You know life is super weird. Some of you know I moved out of NYC and got a marketing job. Like, by choice. I gave up self-employed life to work in an office and build a marketing department from scratch. For a year and a half, it was pure bliss…I was able to do something I’d been doing for myself, except this time I was getting paid regularly AND benefits AND paid holidays. LIKE AN ADULT.
Then came May of this year, and I got laid off from a job I loved. Not only laid off, but threatened, ostracized, and blamed. I was given a months notice, which was nice of them in some weird way, but it made me a ghost. It was a long month, having to go there and know I was a dead woman walking. No one wanted to catch the laid-off disease from me, and the closer it got, the worse management treated me. Finally, I crawled out of that dumpster fire on April 30th and started my re-self-employed life. I had my own Summer of George.
Late July, I landed back in a job because it intrigued me. It was sold as another chance to help build a marketing department from scratch. Long story short, it was SOLD as a marketing job, but it was one of those jobs where it’s “marketing” as in…you’re a woman and you should do admin assistant work, and maybe look for something to tweet out once a day.
Let me put my PC disclaimer here: there is absolutely nothing wrong with being an Administrative Assitant. It’s a ridiculously complex skill set and takes a certain type of person to do that job well. I am not one of those people. I am a nerdy creative who has enough “executive” (weird) experience that I don’t know how to do any of that sort of thing. It’s like that “fish on a bike” quote from Einstein, you know? I sucked, the work sucked, and I wondered why I bothered going in there every day (answer: healthcare). I lasted two months then semi-rage quit (but for a new opportunity that actually IS running a marketing department)
That’s a stupidly long-winded backstory to say: during that time, I spent most of it making back up plans. My time at that last job was spent either A: looking for jobs or B: planning my launch into becoming full-time self-employed again by January 2020. Why then? I don’t know honestly, it just felt sort of “adulty” to plan that far out, save some money, get my 401k match, etc etc.
One of the “tasks” I made in Todoist was to find 10 different conferences to pitch a speaking gig to. It was one of those “wouldn’t it be cool” kinda things, but wasn’t really something I felt like I would achieve, you know? Then about 2 months after making that goal, I got an email from Alt. saying they just announced their call for speakers. My first thought was “ugh, they’d never pick me, why bother?” but that GD goal I wrote down…I mean, it was written. down. Why would I pass up this specific opportunity for this specific goal? WTF else was I going to wait for?
So I pitched, then honestly, just figured they’d reject it. I had no street cred, I wasn’t a huge ginormous influencer. I was just someone with questionable hair choices who lived marketing and nerded out about it way too often. I wasn’t ~special~
Then this email came:
So yeah, holy shit, right? If you’re ending up at Alt., you might see me running a workshop called Stop Sucking at Marketing. And if you come and give me a high five…that would be the best.
I don’t have any sage-like advice to give you for this post except that, you know, just take a breath and go for it, whatever it is. New job, weird-ass goal you didn’t think you were serious about, new life, new outfit, whatever. Because it’s incredibly woo-woo-cliche but it’s sorta true when they say the world wants to give you things you ask for…just fucking ask for them.
And, duh, if you want to come to Alt. I’ve got discounts! $50 off with the code: LIVELY
See you there? High five.
