Moments of Introspection

I've been doing a lot of introspection lately, and I realized my priorities in life have changed. I would say for the better, yes. This might be a long and boring post, but I feel the need to get this off of my chest.

My priorities before were basically 1) Money 2) Myself and 3) Family. It used to be I was after a bigger salary so that I could provide not only for myself, but for my family. I was always gunning for a bigger paycheck, and sadly that left me in a "dangling carrot" scenario, as I liked to call it.

I did a lot of things that were suggested to me in my evals, not because I knew it would help me as a person, but because I thought it would help get me that bigger paycheck. I was bending over backwards (in my mind at least) doing things and changing stuff about myself that I wasn't totally willing to change and I think it made me lose touch of what was really important.

I blogged about this before, but I'm too lazy to look for that post. I was willing to risk my safety for a few hundred Philippine Pesos. Long story short, a big, bad storm was about to hit Metro Manila and I didn't want to under-time so I could go home safely. Until my mom convinced me to leave before usual work hours were over.

The funny thing was, after I left to go home that day most of the people in the office followed my lead.

I was so busy gunning for a bigger paycheck, and even ignoring my own personal safety, for a few Pesos. Was that right? No. Eventually I burned out. I got frustrated at work, and it led to me leaving my old job without a back-up plan. Basically I was jobless for a little over two months after that. Did I hit rock bottom? I don't think so. It did help me realize how skewed my priorities were.

Now my priorities are 1) Myself 2) Family and 3) Money. What changed? I realized the value of time and money. And I believe that taking my current job helped me realize that.

I have a smaller salary now compared to before, and because of that I have learned the value of money, and I have learned to appreciate it more.

I work six days a week now, and thanks to this I now value and appreciate time more than ever.

It's interesting that I had to have a change of careers to have a change of perspective. To be honest, I think it's also because of my new work environment that let to these changes. Yes I still have my faults, and they still manifest a lot. Overall, though, I have seen my changes. And I do feel that now, more than ever, I am prepared to handle whatever life throws at me.

Out.