Facing the Evening Daemons

Why is it the demons of our minds only come out at night? I find myself this night unable to sleep simply because my mind won’t rest.  Thoughts keep spinning around and around in my mind which is forcing me to pick up my computer to write out what they are.  As with most nights my thoughts circle around my unknown future.  This is the first time in my life I don't know what is going to happen to me in the New Year.  I've been job searching over two months now and still I have been unable to find any form of employment or at least in my previous career field.  Even my attempt to find other drafting positions in other fields have proven fruitless, since either I don't have experience in those fields or lack the necessary knowledge or training to do them.  I have no hesitation in saying the first time my life I don't know what to do.

            My thoughts are filling with horrifying possibility that keeps me awake.  The possibility of not finding another job or forced to take another job outside my field of study just I have some form of limited benefits.  Even the idea that is impossibility to find a job in a different field is impossibility and I may force to go on welfare or to rely my parents the rest of my life for a place to live and to take care me as if I'm still a child.  Even the possibility of being forced out on the street has at one time or another has entered my mind.  These are the demons that I am facing right now, demons of unknown possibility and an unknown future.  Never before have I been so unsure of my future but then again never before have I been put in such a position where I have to consider my future such broad context.

            When I first finished college I never thought about not being able to find a job as a drafter just how long till I found one.  I'm so relieved when I found a job even before completing my program and in just a few days after the last final I began my career at my first real job.  A job that I originally thought I would stay at till I retired but as with many things in life that was not to be.  After years of working there the company underwent a merger with another company which resulted in changing the corporate culture that I originally introduce too.  No longer was I working a job where I was encouraged to learn and further develop myself into designer but forced into a simple AutoCAD technician role. A roll that is nothing more than a tracer, simply copying what the engineers draws on paper, reproducing them in CAD and never questioning or asking why they designed it the way they did.  That wasn't the reason I spend three years in the diploma program just to become a simple tracer.  I had a need to learn more and to do more with my life.

            That's the original reason I started to search for a new job and seek employment elsewhere, employment that I hope and thought would lead into a designer role and finally earning me my Certified Engineering Technologist designation that I so wanted.  As it so happens taking a new job, one that originally found me instead of me seeking it out, led to present position now, one of unemployment and confusion.  I took on a role but I knew that I didn't have all the qualifications for but promised training and mentorship to aid in my development into that role.  The training I received was miserably delivered and simply comprised of a training manual that was poorly put together and difficult to find the necessary information, one class at NAIT (which I had to sign up for myself) and a few training courses that were forcefully given to me because they were required by the human resources for all staff members.  I never received a mentorship that I was promised, the style of training I expected or all the safety training or gear that was needed to do the job, instead of providing what was promised I simply let go because I wasn't “fitting in.”

            Now my career has been set back more than five years and to a point where my previous education isn't worth much anymore.  The five years I did at my previous job doesn't qualify me as a designer or much of an AutoCAD operator.  I may have five years’ experience of using AutoCAD and Autodesk like platforms but that experience is just using them on their most basic level which is nowhere near the expertise that is wanted.  I may part of a bachelor under my belt but that only makes me overqualified for job I'm applying for.  Now I have to consider position pay me far less than I left my first job at which was below the average for my industry.  Because of that I am considering a career shift onto a different career path or once my EI runs out returning to school full-time to complete my present bachelor's.  I am even considering entering a new program whether it is the degree program for another diploma program after completing my first bachelors just to make myself more employable.

            I'm attending workshop that I hope will improve my resume and cover letters writing as well as my interviewing skill as an attempt to stay on my present career path.  Whether this will work or not is yet to be seen.  So far the only workshop I attended a showing that and to drastically revise my resume and how I've been doing my cover letters.  Something I plan to undertake during the so called “Christmas holidays.”  I hope after the holidays I'll have a presentable resume and cover letters to match that may be picked up by the human resources algorithms.  I have some hopes that I may fine new employment early in the New Year but somehow I think that is doubtful.  Already I'm thinking of possible alternatives I can follow if I fail in my job search. 

            Thinking about these alternatives may be one reason I’m up so late, one of the many demons that is haunting my mind.  What alternatives are there for me?  Is anything else I can do with my life?  At the age of 30s is there anything else I can follow that I could possibly hope to succeed in?  No wonder I can't sleep.  So many fears and so many thoughts spinning in my head with no end in sight.  All I can do is keep at what I've been doing.  Keep improving my resume, keep looking for new jobs, applying for what jobs I find and try to keep busy so these thoughts won’t haunt me at night.  For now what else is there for me to do?  I don’t know that answer to that question but I hope it comes to me soon so I can sleep soundly again.

Beginning the Process with a Plan

            For anything to begin there must be a starting point, my starting point will involve developing a plan which I can follow and carry out which should help me on my new journey towards being a more creative person.  Now I am already aware that this plan has to be a living document one that will be constantly changing based on how I'm developing in the position I find myself in.  Now in developing this plan I will have to consider the lessons I learned during my Leadership Development class.  A class that has been worthwhile to me because it made me realize that I have to start taking control my life instead of letting my life control me.

            To begin my plan I must have a series of goals in mind since I have multiple projects and skills that I want to develop. Some of my goals include learning Photoshop and Illustrator, getting back into photography and developing my photography skills, begin to world build my literary worlds, learn to draw as well as continuing in developing my own blog.   Now as anyone can see from all that my plan will have to be diverse to cover all these areas and in fact may involve multiple different plans for each one while keeping in mind that I must continue job hunting to find a new form of employment.             

            One of the items I have to keep in mind is the goal of finding a new job and what that may entail for me.  It may include making a slight career change for short period of time, or speeding up bachelor program to complete it sooner or even entering a new diploma program at NAIT after completing the bachelors.  My primary goal is to find a new job which I hope will be in my previous field but I have already come to the conclusion that I may have to change and may involve in taking a severe pay cut compare to what I previous was making at my first job.  I already know that I won't be making as much money as I did my last job unless somehow my old union gets me back old job back or some close to it.  To be truthful I'm not going to be holding my breath since that is unlikely, though I am hopeful.

            Now my plans will take some research to do everything that I want to accomplish.  One of the items that I will have to take a look into is how much longer till I complete my bachelor's at NAIT.  If it's under a year then I might have to consider getting a student loan and just completing it as rapidly as possible.  Once I get my education out-of-the-way then I can start considering other forms of employment since all have the educational background I may need.  I will have to speak with one of my instructors to discover which courses would suit me and my final educational objective.  I want to balance the project management branch and the sustainability branches available within my program since I believe these two branches will best server me once I regain employment.  It may involve taking one or two extra classes beyond what is required but I still believe it will be worthwhile to have as much underneath my belt as possible.  It may even help me finding a better job in the future.

            Another part of my plans will be to develop a routine which will allow me to continue improving my writing, my photography and allow me to develop some drawing ability.  No irony realize that once I have employment I will have to reset that schedule or routine to still allow me to do what I want but I believe its well worth it.  Getting into the habit of creating these blog is but one step in developing a writing routine.  I hope to get in the habit of at least creating one blog week and dedicate at least a few hours a week world building my literary projects.  First have to discover which part of the day would best suit me for writing for prolonged periods of time.  Now this will take some experimentation on my part, whether its getting up earlier or writing later into the evening.  I do believe it is possible since every other writer out there has been able to do it themselves and if they can I should be able to too.  It may even result in me needing to find a different location to do my work in such as coffee shops, writing at school, going to the local library or I hope discovering that I'm able to write at home.

My photography may be a little bit more difficult to progress since for some styles of photography I will need willing subjects take portrait shots of.  I hope one or two individuals can still fit in their wedding dress so I can begin practicing some wedding photography.  I already own several photography workshops’ books which I will allow me to explore different types of photography and give me something to start from I just have to find the time to do so.  I believe that I can persuade my sister-in-law or even some of my friends to pose for me if I want to practice portrait but I am not one hundred percent sure on that.  I may have to look into possibly getting some models to pose for me.  Now I'm little bit hesitant in using professional models since with my limited funds right now I can't afford to pay them all for their time.  I have heard some models a willing to pose in exchange for photos for their portfolio which is an alternative I will have to explore.

I also plan to take part in the photography challenges posted by my photography group as well as the different photography communities online.  Taking part of these challenges will I hope help improve my own creativity, develop skills and even possibly getting some productive feedback on what I am producing.  The Shutterbug group that I joined have monthly challenges which I will be taking part and  I know some online groups have weekly challenge but I don't believe I can keep up with those especially since I'm still learning how to edit my photos.  Developing my editing skills goes with my photography development which is something I have to keep in mind as I keep find project to work on.  I have already invested some money into some books to learn more about Lightroom and Photoshop and found online tutorials that should help improve my editing skill and understanding of the programs I am using.

I might discover the greatest challenge to my photography is not the photography but developing my skills and ability to edit my work.  Already found even small amount of editing as drastically improve the quality of the photos I have taken and that's my only scratching the surface of what these programs can do for me.  I might have to dedicate a piece of time were I'm only editing photos which may be boring at first but I have to keep in mind the results, which I hope will be better photos.  I think Lightroom will be the first program I invest time in since I have already been using it for some of photos and already seen some positive results from it.  I hope to continue to improve my skills using the program as well see what Photoshop can do for me down-the-line.

Now continue my development and understanding of the drafting platforms I have used in the past and may have to use the future is a whole another matter.  I already know that I have become rusty using AutoCAD and Civil 3-D, which fortunately I do have student copies of the programs so I can brush up on my skills.  I may have to talk to some my old instructors from my engineering design and drafting program to see if they can give me so I can improve my skills with.  I may even have to buy some workbook from the school bookshop to do this and look into buying more student programs to learn the different drafting programs out there such as Revit which is used in architectural drafting.  I have more positions open for architectural drafter than I have for civil or the standard AutoCAD drafter.  Even learning the basics of those programs may open doors to potential employment and will allow me to find a new job faster.

I've already downloaded several books on the basic AutoCAD programs I have which I hope to use to increase my skill level with but MicroStation on the other hand may be a little bit more difficult to develop.  The public library doesn't have as many books on MicroStation as they do for AutoCAD and I already have from my original program all that is available from them on MicroStation.  I may have to use alternatives such as YouTube or the Bentley forums to continue my development in MicroStation.  It may prove a little bit more difficult but it is one of the few choices I have open right now. I hope using the forums and hunting around on YouTube will be the only resource I’ll need but I what books are out there to help me even if I have to buy one or two of them.

The most difficult goal that I want to accomplish is not my writing or photography or even developing my drafting skills but learning how to draw artistically.  Drawing isn't like drafting or at least that's what I found so far, I may be able to draw buildings or other geometric shapes but animals’, flowers or even people still prove a challenge to me.  Luckily the library has assortment of books on learning how to draw from figure drawing to cartoon illustrations. The more difficult part of this goal will be the amount time I will have to dedicate to learning how to draw properly.  I will have to dedicate more time compared with any of the other goals.  To succeed at this one goal I will have to set up her daily routine where I dedicate several hours to simply drawing which for me might be a little bit difficult especially with my attention span as it is.  But I still believe this to be a worthwhile effort especially since I can transfer some of those skills to help develop sketches for photography projects or even design projects for drafting.  If I become good enough I may even start a web comic and possibly develop some revenue from it.

Now how I go about performing all this?  To be truthful I don't know, and just reading over what I wrote, I am feeling a little bit overwhelmed with everything I want to do.  Looking at it as a whole give it does give the impression as something too great to be carry out but if I break down each goal to the most simple I should be able to do everything.  Its about breaking down everything I want to do into the individual parts and then sorting how I want to go about doing it. Now how that is going to be done I don't know right now it will have to research or reflect more on this. I do believe the first step is writing down what I want to do and I hope what my angles which is the whole point of this blog post “beginning the process with the plan.”  I know I need a plan so I can call this all this in the first step in planning is discovering what I want out of it which I think I've just done.   So I hope in the next post or two I will be getting to developing a real plan to carry out everything or to the least the beginning of a plan.

I admit it might be madness want to do all this but right now madness is all I have.  While madness and, a lot of time on my hands I might as well be using it to do something besides hunting for a job and waiting for the next interview to come.  At least now I don't be so bored anymore or at least I hope so.

Beginning the Process of Self Evolution

            It's never easy start from scratch but that's position I'm in right now.  It seems that all my progression over the last few years has been for not.  Because of one simple choice and now find myself in a position where I have to take a job that pays well below than I was making before making the choice.  Just over six months ago I decide to leave one job for another, and it was easy for job that I originally applied for they in fact hunted me down and asked me to come for an interview.  I only went to the interview to get more interview experience and was shocked when they offered me the job, for the simple fact that I didn't have all the qualifications for the job they offered.  I even pointed this out to them on multiple occasions and only accepted the job because of the promise of mentorship and proper training.  The training ever came and I never received a mentor, the training game he was in the form of a manual that I had to memorize within a few months which is contrary to how I learned. It was also not what I originally agreed to when I took the job became to know shock when they finally terminated me.

            Now I've been unemployed for a month and a half and already bored to tears.  It isn't like I haven't been applying for jobs, in fact I've applied to more jobs in the last month and a half than I ever have in my entire life and at least been having one to three interviews a week with no luck.  I can't even begin to describe the frustration I am having, this is the longest time I've gone without employment including my three years of my original diploma.  Even when I took a week vacation I was still working since I had classes and course work to complete.  This is the longest time I've gone without anything to do besides my one class a week which I have to admit has been a godsend to me.  It wasn't for the class I would still be blaming myself for losing that job but now I find myself in a position where I can no longer around and wait for a new job, I need to be doing something.

            Now I will admit to everyone that I wasted the time on my hands.  I could've been working on the various creative projects I have on the go or indulging in the many hobbies I have but I haven't.  All I've been doing is my schoolwork, job hunting, writing cover letters, sending out applications and going to as many interviews as I can and only focusing on finding employment.  Now I'm not saying that's not important I do want a new job and I do need to find a new job but besides that I'm been wallowing in self-pity and is becoming more depressed which hasn't been helped me in the long run and in fact could be impeding me in some way that I am not even aware of. 

            I still plan to look for new job and in fact planned to dedicate at least three hours a day to job hunting but I will also be exploring alternatives.  I intend to get back to the gym which even though I've been paying the monthly fee for it I haven't been going, which has been only a waste of money. I need to get back to being active for all the progression I made in my weight loss journey will be for not.  I also want to get back to writing and not just these blog posts which I just now undertaking but on the back to create a right, my poetry and possibly working on the world building I have been putting off for many years.  I also want to get back to my photography in learning more about it, improving my skills and I hope one day getting to the point where a connection make some form of income from it.  I also have been meaning to teach myself how to draw again.  I remember a long-time ago, back in junior high that I was fairly good at and in fact enjoyed it and since I am a draft by trade I should be able to transfer that skill to a more creative area or at least I hope so.

            I'm also going to take this time to teach myself new skills and improve upon the skills are have. I should be taking this time to improve my drafting skills and my understanding of the programs I use such as AutoCAD and MicroStation and seeing where I can progress on my own initiative.  I also want to take this time to learn how to do Photoshop and work with illustrator as well as learn how to use Lightroom better, since it is the primary platform I use for editing my photos.  I even want to learn how to edit my photos and work better and this is time I can use to do that.

            I finally came to the realization that if I don't keep up on my skills and continue to learn it at least keep active somehow I will simply slide back to bad behaviors; bad behaviors that allowed me to become over 400 pounds, which made me a social outcast, and slipping back into old habits that will only hurt me in the long run.  I know all this will take much time but since I have the time I might as well use it to begin the process of becoming something more than I am now.  I might be without a job for now and have come to terms with the fact that I may be without a job for some time but it doesn't mean I have to waste that time or just use it to find a new job.  I can use that time to prove myself, to regain the creativity I lost, and expand on both my drafting skills, my understanding of the programs as well as the new skills and learning in school.

            Like the less I learned in leadership, a true leader has to take it upon themselves to continue learning no one else is responsible for.  I have to start taking responsibility for my own development and my continual development into who I want to be and not just who I am and what others think who I am.  Too long have I allowed my bad habits, negative behaviors, and other people's views on the to control how I see myself.  It's time that I redefine myself and see what I'm capable of doing.  I'm not saying I won't stumble on the way but any path in life starts with the first and I think putting this down to text is the first step in becoming something more, something greater than I am now.  I know I have the capacity and the ability within myself I just have to have more faith and take it on myself to prove that, not just to myself but to the world as well.

            Years to taking the first step in beginning the process of my own self evolution and hopefully transforming my life into something what I want to be and not just what it is.  As I have always said "time to embrace the madness for that is where true creativity and our future lies."  Time for me to embrace the madness and see what I can become form it.