I've decided I need to pick the grateful posts back up. I can't commit to a day. I may not even make it to this once a week. They probably won't always be in the same format either. These thoughts are always in mind even if they're not on "paper" here, but the act of putting them down in writing does my soul good. And with the end of the year quickly approaching, I feel it's best to end on a high note.

There seems to be a lot circling lately, like something big is coming. The universe seems to be preparing me for something. I have no idea what; I can't even point to exactly what I mean. Maybe it's just a feeling or an intuition. Maybe it's that I feel a need for a change. Something has to give sometime.

I'm tired of talking about and thinking about work. When I was young, I thought I'd make something big out of myself, that I'd become a magazine editor and create beautiful pages, or that I'd write awe-inspiring articles for some big newspaper. Life took such a toll on me, between my family's problems and the pressure I put on myself, that I gave up trying. I took the easy way out, the art history route, that required no more than me putting my nose in a book and visiting quiet, peaceful museums. The thought of it now lulls me into a peaceful state. I fought so hard for so much of my early life, fought for myself and for women and for animals, fought against people who'd rather I didn't exist, who'd rather continue to step on me and those I stood for on their way up, that eventually I did feel trampled and squashed. So I gave up and retreated into myself. I see it now, though at the time I thought I was just doing what was best for me. I guess it was what was best for me, but I feel like I also cheated myself out of what could have been an amazing, if trying and stressful, life.

The annoying part is that despite me running from positions of power, they somehow keep getting thrust upon me. This office looks to me for guidance now, and I feel no more suited to that than I would to swimming in the Olympics or figuring complex math equations. I'm out of place. I'm torn as well, because I feel cheated, like if I was going to be this stressed out, it could have at least been for something that I cared about, some cause or career that I wanted, rather than one I fell into unintentionally. And if a stressful yet worthy career was something I wanted to avoid, why can't I actually do that and find something peaceful that I can do?

It's not that I don't care about my work. I care about the people here and about making this work so we all succeed, so we can make enough money to do the fun things in life without worrying about paying bills, so that we can make a difference in the lives of our customers. But running a company is stressful, and our customers half the time are jerks. I keep coming back because of my coworkers, because I care about them. If it wasn't for them, I would have been gone a long time ago. I am grateful for them. I'm also grateful for the lessons this job has taught me, like management skills, communication skills (HR will do that, quick), patience, and even more empathy and understanding, though I thought I had no more room left for that.

I'm grateful for this trying and stressful year. It didn't kill me, so it must have made me stronger.