Dream Jobs

Are you doing what you want to be doing for the rest of your life right now? If you answer yes to this question and are currently in your dream job, I commend you and say congratulations!! You're a step ahead of a lot of people, including me. I know some people might think I want to be working in the office at C&C forever since I tried so hard to get back here, and was thrilled beyond belief to not have to clean another ice cream machine, but that's not really true. I technically wanted to be back working in the office at C&C the minute I quit. Both times to be exact.

 {long story, but yes, they've graciously hired me at the shop three different times. i keep telling them if i quit and they hire me again, they're all insane.} 

Part of me thinks that I just wanted something other than what I was doing at that moment so much, that I couldn't see what I really wanted to do. I'd much rather be here than out in the 100 degree heat of Georgia summer stocking vending machines, but this isn't where I want to be in 5 years, either. I haven't actually nailed down many details about my dream job quite yet, but i do know what I want to do. As vulnerable as it makes me feel, I'm going to share that with all of you. Marketing, Advertising, and Social Media all combined somehow is exactly what I want to do. 

On some level, I get to do those things here at C&C, but it's not in any way my main job.

My boss hired me back full time under the circumstances that I keep up with the Facebook pages, learn about the website, and help with things like that on top of doing all of the clerical work in the office. I was ecstatic! You're going to pay me to Facebook and tweet?! Heck to the yeah!  Then, a month or so into it, he asked if I would be willing to help him with the radio show. 

(we have an automotive show that airs on the local talk radio station on saturday mornings.) 

To start, he asked me to help him write commercials each week. 

(we have about 10 businesses that sponsor the show, so we write a short commercial for each one.) 

After he saw that I was doing well with the commercials, he added a few other radio show tasks to my to-do list, like the Auto Song Trivia. Basically, I pick a song each week and they play a clip of it during the show and give listeners a chance to call in and guess the song. (each song has to have something about a specific vehicle in it.) On top of that, I recently started learning how to update, edit and manage our website! 

Those are the parts of my job that I absolutely LOVE! Everything else I do, which is filing, paper work, taking payments, answering phones, getting credits for returned parts, and so forth, is just busy work. It makes me feel like I'm back in school again and there's a substitute teacher for the day. Overall, I really do love where I work, and I'm not complaining about it one bit! I have hilarious co-workers, everyone is easy going for the most part and I'm so very thankful that I have to opportunity to incorporate my dream job into my day job.  I need to practice and I need the experience, and I couldn't think of a better place to do that. 

I just finished reading Jon Acuff's book Quitter. (his blog, stuff christians like, is most popular. and it is perfection.) If you aren't in your dream job, I encourage you to read it right away. It's one of the best books I've read recently, I could hardly put it down! I read during my lunch break, at night, at the doctor office, anywhere I had a few free minutes. When I was out of lives on Candy Crush, that is. Priorities, people. It's so encouraging first, to know that other people are in the same boat as you, and then to hear a success story about someone quitting their day job to pursue their dream job. 

At first, you might think Quitter is about quitting your day job and start your dream job, but in fact, it's quite the opposite. When I was reading through the book, I highlighted lots of things that really stuck out to me. I don't want to spoil the book if you plan to read it, but, I do, however, want to hit a few of those phrases I highlighted. 

"Anyone can dream; it's the doing that is such a hassle." 

"...each dream comes wrapped in some degree of risk. If it doesn't, it's not really a dream."

"90% perfect and shared with the world always changes more lives than 100% perfect and stuck in your head." 

"If we rush it[a dream], if we don't give it time to incubate, we usually end up killing it before it even has a chance to breathe." 

"If you're patient and deliberate, your day job can become a wonderful platform from which you can launch your dream job." 

"Your employer didn't hire you to pursue your dream on work time." 

"A plan is not the first thing you need. Often, it is the third. The first thing you need is a passion." 

"Hustle isn't just doing the things you love all the time. Hustle is doing the things you don't enjoy sometimes to earn the right to do the things you love." 

These are just a few of my favorites. The part I had the hardest time with is stealing from work. Hit me square in the face. Not to say I was working on my dream job, but I would spend time writing blogs, browsing my own Facebook feed, or playing Candy Crush while I let the stack of invoices to file sit for days. I felt like one of his main points in the book is to fall in like with a job you don't love. And you can't be successful at your dream job, if you're loafing on your day job. I love that! I'm not changed yet, but I'm working on it. I'm trying my best to use my time more wisely for the company I work for, and for me.

 I'm planning to read Jon Acuff's book Start next. "It will teach you how to punch fear in the face, escape average, and do work that matters." 

The Start conference is in a few weeks in Nashville and I am dying to go! (Sept 13-14)  But, I don't want to go by myself and it's cheaper if you sign up with more people. Anyone want to go? 

I'm anxious and excited to read Start and about going more in depth with my dream job! 

Happy Tuesday! 

XoXo

-AK