I forgot how discontent I am with my current employer (not with my team, they’re fabulous, but with the the people who exist outside our offices but within our building).
I forgot how excruciating it can be to get blindsided by the people who are supposed to be working with you. (This is from the “with colleagues like these, who needs enemies?” workplace.)
I forgot how draining a stressed day can be, how working against the current can take all the joy out of the work itself, how trying to be logical in an illogical situation only leads to headaches.
I forgot that the easiest way to jinx yourself is to think, even for a moment, that you have a project wrapped up.
I forgot that getting pissed off and not being able to show it, even with a flicker of emotion, takes attention and practice and talent and energy.
You have to understand, after the pain was under control, I was basically on a week-long vacation where the only thing I was allowed to do was rest. I read, I thought, I made lists and and I rested. I have never taken that much idle time to myself, ever.
I came back to work very relaxed. I came back to work on very powerful drugs. I came back to work without my guard up.
But in that first week back, before I was forced to remember those negative things I forgot, I remembered other things. I remembered how much fun it is to do the work. I remembered the absolute joy of being proved right when everyone had expressed doubts. I remembered the high of seeing a great return on a communications plan I had created and implemented myself.
I remembered why my work is important to the people who count on my being effective and efficient.
I remembered why I enjoy my field of expertise. And the fact that it is growing and changing and adapting to new technologies and demographics and trends only makes it that much more fun.
I remembered that the exchange of ideas on how to get my job done, on how to communicate and how to promote and how to reach the customer, that there is beauty in the process itself.
In the time when I wasn’t being distracted by office politics and personnel roadblocks and the tyrant queen of my building, I remembered why I’m actually still doing that for which I trained, which I thought I would do, which I knew I would do… and I’m glad.
So, if it’s not the work, and it obviously isn’t, then it’s the workplace. I am happy to work within my current team, but they are a very small part of what makes my work environment. They are a very small part of what makes my workday. At some point I am going to have to decide if the team, the work, makes up for the rest.
In the meantime, I am going to start updating my resume and look at getting accredited. I hadn’t considered it previously, but one of the many many things that dinged through my brain while I was “resting” is that next year I celebrate 10 years of doing PR profesionally — isn’t it time I sought accreditation?
Some of the things I’ve had to remember I wish I didn’t. And some of them I’m glad I did.
So speaks the PR professional.
