Rat Race

I started working again for the first time this week after a break for more than a year. Imagine your first day back at work after a long holiday then quadruple the feeling. Multiply the disorientation, given that this is the first time for me to work in this country and in a position that I am - so - not - used to.

This is day three of my renewed working life and already, I hate it. 

Everything feels alien and unwelcoming and the only plus point to the whole thing is that I am earning money again.

I sit on the train in the middle of the morning or late afternoon commute, thinking. What am I doing with my life? What was I thinking changing careers at this point in my life? Where is all this going? Will I get to where I want to be? Is all this worth it or will I suddenly find myself venturing towards the forties having done nothing but gone around in circles. I look at the people around me and see them accustomed to a life of wasting precious minutes away on the train. A lady was reading on her iPad today. Others just hold a book, newspaper or just listen on their various devices. I turn back into oblivion and sink deeper into my thoughts. I have now officially become a part of the rat race. But what for?

I have gathered degrees and certificates but that is all I seem to have done. I had a dream. It is slowly becoming invisible with age. It was to make a difference and distinguish myself. It was to sit on the edge of the nouveau and innovate. Work with the trend setters in industry and relish the feeling of success. Be a part of change until you become the change that makes people's lives better. Makes society better. Make life better. That was my dream. To breath a bit of life and touch people's lives. I am no where near my dream, or so it seems.

I have a little tip for those who do not want to end up in the rat race. Choose your career wisely. Choose something you love so much that you just cannot imagine doing anything else, ever. And if you just have not found that sort of passion yet, do not let yourself be socially conditioned into taking the easy way out by joining the rat race. It is so easy to get drawn into it because opportunities in it are all so readily available.

My job is a temporary position. Perhaps that is a good thing. It is certainly giving me a taste of what is to come. I realise that the most important thing I can do now is to keep the faith and grasp hope, not letting go of my dream. It will come true. I just have to be that more patient and a lot more resourceful to get where I want  to. Maybe some day I will touch people's lives.