regular readers will know about my crazy roller-coaster ride with employment in the last 12 months:
• getting a job as a kitchen hand in london after a PSFK conference by just walking in off the street. only to walk out by not turning up one day – stressed out and seriously ill.
• rejected from a job in a high-volume copy shop/print room after the third interview, because i wasn’t M—–t material. (ie, I wasn’t from either financial or legal fraternity aristocracy.)
• working over summer at the sydney myer music bowl and getting to see jon bon jovi, cypress hill and kanye west!
• landing a fab job at a craft and design organisation, doing what i love, then having it become something that i didn’t love anymore.
• giving up full-time employment to go back to uni, letting go of a ‘real’ salary in return for some ‘real’ time whilst getting a job in an international aid organisation, within the design and architecture fields.
• and the clincher for ‘oh my god, can my work life get any more operatic?’, i went looking for a bit of contract work, just to get a bit of money happening in between gigs. the lovely ms g at the recruitment agency rang me and told me about this short term thing which was right up my alley: arts, culture, environmental/social issues and advertising (ok, so i’m not quite a cliche, yet). i went along, thinking it would be just a nice place to spend some time, earn some money.
two weeks later, it’s a life-long love affair and we’re vowing to stay in touch. all of them were on my wavelength – we talked structure, the value of creative thinking when developing strategy, the importance of sticking to your principles and the art of staying true to who you are as a person and as a company (made up of people). bliss, i tell you, bliss!
that is the bit about life that i find absolutely amazing and gets me EVERY time – you find it when you’re not looking. in fact, hanging out with the kids at midnightsky* not only restored my faith in the gloriousness of life’s twists and turns, but restored my faith in the power of authenticity, self-belief and well-aimed business strategy. i have also learned a whole lot about value from these guys. namely that i undervalue myself ALL THE TIME! i knew this already, but this time i saw it with fresh eyes and saw, in practice, that when you value yourself highly and know thyself absolutely (both financially and emotionally), it is reciprocated.
i know, this sounds like something Agony Aunt would love, but it has been quite a profound experience and one that i think marks the passing of age, actually. i don’t know if i could have had this kind of experience 5 or 10 years ago (fortunately, or unfortunately).
perhaps this was just a long-winded story filed under ‘to thine own self be true‘.
* actually, for any of you strategy/planning peeps out there, the midnight sky crew are looking for team mates. go and talk to them, they’re amazing.