Karma before "D-day"

Posted on 2006/06/11 23:05:13 (June 2006).

[11th June 2006]

Maybe it's a little too much, I am sure that there will be more important days in my life, but tomorrow I will be resigning from my present company, a place where I worked for five years, that made me know a lot of interesting people and most importantly travel all around the world.

I feel strange tonight, mostly because I don't know how to convey the news to my boss. He's been the one who employed me, then he left to come back again, and I always feel a sort of moral debt towards him, after all he did picked me just on the sheer value of my CV as I didn't have any experience before.

I know that he will take it badly, that he will feel betrayed, and that it giving me a bit of pressure. I have spent the weekend hoping for Monday to come as soon as possible, it seems as if my life will be able to start only after tomorrow. It's a wierd feeling.
I didn't even tell my parents about it, I kind of hinted to the fact that I MIGHT go back to Florence, but until I am thorugh with the notice thing I don't feel as if I am about to start something new.
Still the whole idea of having to tell him makes me shiver a bit, probably because I know that I will hurt his feelings a lot, and in the end I am a nice person and I'd rather avoid to do something like that.

It's all about karma. If this thing happened 6 months ago, I would have probably gone at his face with my 56 teeth smile, telling something "I am leaving for good you fucko! Gnnaaaaaaaaaaa"... Now, after I ate so much shit to keep quiet and rebuild a good relationship, I don't know how to approach things.
Before I was totally unbalanced with the work environment (bad Karma), now I am at home again (neutral to good Karma), this is why I get the offer only now, so that I can eat my liver thinking that maybe the move might not be ideal anymore (under the work point of view). Life cannot have a better timing sometimes!

When in the past I had to make bold decisions I always went into the new enterprise (going to live in the UK or Japan, or coming up north to do a job that I didn't know anything about) completely not caring of the possible outcomes.
I mean, when I went to England my safety net was the fact that if everything went pear shaped at least "I will learn some English", or when I went to Japan "at least I can say I have been there once" even when I came up north, since the offer was so much better than what I had before I felt I had nothing to loose.

This time I feel a little different. As much discussed before in previous posts, a move to Florence is mostly for what we Economists call "Consumer Utility", i.e. that little something that makes it better to buy a certain service instead of another, but that cannot be accounted for, as it is a personal experience.
This is what is going to make the difference this time, but I cannot materialize it in front of me, so I am a bit more dubious and worried than before... Even this time if things go really bad... well at least I am at home, not much of a consolation but it's better than nothing I guess. Of course it's up to me to make it right.

I have willingly avoided any mention to Marta and the people that I will leave up here. It's a different story, like in the past, who managed to stay are the people that are really worth something to me, if something will fall behind it simply wasn't meant to be.

Last week was strange. I spent three days telling myself that accepting the offer was good. Then two days meaning to tell my boss but blatantly failing to make the first step.
In the meantime we have discussed with Marta our future until we got nauseated of doing it, and we started acting promptly to look for a new apartment and cancel the present one. I still have to start looking for mine in Prato or Florence, then pack and move everything... And then it will be JUST the beginning, I'll have to get down into this new thing, meeting new people, clients, products, problems and so on...

To use a euphemism, I am not at ease...

Ah, in some ways not an enviable situation... and in some ways, oddly, it is. There is something quite empowering about resigning, and to be honest it has been on my mind a lot recently, but for one reason or another I feel I can't or shouldn't. So strangely, despite all the difficulties it will involve, I do envy you, being on the cusp of a change, and being within sight of going back to the place where you really want to be.

When I resigned from my previous company, I just strolled into my manager's office and blurted it out, without any real emotion or build up or anything. My old boss is a really nice guy though, and that company was like a family in a way - they generally speaking wanted what was best for their employees, and if that meant a change of job then so be it.

Anyway, despite that atmosphere (or perhaps because of it) I was a bit nervous about going and telling my manager... So for me, as I say, the only way to do it was just blurt it out. I think I had already prewarned him a few months before that me leaving was on the cards. So I think I started by reminding him of that and said "well, sorry, today's the day". Or something like that.

Anyway once I'd got over the first difficult couple of sentences, the situation just carried itself along without me having to do anything. My boss was very understanding, and just let me know in a calm and friendly manner what the procedure was from there on.

The one thing that no-one can argue with is the fact that you're unhappy there - I'm sure your manager can bullshit you about how competitive your salary is, and how you might have great prospects for promotion "one day" (in reality you give me the impression there aren't any prospects for promotion, but this is the sort of vague carrot that management types usually dangle in front of you)... but the fact that you are unhappy is totally non-arguable. He can't say "Yes you are happy!". So for me that would be the core of the justification, that you've not been happy there for a long while, for the sake of the company you've given it your best shot, but ultimately things do not look like they can improve sufficiently, and so you're going to have to move on.

Anyway, I'm not sure if you'll actually get a chance to read this before the showdown, so maybe all of this will be in vein!

Still, good luck, and stick to your guns mate. Better things are on the horizon, but you can only get there if you go through all this crap first.

Posted by John at 2006/06/12 01:37:12.

Any news yet...?

Posted by John at 2006/06/12 10:38:03.

Not yet, I'll make an intermediate post to recap the maniac morning that I have had today...

First of all thanks for the comment, I managed to read it before showdown as you can see, and it really helped in calming a bit.

As for what you write it is true, this move it's not done in spite of this company but because I feel I need to move on. For once I am moving for "feelings" and not for "hard facts" (more money, better career), and this scares me a bit, but I hope I am taking the right decision.

I have left Florence when I was 18een, and since then I never managed to make up with "her", this time I am going back for that reason. I can only hope that I will manage to tackle all the obstacles and problems that I will encounter, and that my new company will not be a failure...

Posted by Lox at 2006/06/12 13:31:28.

I'm SO jealous of your eurrotip! Ithaca is actually not that bad if you go out there and try new things, like fishing and hiking and stuff. it's very very beautiful (although that may not apply to working in a lab) =)

Posted by Marie at 2012/12/06 21:25:37.

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