I QUIT!

I'm 25! I honestly thought I'd have life figured out by now. But I recently started to give up on this concept. Life isn't meant to be figured out, you're meant to find your own way of living that's not harmful to the people around you, and you keep doing that till you die.

Around 7 years ago, before I started college, I looked at those in their 20s and envied them. Life seemed easier for them. Turns out they just adapted to the things happening around them, or perhaps they knew how to carry it silently.

I've been having lots of thoughts, which came in parallel to making a big girl decision of quitting my so-called stable job. Honestly being 25 and not yet graduated with years of work experience sometimes doesn't add up in my head. People escape jobs by studying, but I willingly choose to do it all at the same time, with no chance to rest (because I'm not giving myself the chance to). I've almost given up on this degree a million times. But the pursuit of learning is what keeps me going every time. Mind you, I do wanna get smarter in this economy!

A couple of days ago, my finals results came out. I achieved the academic goal I put for myself by the beginning of this academic year. Straight As, a couple of Bs and a GPA above 3. Not very bad, right? However, I found myself so caught up in burnout that the dopamine only lasted for five minutes in my blood, then completely vanished. I'm too stuck in this burnout that I cannot even get excited about the new job I'm beginning very soon.

I must make sense to my pain, so I sat down, and I started talking to myself (as I usually do). Where is this feeling coming from? It is coming from a place of frustration that all the efforts I've exerted for the past year and a half in this job are going unnoticed. It hurts when people start to treat you differently just because you're leaving, as if you never existed.

Business is business, and there is no room for emotions. Understandable, however, why is there always room for pushing people beyond their limits? Why is there always room for disrespect just because we're not seeing this so-called person in a couple of weeks?

The human dilemma resides in the fact that we have different values. We're mature enough to understand that not every person will treat us well just because we did so first. However, in this century, I wonder why people are pushed beyond their limits to the point that it creates a toxic competition? People are easily allowed to be abusive if it's within the system rules. It is like eating someone else's cooked meal after they stood tirelessly for 2 hours making it, leaving no crumbs.

To each of us their own compass. Mine is asking if I'd sleep well at night after doing this or that. I've had enough sleepless nights in my life to know this much. I wonder what other people's compasses look like? Because to some, it looks like this: "if this serves me and only me, then it's good, whatever the consequences are on others." I can't judge that, but I can't help but wonder if this comes from a place of pain.

Things like values and work ethics are less valuable in work environments, or so I figured out in this workplace. Businesses care about the cash coming in, way more than how it came in. In this dilemma, what would you choose? Is it going to be standing for what you believe is right, or would you go with the flow?

As I handed my first ever resignation, with all the frustration filling my soul, I was again tested. Do I go with this toxic unappreciative flow? Or do I stand for what's right? And I almost failed myself.

Every place we decide to join leaves two marks in us. A good one, and a bad one. Whether you like it or not, you can't stop it from coloring you. However, what you can do is let go of the pain, the disappointment, and the lack of respect. Only then, you can fix that scar it left on you.

I wonder how much time it'll take to erase that scar, and I wonder if life will ever feel less heavy. But what do we, humans, have except for hope?