I was fired on April 23rd.
It was a Thursday, the typical day that my boss, “Joane”, fired people. To be honest I felt it coming for months after Joane’s brow beating, passive aggressive hints that I would lose my job, and piss poor attempts to establish a fictitious work-friend relationship to soften the day that she would actually have to fire me.
When I was originally hired on at Student Mill University I was pulsating with excitement. Fresh out of graduate school with my degree in Education Administration I thought that I would be able to single handedly impact the lives of college freshmen. Fast forward to a couple of years after working at SMU my rose colored glasses had been removed. Actually life had snatched them off of my face. At that point I basically had a mini breakdown in the bathroom at least every 2-3 months. I would dream at night and hear phones ringing in my sleep. My job was beginning to haunt me. The environment, more so the interaction between staff and management, was simply toxic. Seriously that is the best way that I could describe it.
Everyday I came into work I felt as if I was suffocating and that Joane was tightening the belt strap around my neck more and more each day. What made it possible to get through my day to day tasks were my coworkers. While we all felt that 99.9% of upper management was composed of a team of nincompoops with about as much spice for life as two spoonfuls of mayo, those of us on the frontline still had flavor and pizzaz. It was the unique zest from the other team members that I would have to feed on to revive my optimism and positivity when Joane shoved her corporate mayo bull down my throat. Don’t get me wrong, I know that Joane’s position was totally business and never personal. At least thats what I tell myself so that I don’t loose all hope for humanity and place her in a category of emotionless corporate drones.
“You are being terminated effective immediately!” said Joane with a blank robotic stare. Have you ever walked the fine line of something hurting but yet it felt so good? Thats how I felt in that moment. Soon after the human resources representative began speaking I pretty much heard things in mumbles. You know like the infamous cartoon character Charlie Brown did when any adult would start to rattle off at the mouth. Then the blabbering stopped and I heard one clear question, “Do you have any questions for us at this time?”. I said “No I don’t have any questions at this time.” I then did something that I believe neither Joane nor the HR representative expected, I stood to my feet, I smiled, I extended my hand to shake their hands, and said “Thank you for the opportunity.” For the first time in 2 years I saw a genuine expression on Joane’s face. It was a look of shock. I’m unsure what exactly she thought I would say or do but I kept it classy and professional.
It wasn’t hard to pack up my desk and prepare for what some would call “the walk of shame” seeing that I had packed my personal things into a bag about 4 months before. Now I know you’re probably thinking, “How and why did she have her things packed up? Is she clairvoyant?” No no no. That was the result of Joane’s antagonizing tactics during our daily, weekly, and monthly reviews. She had beaten the hopeful education administrator spirit out of me. She had won and every day I worked in this dark fear wondering would that day be my last day. Or we can look at it on a grander more praise worthy scale, God was preparing me for a new transition.
The first day after being fired was surreal. There was no immanent cloud of misery hanging over my bed like there had been for the past few years. In front of me I saw a blank canvas of my life. I got up and went for a walk allowing my brain to just wonder. I took it all in. The trees. The concrete. The homeless guy picking his nose. Everything! Now the week after that I will admit I felt numb but soon after a sense of resentment set in for a few days. It was a self-righteous “How dare you fire me with my two degrees?” type of resentment.
It was then that I learned the hard way about following my own plans. Despite having put much time and effort into obtaining my two degrees that I was so proud of, when in reality me and my two degrees never belonged at SMU to begin with. I would’ve never been there if I had been obedient to what God’s plan was for me. He is recalibrating my life and getting me back on track. So my feelings of resentment towards SMU and Joane for not recognizing my awesomeness as a creative individual have dissolved. I was never meant to shine at Student Mill University and Joane was never meant to witness the sparkle of my talents. Thats not how my life story was written.
As cliche as it sounds after going to church that next Sunday I had a breakthrough. Pastor J spoke of God removing things from our lives that had only manifested because instead of following God’s tutelage, we had decided to move and operate under our own instruction. If you have read any of my previous blogs you know that for the past year I have slowly begun to see that God answered my pleading prayers for transition. He transitioned me out an insanely toxic relationship and now he had transitioned me out of the very job that was stained with corporate bile that chipped away at my self-esteem as an educated professional.
That feeling of having a blank canvas was dead on because God had given me my blank canvas again. Won’t He do it? Now I won’t fool you into thinking that not having a job right now doesn’t leave some worry in the back of my mind but I make it a common practice in moments of doubt to be thankful for deliverance and to know that God is guiding the next paint strokes on my life’s beautiful canvas.
-MonaLita