Ugh

Since coming back from vacation and being back at work (the whopping two days), I've realized precisely how much of my frustration and unhappiness has been stemming from my job.  I've known I haven't been completely happy there for a while and that I should move on,  but when I was just living my life and dealing with it day after day, I really couldn't identify how strong of an impact it was having on me.  But after coming back from vacation to find I am dreading every single morning and every single hour that drags, it is impossible to ignore just how bad the situation has gotten.  This job is not worth this level of stress and dissatisfaction.

I am not one of those people who lives for my work.  I never will be nor do I want to be, and so accordingly, I don't look for that kind of career or for a job where I will constantly competing at a cut-throat level to move forward.  That said, I am motivated and a hard worker and willing to go to pretty extreme levels to do a good job.  But not when it's not worth it - not when I'm being made unhappy by the work I'm in.

And thus, the job search begins!  Time to get my resume out, updated, and polished.  Time to juggle interviews around when I can get off work without creating chaos or suspicion.  Time to move on.

snap

My current work situation is not ideal, to put it mildly.  It's not a bad job, it really isn't, and in many ways, it offers me the flexibility I need in terms of being more productive or less productive as need be.  But there are a lot of things that bother me and frustrate me to the point where they become impossible to ignore. Worse, they are making me actively feel unhappy, dissatisfied, and negative. Even worse than that, I notice myself taking it out on people at work.  Not in clear defined ways, but I'm snappy and short-tempered which is the opposite of what I usually am, and as my job involves a lot of interaction with people, it's a bad combination.

I'm never outright mean, but there are times I react more strongly than necessary when someone is irritating me or being otherwise irrational. I don't turn into a raving lunatic, but I do lose patience and it shows.  Whenever this happens, I then have to deal with feeling guilty.  Sometimes I think my guilt is unwarranted because I'm overly patient and too much of a people pleaser anyway, so it's not a bad thing for me to be pushy or not overextend myself to deal with nonsense.  Other times, I can't help it, I completely regret my tone of voice or attitude the second that moment is over.  I regret it even more when I realize it's borne more out of frustration with my job or situation in general rather than the person I'm dealing with. It's not their fault I'm unhappy so I need to not let them feel the consequences.

Anyway, I had that moment again today - where I was being impatient with someone who was frustrating me, so I snapped at them, and then immediately felt guilty.  The frustration was warranted, but in reality, I was reacting to a series of emails from a supervisor who wasn't listening to what I was saying.  Ugh.  Instant bad feelings and even more resentment and unhappiness.  Bad cycle.

Then on the subway home, a stranger told me, "I just wanted to tell you you have a soft beautiful face".

Ok then.

STRESS, Stress, stress

Stress is another enemy of mine, although I believe this one to be much more universal.  Stress can have a major effect on mood and on physical health without people even really realizing.  And if you're bipolar, stress is one of the major triggers for an episode.

I'm generally a pretty laid-back person and there isn't a lot that phases me.  I tend to have pretty high anxiety levels but that has more to do with I'm a worrier more than I actually get stressed out.  However, because of this, I usually don't realize when stress is building and I have a tendency to ignore it until...well, until I simply can't anymore and either feel it physically or just shut down. I basically have to be forced to recognize it.

Well, today...today, I had a moment of realization that I getting close to a breaking point.  I'm heading to Europe for a trip in a couple of weeks with 5 friends, and while I'm extremely excited, it's been close to a year of planning and I'm just at this point of having to think of all the tiny details and figuring out what I need to bring and figuring out currency and making sure I have enough money....and well, the list goes on and on.  Added to that, a variety of things at work, and naturally, it's at this point in time that basically all the electronic equipment in my life has decided to up and quit on me.  My laptop was an issue that took me over a month to get resolved and while it is now, that was a huge interruption in my life.  Then a couple weeks after that, my very much beloved Nikon D70 started flashing error messages at me.  Because I was so wrapped up in my computer drama, I didn't address it nearly as soon as I should have, although in all honesty, it would only have given me an edge of about 3 days.

I sent it to Nikon for servicing because when I called in the issue, the rep. told me it sounded like a known problem and they had a service advisory, meaning I wouldn't have to pay for repairs.  However, today I received an email detailing the issues and asking me to authorize the repairs....for 300 dollars. I kind of lost it.  I love my camera and I need my camera...but 300 dollars? I could essentially buy another camera body for that money...which is also money I'm really not looking to spend right now seeing as I'm going to Europe.  I couldn't breathe and I immediately started to feel my whole body tense up and my mind begin to race.  I felt a huge surge of rage at the circumstances and also body-trembling panic at the thought that I might not have a camera for my trip. It just all felt like way too much and I couldn't even gather my senses enough to deal with anything.

So that lasted for a ridiculous and annoying 10 minutes or so until I finally calmed down, started breathing normally again, and just decided to deal with it and move on.  I can only do what I can.  So I called Nikon, asked them to check again to make sure my issue wasn't the same as the one that the service advisory warned about.  In the meantime, since there's no way they'll get it back to me before I leave, I started looking into used camera bodies and have realized I'm just going to have to bite the bullet and pay for it - that's what credit cards and hoping for a raise is for.
Life is short and money is just money.....or so I keep telling myself anyway...

I calmed down and I feel relatively under control...but I'm annoyed that kind of stress got the better of me. Ef that.