Job hunting

[thagandizzle]

So, up until the end of October, I had a job that I really liked. The hours were good, the work was pretty chill but interesting, and the people were lovably strange. But the company decided to move our office from Seattle to Spokane, which is extremely too far to commute. Also, I'm married and my partner had recently gotten a raise and a promotion, so it didn't make sense at all for us to pack up and move so that we could live on my more modest income in an unfamiliar city.

All this means that I've been on the hunt and, god, I just DO NOT WANT to deal with it. I know that I basically live my life at a small fraction of my potential. I'm pretty ok with that, though. I like being a big fish in a small pond and I'm too much of a perfectionist/anxious person to risk putting myself in situations where I might be able to make mistakes. But there is literally no way to effectively communicate that in a way that doesn't make me sound like a 500% Bad Person: "Yeah, I know that I'm overqualified for this menial job, but I just want to phone it in and still be the best employee you have. Is that cool?"

Ugh. But what I really want is my unemployment to get approved so that I can at least have a little bit of money. We can live ok but not comfortably on my partner's income, but it's a lot less tight when I have even a little bit of something coming in. I've thought once or twice of doing art commissions, but then I run into the "I'm not good enough" series of thoughts.

No one's going to pay me to read fanfiction all day, but it would be awfully nice if they did!

Comments

[sparkythegeek]

The older I get, that's more often how I feel about jobs too. 20 years ago, I was ready to take over the world. Now, I just want to get paid well enough and do as minimally straining as possible.

[rafiwinters]

Ooh, the concept of being paid to read fanfic... *clears throat and refocuses on the mundane*... Yeah, job hunting sucks. As does living on tight finances. We're there even though my wife has a good job. I'm on SSDI and I don't love having that as *my* only income, and I don't love being dependent on another person even though she is my wife.

[hlagol]

I tend to agree with you. Life is short and work is mostly just a thing that saps me of my energy in exchange for money. I do not understand people who are deeply passionate about climbing the corporate ladder and working 80 hours a week.

[mrs260]

Possible way to communicate your job goals -- you place emphasis on a good work-life balance, you liked the balance you had at your previous job, and you're looking for something that will let you maintain it?

(Note: my advice is not necessarily good.)

[zesty_pinto]

I don't miss job hunting. As someone who tempted for over a decade, it was annoying and aggravating half the time. At least you live in Seattle so there's always things there, but yeesh what a pain in the butt!

I think there probably could be someone making a job out of reading and reviewing fanfiction, but I don't know how I'd market that. Twitch or something? You'd need to have some sort of personality to really make it work, too.