At 43, I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up (part 2)

Needless to say, neither of those jobs played out. The insurance thing said they was family first but they meant the insurance family, not mine. I wasn't looking for a full time job to begin with. I wanted something I could do part-time while staying at home with my 3 year old. So, I decided to jumped back on my computer and do what I do best. Writing. I started playing around with my website and revamped it. Made a couple of post for social media.  Which lead me into updating another site that I manage too. All the while thinking this is what I really enjoy doing. Being creative, capturing the imagination, engaging the reader's emotions with descriptive language.  

After many hours (more like several days), I have decided that I need to go back to school or  take a couple of business classes, maybe even some design classes or creative writing classes. In all reality I need a college degree. But in what? Which degree do you choose when you don't know what you want to be?  Well, at this rate I might graduate from college before Brooklyn does. 

"How can you tell her to get a college degree when you don't have one?" I know, I know. I should have kept my month shut before I had her. I set high expectations on the kind of parent I would be....when I thought I could not have kids. My inner voice constantly reminds me of all those predictions. But...I never thought I would have to be a 'grown-up' in that sense. 

At 43, I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up

 Okay, so I took a detour. At 43, I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up. I needed to stop and get focused. Since the beginning of the year, I started looking for a normal job because it seemed to me as if the business wasn't going as planned. I finally got  registered with the state and federal government. And I'm in the process of becoming a certified woman owned small business. Self certification is a drawn out process. I've learned so many new things through this journey that I didn't know before. But before I get into that, back to the job hunt. So I landed two jobs at once and got a little overwhelmed at first. Going from working for myself and staying at home with my little girl to working full time and studying to get my life insurance license in the evenings. Talk about stepping out of my comfort zone. The insurance job sounded like my dream job. The company said that family was first and they understood that I had a small child at home. I would be able to learn at my own pace and they would be there to support me all the way. It did start out that way. Then I got the phone call saying I got the job at a local, well know pine straw company as the Accounts payable position and I was overly excited. It was an 8am-5pm Monday - Friday job, less than 20 minutes from my house. My parents house is halfway between here and there, so I could drop my daughter off on the way to work and pick up her on the way home. The job required Quickbooks knowledge and I am Quickbooks Certified. I have been working with Quickbooks since the start of All-Tech Communications. Although I have never had a job other than working for myself, that had no job description. My first day I was shown my desk and was given my login information and that was it. There was policy or procedures. Now most AP jobs are pretty much the same. You pay the bills and track down any past due invoices. Pretty easy, right. Wrong! Not when you can't issue checks in Quickbooks, or pull bank statements, or even login to online bill pay accounts. Each day I was at work early (which says a lot because I am late to everything!) and I stayed late trying to figure out how I was supposed to do my job if I had no guidelines and didn't have the resources needed to complete the task at hand. Needless to say, I didn't go back after the first week. I will not listen to sideways comments nor will I listen to my supervisor degraded me to co-workers.

                                                                                                                         (to be continued)

Alice in Wonderland (Part 2)

While doing a little research on Alice In Wonderland, I came across Debra Smouse "When You’ve Fall Down the Rabbit Hole: 17 Ways to Climb Out." Seeing that I often use that reference, finding this article is right on track for me. You see, I can relate to this story, on so many different levels. Some days I am Alice chasing the rabbit and some days I am the white rabbit. As in, I am always running late and giving too much of myself to other people. I love hard, regardless of the type of love. Family, friends, significant other, and business associates. I know no separation between personal & professional life, just like the white rabbit. Which can lead me down a rabbit hole, triggering my own confusing views of reality. Today, I can thank Debra Smouse for showing me how to climb out before falling deeper. I love what I do and I love my crew. We tolerate a lot from each other, being that we spend a lot of time together. I am blessed to work with friends that I trust (I have to remind myself of this daily). Newc Solutions is more than just me, and Kelsie (who also lives with me). There are a lot of behind the scenes people involved, some that are my resources. They have their own businesses or work for themselves doing their own thing but I can call on them and they make solutions for whatever problem is at hand . Some people are more of a support team, listening to ideas or just allowing us to talk out loud. In reality, we all work together. A paycheck doesn't make you part of an organization or a company, it makes you an employee. Newc Solutions has no employees. We work a little differently. Our goal is to succeed at helping others be successful. We know what we are good at and we know what we can do so our approach on this business is like no other that we have done before. If it takes a village to raise a child, why wouldn't it take a village to be successful? Why not find out what each person brings to the table, then go from there. Insead of having one company that does it all, we have multiple small businesses that comes togerther to support each other. Maybe our view of success is different from the norm. Maybe past lifestyles or major events has caused each of us to reevaluate what is most important to us. And by coming together, using what we are each good at, and making our resources available to all those that are involved, we are able to build something bigger than any of us while not losing focus on what matters the most. This time around it isn't money or social status that defines success. Being able to both provide for and raise my daughter happily is plenty of success for me. Knowing I have a support team of business associates with the same views, means my village won't allow individual failure. This crew builds with each other. It takes all involved to be successful.  This is our twisted version of reality. This is our real-life Wonderland. Except, we save the emotional manipulation for our advertisements and marketing strategies. We use play-on-words to again your atte vntion, not to deceit our abilities. New problems require Newc Solutions! Give us a try and find out why   

Career (lack of)

It's May 1st. Starting month number 5, without a job. I have turned in over 200 resumes and applications, still nothing. Every time something looks promising, it doesn't come through. Now I'm not the one for pity-parties or poor-pitiful-me stories. I'm the kind of pick myself back up, brush it off and keep on rolling with it, something is bound to come through. Over 200 rejections. This is something I've never dealt with before and four months without a job, I'm lost on what to do next. The business isn't taking off and I know these things take time. But how much time do I have. I'm lucky enough that I live in a rental that was part of my previous employment. My best friend and I had an agreement that I wouldn't cost her anything to live here. The double-wide trailer should have been condemned before I started working on it to move in. I've done a lot to the place and still working on it. With me no longer being employed since her son took over and our employment contract came to an end, how long am I going to be able to stay where I am. I can't pay rent because I haven't found a job. I know I could go somewhere around here and get hired, don't get me wrong. I am not ready to put my little girl in daycare. This Friday she will be 2 years old. I'm not ready to be away from her 8-10 hours a day, to work full time only to cover the cost of daycare. There is no father, I am all she has. Me and my parents and I know my parents can't keep her that long either. Yes, I know how spoiled and selfish I sound. I guess that has been weighing on my mind the most. I'm gonna have to do something cause finding a job that I can work from home doesn't seem to be working out and it is stressing me out to the max. Not only feeling like a failure, I gotta be doing something wrong, and all the emotions that come with it but there is also the financial side of it. I am pretty good with money but when it's not coming in regularly it makes things really hard. By no means am I giving up, it's just a struggle that I'll deal with like all the rest. One of my best guy friends said something to me the other day that has stuck in my head and I kind of having a hard time wrapping my mind around. He said "Steph, your career is over for now". It can't be, I don't know how to separate my personal and professional life yet. I don't know how not to work and give my all, much less just not work at all. And what about Brooklyn?  As a single parent, do I really have to choose between raising my daughter or providing for her?