I’m sure by now you’ve seen all the recent YouTube videos, TikToks, and Reddit anti-work posts full of people sharing stories about quitting their jobs, quiet quitting, leaving corporate America, great resignation, etc. Although it looks like it’s just a trend for more views and interaction, I’m here to say it’s real and that I’m one of those people. Here’s my story…
I’ve quit my job with no backup plan 3 times now, and I want to share my journey because I know there are a lot of people who can relate and may be where I was when I decided to quit.
I’ve quit 3 jobs so far in my post-college career. I was raised with a really strong work ethic, big “girl boss” energy, and just a big desire to succeed and do really well financially. I wasn’t against working or hustling to get where I needed to be. I’ve always held a job and often worked two jobs at once, so this should all make it sound even more bizarre that I quit with no backup plan.
So why did I do it? Well, corporate America broke me. It was a slow breakdown and I still realize more things to this day. When I initially left those companies, I left out of anger and frustration. But after going to therapy and doing some self-reflecting, I understand more about why I did it. Here are some of the things I realized lead me to leave these jobs:
The first thing was that I didn’t really know “myself” and struggled with my true identity. I constantly felt stuck between the self-image I found myself wanting to have vs what image I was being told works best in the field. I felt like I had to hide who I truly was. The code-switching. Limited hairstyles. Control of my image outside of work. To give some color, I spent the majority of my career in banking which is very conservative in nature. I was told by other people who looked like me that they learned very early on to hide aspects of themselves and be very conscious of the hairstyles they chose. This was very shocking to me, but I accepted and decided to assimilate anyway. But every morning while getting dressed or every so often when shopping for work attire, I felt like I was dressing an avatar or like I was putting on my acting gear for a role I’m filming. None of it felt authentic to me. I felt the same with dressing to go outside of my house in general because at any moment I could run into a potential client. And god forbid a potential client see’s me with my hair “unkept” and cleavage out. It felt like I needed to become a brand new person just to have a shot a succeeding in my career. Now, this may not seem too bad but constantly questioning my appearance and fighting against presenting myself the way I actually wanted was a huge stressor that I didn’t even realize I had for a very long time. I could talk about all the individual experiences I had with this, but that’ll have to be a post on it’s own.
The second thing I realized was these jobs didn’t align with my values (I didn’t even know what my values were at the time). During a recent therapy session, I finally learned what my values in the workplace are. Now I know they consist of flexibility, diversity, inclusion, ability to connect and bond with other people, no micromanaging, etc. As far as flexibility goes, some people work better with strict structure while others like myself work best with flexibility and autonomy. Some days I have the motivation to blow through 10 hours of work, while on others I have absolutely none. I don’t believe that we’re wired to perform at the exact same capacity every single day, especially as a woman where my hormone levels are quite literally very different week-to-week. The short few opportunities I’ve had where I could choose my working hours on a day-to-day basis and where my performance could fluctuate with no penalty were my happiest and most joyful. I realized other values like diversity and inclusion were very important for me as well. Whenever there were rooms full of diversity, I felt the most comfortable. When there were moments my opinion and expertise mattered, I felt my most fulfilled. I always just thought of these things as “nice-to-haves” but it was the lack of them that made my working experiences miserable.
The biggest reason I realized was that there were internal biases at every corner. There were quite a number of instances where someone assumed that I knew less with no evidence other than my appearance. I often could confirm this by the cognitive dissonance on their faces and small things throughout interactions with them. I have 100s of stories about this along with many recorded conversations and email chains that I needed to keep track of to later prove the biases. There was even a time when I turned in a work assignment that a coworker of mine worked on, but with my name. That same assignment was approved by my manager just a week prior when my coworker submitted it, but when I submitted it with my name it was completely ripped apart. Tons of mistakes were suddenly found when my name was shown on the front. This instance did two things for me. One, it proved to me that I do in fact perform just as well (or as bad) as everyone else, and two, that I will always be looked at with a deeper scope. This unfortunately taught me that because the scope is bigger for my work, I have to outperform everyone (including my manager that overlooked the mistakes initially) if I wanted to ever succeed. This is just one example out of MANY. Growing up, I was always told that because of who I am and how I look I will have to work 10 times harder, so this wasn’t anything too surprising. It just became very exhausting and hard on my mental health a lot earlier in my career than I thought it would.
I’m not writing this to say if you feel these things then you need to quit too. I felt the urge to share because I know someone somewhere is experiencing what I did but thinking they’re the only one. I’m sure these things are far more common than we realize. I was fortunate enough to leave these jobs because of the loved ones who were willing to support me each time. To those out there experiences these things with no ability to quit suddenly like I did, my prayers are with you. I do plan to write about everything I would have done differently if I could go back in time.
So I quit 3 times with no backup plan, will there be a fourth? What’s my plan currently right now? Do I regret anything? I can’t be so certain. All that I know for sure right now is that I plan to write my heart out. Writing is something I’ve been drawn to since I was a child, and for some reason I’m in a phase of radical self expression. My dream would be to have a creative career making content that feels genuine, but we will see what life has in store for me. Oh yeah also, I regret NOTHING. I did what was best for me and am getting the mental break I deserve.
Thank you for reading! Every view and interaction lights my world up in ways you couldn’t imagine. Be sure follow & subscribe to get future stories!
