Guilt

I’ve been told that guilt is a useless emotion. I agree. It doesn’t accomplish anything. It doesn’t make you feel good, it doesn’t help you process anything. And yet, I still feel it. I feel guilty because I am leaving the current job I have been working for the last three weeks. At first I wasn’t very happy with it, it doesn’t really fit me well. I know I am adaptable and over the last three weeks the habit of this job has started to set in. But the job I have just been offered was one I wanted so badly and I know would be such a better fit for me. Not to mention the schedule would be nicer, 8:30am-5pm instead of my current 7am-5pm. The overtime money is nice, but it’s not worth the drive. I hate having to drive for an hour in traffic to get home and then only having three and a half hours of my evening time so that I can make sure to try to go to bed early enough to get enough sleep to wake up at 5:30am. It just sucks. Not to mention I’ve been terrible about going to bed at 9:30 so I’ve been tired. This job is only 20minutes away and it’s a private college and reminds me so much of my job at UNC. I think I will be much happier there. But there is still the issue of guilt of leaving my first job. I am only temporary right now, I was placed through a temp agency, but they had plans to hire me on permanently and I know they had big plans for me to help with payroll and HR and other things. I know people really like me here and have appreciated the work I have done. They are very nice here and very encouraging, I get a compliment a couple times a week about what a good job I’m doing, that only digs the wound deeper. Also, I am aware of the fact that they have had a hard time keeping anyone in this position, and the fact that I am leaving after only a month and to know they will have to start all over again tears me up.

But then on the other side, I start to feel like I’m being conceited or something. I’m sure they can find another replacement, probably someone who would stay longer and be happier here. I feel like I’m making myself out to be some great thing, but I am replaceable. So I don’t know. I guess the other thing to is that I have started to get to know a few people here and I have started to develop some coworker relationships, though not really, since this is such a corporate place. My job is very isolating, but there are a few people who come and talk to me a bit and have been just wonderful to me. I hate to think I’d never see them again. But I am always like that, I hate goodbyes, I hate thinking I will never see someone again, even if I have only known them a few weeks. But that is something I have had to deal with my entire life. I had to leave all my childhood friends, the city I grew up in, the school and teachers I loved, everything I knew, to be shipped out to New Mexico. That was traumatizing for me and I will never forget the pain of leaving all that and not understanding why. I think that is why I fear goodbyes, because that pain still haunts me and I am afraid every time I say goodbye more pain will come. But I’ve never experienced a pain like that again from a goodbye. My good friends stay in contact with me now and everyone else remains a fond memory but nothing more. I think I can be okay with everyone I work with being a fond memory. I just need to let go of the fear and guilt, move on, and know I am doing the best thing for me, and that is what is most important. I cannot sacrifice my happiness for a bunch of people I hardly know and who it most likely doesn’t even really matter to on the greater scale of things. I think I blow everything out of emotional proportion, but that’s just me! I wouldn’t change it for anything.

It will be hard to say goodbye, I know this, it always is. I don’t want to disappoint anyone. Hopefully they will understand, and if now, at least I know why I have chosen this and it won’t matter in a few weeks because I will be happy at a new place and enjoying what I have to do every day until I take my next big step in life.