Some are discontinued passions from younger days, some are personal challenges that really excite me, some are what I wish I could do for and with the people who matter to me, and some are just outright big daydreams that even I would have laughed thinking of myself ever getting close to doing them in my life.

You get what I mean. I have hashtag goals for my life. I have a lot of them.

The thing is, I never had any concrete plan nor made any actions to start on them. I just kind of imagined them happening to me when I reach the right age, reach the right job or meet the right people. As to exactly when will that 'One Day' be? I don't know. So since I don't know, I ought to just wait and see right?

WRONG WRONG WRONG.

I didn't fully get that I only have so many minutes in my 24 hours - and so many weeks in my 365 days - and every minute I spend waiting to end this job that no longer serves me, is me taking away more time from my future where I can be doing things that actually set my soul on fire.

If those goals mean anything to me, then I have to make a choice of how I want to spend my time, which honestly at the end of the day, is the only thing we ever own.

And it is about time I make mine.

Our goals only matter to ourselves and they should be the guiding light in the course of our lives. That's why, after so long, I have finally understood that only I can take over the steering wheel of my life, and steer myself out of this current path that I have already known will not be bringing me closer to whom I want to be tomorrow.