Stuck

The best way to describe my mental state of late can best be described in one work: "stuck." I feel stuck in my house. Stuck at my job. Stuck in bad habits. Stuck, stuck, stuck, stuck.

I realize, of course, that it is within my power to get unstuck. I'm just having some trouble figuring out how to do that, or what "unstuck" would even look like for me.

On the house front, we haven't found much in the way of real possibilities. Of course, it's still early in the game, but it's definitely been a bit frustrating to have all the momentum of finding a Realtor and getting together our financing and making the decision to make the leap and then just . . . waiting. We'll find the right house. I know we will. But until then, it's hard to stop endlessly daydreaming about home decorating and renovations, which is fun to think about but also a little frustrating when you can't actually do it.

On the job/career front, things are a bit more complicated. I have totally reached a state of inertia with my business planning. This is not good, but it is the truth, and I've been trying to figure out what is going on. I know that a big part of it is probably fear of failure--as I get closer to the actual point of launch, the point at which I actually need to take a real risk comes closer and closer, and I am sometimes lousy at risk-taking. I knew the fear of failure hurdle would probably be the biggest one for me to jump.

It's a little more than that, though. To be honest, while a lot of my initial excitement about the prospect of launching has slowly faded away (or been overshadowed by other feelings), so has the encouragement of a lot of family and friends, which I guess I was relying on more than I realized. People have stopped asking me much about my business plans, or at least asking me about it with any enthusiasm. I don't blame them, since I haven't talked much about it, but it has definitely fed my self-doubt. When I went home to Georgia, I sent an e-mail to my family and friends asking if they (or anyone they knew) had any organizing projects I could help them with for free to help build my portfolio. I got only one response, and zero takers. Perhaps people didn't need any help, or perhaps no one reads e-mail anymore, but it's hard to believe in what I'm doing if my family and friends aren't even interested in my services when I'm offering them up for free. Sigh. I know their lack of response wasn't necessarily a reflection on how they feel about my business, and I know that as an entrepreneur I can't rely on outside reinforcement all the time, but I was already feeling a little low about things, and that just seemed to push me deeper into the hole of self-doubt that I'm having trouble crawling out of.

So, yes. That is not good. I must get out of my self-doubt funk. This is, naturally, easier said than done.

On top of all that, my time at home made me finally acknowledge something I've known for a long time: I really need to find a new job. When I was answering the usual "How's your job going?" question while talking to family and friends, I could barely even answer it because I hate talking about my job that much. Two people told me, "You sound like you need to get out of there," and they are right. I've known that I needed to get out for a long time (pretty much since I started), but I've been trying to figure out this balance between my long-term and short-term needs. Long-term, I know that doing something like my business would make me happiest, but it's not something that will happen overnight. While I want to really make a career shift and not just a job change, I'm working at a job that in a lot of ways sucks the life out of me and chips away at my feelings of self-efficacy, which is counterproductive for a business launch. I'm definitely finding that trying to get my business going while working a job that gnaws away at pieces of me is not really working out so well.

I've been thinking for the last few weeks about looking for another job. I definitely need a change, and even though it's not the long-term change I'm hoping for, perhaps it will still be for the best. Unfortunately, though, it's probably going to mean a delay of my long-term plans: a job search consumes so much time and energy, and I will probably need some time to adjust to the changes of a new job before I'm ready to refocus my energy on the business again. There is, also, the possible implications on what a new job would mean for our home financing, as I'm not sure a loan officer would look favorably on a switch, so I could put our home buying in jeopardy. And to be honest, none of the jobs I've seen out there really excite me. The upside of knowing what I want to do long-term is that I know what I'd like to do. The downside is that anything that's not that doesn't feel worth doing. So I'm faced with wondering whether I find anything I can have at least some enthusiasm for, put in the energy to go for it, and then adjust to it all while not losing sight of my long-term goals, which will inevitably be put on hold.

And, so, this is where I'm at. And to be honest, it kind of sucks. I'm usually pretty good at putting a positive spin on things and maintaining my optimism, but tonight I just feel frustrated. And sad. And unsure. And stuck. And lonely in the midst of it all.