Sliding Doors moment ruined my life

PunkRoquefort

Reading this thread took me back to when I was about 20 to 30 years of age. 

I trained as a chef and got my first job as a junior chef, waiter and barman, earning very little, in a pub, where I stayed for 3 years. I then became a junior chef in the Civil Service, daytime work only, earning more, but not a huge amount. The local 'know-alls' in the pubs I drank in, none of whom were in catering were always telling me how I was wasted and should be a head/senior chef or management in a  swanky hotel or restaurant by that stage, earning far more.

I do have acute anxiety and have never handled stressful situations well, plus was already fed up with pub hours. 

Yes, many experienced chefs made far more than I, but with their roles probably came far more hours than my Civil Service job, more stress, less annual leave, no sick pay or final salary pension. 

At least I had an 8 hour day, straight shifts, good pension and a routine I could manage.

The cooking was not really high end stuff, but I coped and was supported during my periods of illness and taking time off work.

I would have probably run out of a hotel's kitchen screaming through not coping.

After 20 or so years, I needed a change from cooking, so found an NHS post where I retrained in mental health work.

I sadly had to retire early due to ill health, but love my retirement and do voluntary work.

No way would I have changed my cooking jobs or NHS job for a life in a hotel, no matter how much the pay would have been. 

It took me a while to learn, but comparing yourself to others is pointless, as only you know what is going on in your life and just because it looks like someone else is happier, healthier, more successful, it doesn't mean they are.

A duck on a river may look calm as you see it on a river or in a pond, but its legs may be moving like fury, which you cannot see. I remember being told that in my NHS training and how true it is!

MattMattMattUK

Mark_Glasses said:

@MattMattMattUK you will have heard of the company I failed to get a job at in 2006 and the holding company where I work now. I'm not going to name them for obvious reasons but what they both do couldn't be any more different. Lets say you want to be an accountant and have an interest in cars. You ideally want to become an accountant for a car manufacturer but when you start out you don't want to narrow your search that much so instead will take an accountant job in any industry. You become an accountant at a computer gaming company but have never played a computer game in your life. That doesn't matter in establishing yourself as an accountant and a lot of the skills you pick up can be applied at a car manufacturer too. However, you can only go so far without knowledge of the gaming industry and find it difficult to fit with with people who can't wait for some game you've never heard of to come out. You want to work at a car manufacturer where you already have an interest and can talk to colleagues about the latest Ferrari. That's what my situation is like.

That is what you are making your situation into, you seem desperate to make things as negative as possible. I work in marketing, I run my own company, I have little interest in the products or brands that I help promote, but I am good at it, just like your hypothetical accountant is good at accounts. I have built up a range of skills that benefit me, allow me to charge more, offer additional services and keep the business going, they may benefit me when I move onto something else, or they may not. I do my job, I earn money because of that, that allows me to do the things in life I actually want to do, afford my own home, socialise with friends and family, buy video games, go to concerts, eat. The job is a means to an end, just as it is for almost everyone, it is not the end in itself.

You can continue being incredibly negative and wallowing in self pity, or you can get help, you choose.

Marcon

MattMattMattUK said:

Mark_Glasses said:

@MattMattMattUK you will have heard of the company I failed to get a job at in 2006 and the holding company where I work now. I'm not going to name them for obvious reasons but what they both do couldn't be any more different. Lets say you want to be an accountant and have an interest in cars. You ideally want to become an accountant for a car manufacturer but when you start out you don't want to narrow your search that much so instead will take an accountant job in any industry. You become an accountant at a computer gaming company but have never played a computer game in your life. That doesn't matter in establishing yourself as an accountant and a lot of the skills you pick up can be applied at a car manufacturer too. However, you can only go so far without knowledge of the gaming industry and find it difficult to fit with with people who can't wait for some game you've never heard of to come out. You want to work at a car manufacturer where you already have an interest and can talk to colleagues about the latest Ferrari. That's what my situation is like.

That is what you are making your situation into, you seem desperate to make things as negative as possible. I work in marketing, I run my own company, I have little interest in the products or brands that I help promote, but I am good at it, just like your hypothetical accountant is good at accounts. I have built up a range of skills that benefit me, allow me to charge more, offer additional services and keep the business going, they may benefit me when I move onto something else, or they may not. I do my job, I earn money because of that, that allows me to do the things in life I actually want to do, afford my own home, socialise with friends and family, buy video games, go to concerts, eat. The job is a means to an end, just as it is for almost everyone, it is not the end in itself.

You can continue being incredibly negative and wallowing in self pity, or you can get help, you choose.

...especially as the negativity is entirely misplaced. Your thread is titled 'sliding doors moment ruined my life', but looked at objectively, many would envy someone who is:

• capable of loving and being loved to the point where they have taken the plunge and got married
• is securely on the housing ladder
• is in full time gainful employment
• is well educated
• doesn't appear to have any debts other than a mortgage
• doesn't appear to have any real heath problems (other than an overdose of being in a downward spiral)
• is still only in their 30s with plenty of time to 'improve' their 'ruined life'.

You have so much in your favour, but at present it doesn't feel like that to you, which is why so many of us have gently urged you to get some professional help. It's not changing your job and your salary that will work the magic; it's changing your attitude to what you've already got.

theoretica

I think you might benefit from really analysing your job and the realities of other jobs.  It is easy to think another job sounds great, but as a friend who worked in a chocolate factory pointed out the novelty very soon wears off!

• What are you good at?  How many jobs are there that use those skills? What other skills and experiences do they require and how can you get that - which may well not be through your job.
  
• What do you find satisfying in your current/past job?
• What do you feel is missing?  How can you find that not in your job?

You don't need to get everything in your job - to take your analogy of having an interest in cars and working in accountancy, can you find car related things to do in your free time?  Volunteer with something related to your interest?  Self employment on weekends?  Lots of my colleagues owe their current jobs at least in part to experience gained outside of work/formal study.

I also wonder how different you believe your life would be if that first graduate scheme had simply not been advertised so you never saw it?

Mark_Glasses

@PunkRoquefort I feel like I need that change

@MattMattMattUK OK I get that what you enjoy and what you're good at aren't always the same thing. The eye opener for me came from a former colleague at a former company. He'd been with the company for 11 years in the same job and had never been promoted. He then decided to leave and told me he didn't think he was very good at his job because he's never had any interest in it and his real ambition was to be an actuary. I realised that my situation wasn't too different. I'm good at the day to day work but have never been able to get my head round the business side of things. At the 2006 interview I speak of I was full of business ideas because that business interested me.

@marcon I'm not in my 30s. I see the information I've given on hear could make me as young as 39, but I'm not. I have been told that I should let my lack of career satisfaction get in the way of everything but then when I get asked why we're still in our little flat and don't have children it makes it difficult.

@theoretica I hadn't thought of it like that. One thing I did do at the time was start applying for the graduate scheme at PwC but abandoned it when I got the job interview for the job I wanted because PwC looked boring in comparison.