First I want to thank to all my friends who have taken the time to listen, provide ideas, suggestions, etc.

The last weeks has been all about evaluating my options, and the more I look at things the more options I see.

I have taken some steps - I bought and started doing the  Life Makeovers: 52 Practical & Inspiring Ways To Improve Your Life One Week At A Time and instead of doing it 1 week at a time I'm doing 1 week a day, this has been helpful, I also picked up I Could Do Anything If I Only Knew What It Was: How to Discover What You Really Want and How to Get It and this has been really helpful but I STILL HAVEN'T FIGURED OUT WHAT I REALLY WANT TO DO!  I have discovered what I don't want to do.

I HAVE TO MAKE SOME HARD DECISIONS IN THE NEXT FEW DAY!!!!

The good news is I have lots of options and all of them positive - it really just comes down to making the decision and doing it, what I am exploring right now is why is it so difficult for me to make this decision?

Is it because it is totally life altering? 
Is it because if I make the wrong one I'll have to start all over again?
Is it because my deadline for a decision has moved up to RIGHT NOW?
Is it just simply FEAR?

Part of me just wants to put all the options in a hat and pick one and rock and roll with it!

"You are not beaten until you admit it."

-- George Patton, general

        

I am at a milestone and need some advice. Here is the deal:

 

This is the first time in 19 years that I haven't had to make a decision based on what is best of my daughter.

 

• My daughter leaves for college August 13,

• I hate my job - they cut my entire staff, reduced my budget to nothing and quadrupled my goals (although I do love what I do when I actually get to do it) I am not wedded to my career – I just don’t know what else I want to do.

• The lease is up on my condo end of July.

 

 

My biggest fear is that I'm going to be like my mother and stay someplace I hate (El Paso) around people I can't stand, living in a house that was my mothers and still is full of all of her stuff even though she has been gone for 5+ years  and 75% of my stuff is still in boxes in the garage because I'm afraid and/or too apathetic to make a change.

 

I don't know what I want to be or where I want to be, I just know I'm not happy with where/what I am right now.

 

I do have options:

 

1.  My mom has offered me a house in El Paso – note previous (she hates El Paso)

2.  

1. I might be able to pick up some consulting jobs (work from home stuff)

2. I can take another job someplace else (I have sent my resume out and gotten a couple of nibbles but nothing firm)

3. I have no debt – I also don’t have a huge amount of savings

4. I don’t need a lot to survive – but I don’t want to starve either

    

   I need to come up with a plan, idea, or something and quick or it’s a real possibility I’ll be stuck for at least another year.

    

 

 

Any ideas, suggestions, advice etc would be appreciated.

        

My daughter graduated high school June 18th - my entire family came in for it.

It was a milestone in so many ways:

• My daughter finished high school and is off to college
• I am going to have an empty nest - the first time I have lived by myself since I was 22.....
• I saw my parents in the same room for the first time ever.
• First time my entire family has been together in one time and no one had died.
• I realized that I am the common denominator when it comes to work and unless I change - the way I'm treated is never going to change.

Its been an emotional roller coaster to say the least, and to top it off I came down with the worse flu ever on Sunday and I'm still down with hit hard.

I feel like I am at crossroads in my life - do I continue down this rut I have been on for the last few years so I could just survive? Do I jump off the cliff see what happens? 

What is off that cliff? What do I want to be there? What do I want to do?

I want to open a cupcakery, I don't know how to bake but its not like I can't figure it out, the question is where?
I want to become a hermit - live way from people closer to nature, but then how to I make that happen and where?

Do I throw myself into my work (which I enjoy) and hope for some kind of life out of it?

Do I go out and do all the things that I have been holding off doing waiting for this milestone? Paris? Spain? Austin?

Or am I going to live in fear or  am I that person that gets on a plane and moves to New Zealand just because I want to?

I know I don't want to be that person who continues doing the same things and hating it because its easier then changing......

So I guess I'm asking myself a lot lately - What am I going to do now?

        

I'm quoted in this DMNews issue from June 7th re: B2B Marketing http://www.dmnews.com/traditional-lead-gen-tactics-still-drive-sales/article/171687/

        

Have you ever thought about what would happen if you had to enter witness protection?

You have to change your whole life - you would have to give up your career/job and a lot of the things/people you love........

Could you walk away from your whole life?

        

You know how you see/hear/etc something that reminds you of someone who hurt u & u get that stabbing pain - when does that go away?


Sent on the Sprint® Now Network from my BlackBerry®

        

So I have been rolling around this in my head for awhile - I think it was a comment in the movie - Role Models

She's chubby she'll do more stuff.....

So do you think it has more to do with low self esteem, or is it that chubby girls aren't obsessing over their bodies and conforming what the media/fashion has decreed as "perfect" which by the way I think is hysterical since most of the people behind defining what is "perfect" are gay men - notice that most of the "perfect" models look like 12 yo boys (flat chested, no hips)?

I know I that I do anything because I'm insecure with who I am and feel that this is the only way I can get "attention" - but then I'm not "normal" either.

What do you think? Do you think?

        

        

Passive Aggressive (adj.) Of, relating to, or having a personality disorder characterized by habitual passive resistance to demands for adequate performance in occupational or social situations, as by procrastination, stubbornness, sullenness, and inefficiency.

Passive aggressive disorder may stem from a specific childhood stimulus (e.g., alcohol/drug addicted parents) in an environment where it was not safe to express frustration or anger. Families in which the honest expression of feelings is forbidden tend to teach children to repress and deny their feelings and to use other channels to express their frustration.

Children who sugarcoat their hostility do not grow beyond it. Never developing better coping strategies or skills sets for self-expression, they can become adults who, beneath the seductive veneer, harbor vindictive intent.^[4]

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I have been encountering a lot of people who employ passive aggressive actions, attitudes, etc in both my professional and personal life.


HEAR ME LOUD AND CLEAR: I AM OVER IT!

I am tired of excuses for poor behavoir - it happened either get over it or don't but stop blaming everything else for your decision to behave poorly - professionally or personally.

        

So I recently left a position and took a new one, I sent around a good-bye letter, from what I hear it got lots of attention (of the good kind) so I thought I would share.

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Subject: Happy Trails

Hi everyone –

As most of you know today is my last day at XXXXXXX and I couldn’t leave without imparting some of my personal brand of humor.

I have decided to become a professional pirate. It has always been a dream of mine to live the life of a swashbuckling corsair, beholden to none and master of all I survey. Once my crew of unabashed rogues is assembled, we shall take to the capacious expanse of the high seas to pursue fortune, fame, and hair-raising adventure.

Our path may not be filled with the porcine comforts and technological marvels that (company name) provides, but we shall nonetheless move forward to carve a name for ourselves in the annals of bold insurgency and death-defying derring-do. Once I have a keen blade at my hip and the Jolly Roger is flapping high above me, I believe I will find my true calling.

Please note that I am currently accepting applications for First Officer, if you are at all interested in applying. I will provide a full medical and dental plan, which will offer immediate coverage of all maladies other than scurvy and the occasional bout of rickets.

Seriously, I’ve got a great offer I simply couldn’t refuse. My time at XXXXXXX has been challenging and educational. I wish you all the best of luck.

Haiku
Leaving work
Send farewell message
Login has lapsed.

Happy trails to you, until we meet again.
Some trails are happy ones,
Others are blue.
It's the way you ride the trail that counts,
Here's a happy one for you.

~Dale Evans

I wish you all happy trails!
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FYI - I started my new gig yesterday! No rest for the wicked.