The Recession is Bullhonkey Tornows Story - When I Grow Up

The Recession is Bullhonkey Tornows Story - When I Grow Up This is part of  The Recession is Bullhonkey series, where I share stories of those who have gotten hired and/or started their own businesses (or sometimes both!) since 2008. This is Tornows story, and I think itll especially resonate with someone who had to create their own career because of an illness. Read on for her story AND the lessons shes learned! I wish this story was about agency and power but, in truth, it is about vulnerability. Sometimes I must remind myself that is okay too, and it is okay for me to share it. Like so many other multipassionates, I hopped around from job to job trying to find one that could be called my “one true purpose.” Being from the SF Bay Area, I sampled start-ups like they were college electives. It was only after I started working with a coach and began to understand my multipassionate tendencies that I found my “dream job”â€"the ideal convergence of my passions. I loved that job, I loved going to work each day, and I loved telling people what I did for a living. And then, I quit! I didn’t leave because I was multipassionate, lost interest, or fell out of love.  I left because of mental health issues. I suffer from panic disorder and agoraphobia, and leaving the house each day got to be too much for me. I was calling in sick at least once a week; sometimes I would just randomly disappear and escape home during the day.  I felt so guilty and down about it. I loved my job; I really really did. But love wasn’t enough. It wasn’t the first job anxiety had caused me to quitâ€"but it had been the first one that I loved. I required a job where I could work from home,  but coming out of a job I adored into telecommuting jobs that left me feeling uninspired was a difficult transition. None of these jobs could ever make me content. I needed to start my own businessâ€"something I was truly passionate about! It was hard enough telling my long-term boyfriend he needed to support me for a while, but it was even harder telling him I wanted him to invest a large sum of money into me so that I could enroll in a coach training program and launch my own coaching business. If it failed, I knew he would resent me. (He pretty much told me so.) Now, this is where most people say that their lives completely “turned around” or “took off.” While that did happen eventually, during my first several months all I felt was regret. Am I selfish and entitled? How could I have quit my dream job? Who does that? I should have been stronger. It took me a long time to realize that I wasnt a “quitter” and I hadnt “given up.” Mental illness is not the same thing as fear or overwhelm. As much as I loved that job, I did what I needed to do. There is no shame in survival. I have learned a lot running my own business, but I think my moments of doubt have taught me more. 1. There is no such thing as a closed book. I was acting like leaving that job was the end of a chapter, but it wasn’t. I could always pick the book back up. If I really wanted to, I could wake up tomorrow and start applying to similar jobs again. That path wasnt destroyed, I was just choosing to take a different one right now. That path would still be there if I wanted to return. 2. Your career is not your identity. Being a coach is fulfilling and amazing, but it is just my job. People believe the answer to “what do you do for a living?” tells a story about who you are as a person. It is okay if it doesn’tâ€"it doesn’t make your career wrong. When I tell people I am a coach, they are always shocked. “Really? I couldnt see you doing that,” they say. When I tell them what I used to do, it is “Oh that makes so much sense!” Did changing jobs change who I was? Of course not. My job is not the only way I express my passionsâ€" for too many people it is. I didn’t lose a part of myself when I changed jobs, I just found other ways of expressing it. 3. You cant compare what is to what could have been. I used to imagine what my life would be like if I stayed at that job and, in my mind, it was perfect. I thought I would be making more money, able to afford a downpayment on a home, and my life would have a ton more consistency. Every time I felt upset about those things (like my tiny apartment), it was easy for regret to come back. But that world was imaginary. This was real! After starting my own business, my boyfriend got the opportunity to work on assignments overseas. If I still had that job, I wouldnt have gotten to go with him and we would have spent months apart. (I probably would have wound up quitting then anyway.) Instead, I got to travelâ€"how amazing is that! In life, everything has pros and cons. Stop expecting there to be an option that is only pros and learn to come to terms with the cons. Tornow is a life and career coach working with multipassionate creatives to build businesses and careers around their multipassionate tendencies  (i.e. totally geeky women who wish their jobs were just doing a plethora of projects).  Founder of  TornowandBing.com, Tornow helps women let go of the need to figure out their “one true purpose” and focuses on how to still be successful and committed as a multipotentialite living out their every passion. You can follow her adventures as a coach, writer, and creator on her blog and twitter page.