Should I Stay or Should I Go? (Making The Decision To Leave Your Job)
“Where have you been?” the man with the glasses asked me. “All over the place,“ I thought, “On a journey of self-discovery”, “In the land of confusion”, “To hell and back”, “Searching for myself”. He looked at me, I looked at him. It was almost midnight. There was a queue forming behind me, men anxious to be reunited with their golf bags, women with their children. He wasn’t asking me a philosophical question. “Faro,” I replied. He glanced at the arrivals board, slid my passport back to me. “On you go,” he said.
I have been all over the place during the last nine months - mentally, physically, spiritually, emotionally. I have written endlessly about it. I’ve shared my no-holds-barred rollercoaster of ups and downs with the world. When I left academia behind and started a career break on 1 August 2021, I had no idea where I would end up. “Not all those who wander are lost,”¹ I kept reminding myself. But there were times when I felt so disorientated, so ashamed of what I had invested my best years in, what I had allowed myself to be defined by, that I let days descend into nothingness. Not only did I have to live with my own discomfort of not knowing where I was going but I also had to live with everyone else’s. I was an anomaly. I was asked continually about my plans. I was expected to have them. My mother simply pretended it wasn’t happening. “Are you working today?” she’d ask. If your life has been mapped out for you for over four decades - school, university, job, marriage, children, career, if you have always conformed, if you have always accepted all the tick-boxes that supposedly add up to a successful life, it’s completely counter-cultural to step away and meander aimlessly along an untrodden path. One of the greatest lies we are ever told is that you can’t leave somewhere unless you have somewhere else to go. “You’re in the wilderness then and that’s a dangerous place,” someone told me.
The highs of September and October when I was so excited about following all my hopes and dreams suddenly descended into the incredible lows of November and December. I questioned what I had to show for my first 100 days. I was a disaster at trying to start a business. I reckoned I was having multiple identity crises. My inbox was empty, I put the laptop away. Fair play to my husband who coped solidly and admirably with me regularly sitting opposite him just staring hopelessly at him. He let me languish and continued his Teams calls. I started to listen to Abba’s I Still Have Faith in You² on repeat. I imagined I was singing it to myself. “We do have it in us. New spirit has arrived. Passion and courage is everything”. I had to believe in myself.
I was conscious of time ticking away. In January and February, I emerged with renewed purpose, something shifted. I began to unpick the idols that were holding me back - identity, busyness, validation, comparison. I committed to letting them go. I tackled the taboo of not earning my own money. I still didn’t know what I was going to do but at least I felt a sense of forward movement. As March arrived, I was aware that I had to make a decision…. soon. I was in a holding position, this career break lark wasn’t a forever indulgence. I had a contractual three-month notice period. I had to inform my employer of my intentions. Should I stay or should I go? Should I return to my job or should I leave my job? It was a stark right or left turn. How would I know which was the correct decision to make? Could I create two columns, list the advantages and disadvantages of each? There was also a third choice - I could choose ‘not yet’. I could extend the career break for another year. It felt like the worst choice. It was indecision. It was a failure to commit. It was postponing the inevitable. In the end, there were no lists. I did what I do best. I wrote about how the relationship with my job was over, how we’d fallen out of love, how the pay-offs were no longer enough to keep me there. “You don’t bring me flowers anymore,” I said³. A trial separation had indeed established that we were ready to divorce. I’d deinstitutionalised, deconditioned, I’d gone too far into the future to go back into the past. As the clocks went forward and we walked our dog, one sunny Sunday afternoon, I said to my husband, “I’m going to resign”. “I know,” he replied.
I realised I didn’t actually want to know where I was going anymore. The joy was in the ‘not knowing’. I’d never been happier. My husband could see that long before I could. I’d learned to trust myself, to face all those fears of rejection, invisibility and vulnerability, to wave goodbye to those idols, to sit in the discomfort long enough to become comfortable with it. I didn’t need to know what I wanted to do, I just needed to be totally sure about what I didn’t want to do. There was so much I didn’t want to give up. I’d found a psychological richness that drove me. I loved the variety of my weeks, the control over my own diary, the opportunities to maintain existing and form new connections, the sense of wellbeing, the freedom to focus on my strength and fitness. I couldn’t attend interminable Zoom meetings, I was too busy trying to find my core.
As March drew to a close, I sent an email. I said I was 99.9% sure I was going to resign. I was testing the water, could I really say it out loud? I explained that I didn’t want to be managed anymore. The recipient completely understood my rationale for leaving. He probably reckoned it was best for me and for the organisation. We’re all familiar with those lyrics - “If I go there will be trouble, if I stay it will be double”! I had started the ball rolling.
On Monday 25 April 2022, I submitted my resignation. I brought most of my working life to date to a close just like that. I handed back my title and status. It was official. As I pressed send, I still hoped I had made the right decision. There was no euphoria, I was surprised at how sad I felt. I was aware there were still the formalities of the breaking-up process to go through⁴.
As I wrote this piece, something struck me. This isn’t just a story about making the decision to leave a job. It is also a love story. I did not make this journey over the last nine months alone. A safe space was created for me to experiment, to explore, to grow, to flourish, to have my hand held both physically and metaphorically through every wobble. I could have done none of this without the support of a partner who has encouraged and enabled me every step of the way, who freed me to make my own choices. He has only ever said to me, “on you go”.
[1] From the poem ‘All That Is Gold Does Not Glitter’ in The Lord of the Rings.
[2] Great song, have a listen!
[3] https://dj-sloan.medium.com/you-dont-bring-me-flowers-is-it-time-to-leave-your-job-58516c4cfb12
[4] I’ll be writing more on this in my next piece ‘Breaking Up Is Hard To Do’.
