The Thing About Advice And Self-Care

People will always tell you what to do based off of their own fears and hesitations.

I recently decided that I was going to quit my job. After almost two years of dealing with a constant feeling of negativity, I figured it reached its expiration date and it was time for me to move on. The only thing about it was that I didnt have a back up plan and still don’t.

Whenever people ask, “what do you plan on doing now,” and I tell them “nothing,” they look at me like I’m making the biggest mistake of my life. “You’re quitting your job without having secured another position?” Why yes, yes I am.

I’m 25 years old and always knew that working someone’s 9-5 wasn’t for me. Add in the fact that my job involves me dealing with people b*tching and complaining on a daily basis while I have to pretend that I can’t help them all for the betterment of the “business,” I knew that is was my time to bounce out of there. But the biggest thing that pushed me to want to leave was the fact that I started to notice how my creativity was lacking. I had a desire to create but I didn’t have the energy to and I couldn’t even think of any content because I was so drained. The only thing I wanted to do after work was walk into my apartment, throw the chain on the door, light some incense, turn on my music and drink a bottle (or two) of wine to push start a nap.

I would say that I’d been sitting on the thought of quitting for a while, but it was honestly a quick decision for me. I’d been going to therapy for a few weeks and learning the importance of making sure that I’m taking care of myself. If you’ve ever worked in an environment that was constantly full of negative energy, you’d know how emotionally and mentally draining it is. So I decided, after a lot of research and advice taking, that I was going to put in my two weeks notice and make my way out of there – for my sanity.

The thing about it is that while I was asking for advice from other people, I realized that those people were telling me what they’d do out of fear. I would constantly hear things like “don’t leave yet, stick around a bit until you find a back up job” or “you take this job too seriously and personal.” The thing is, even though I’m 25, my job is very important to me. I actually like working, but if I’m working somewhere that doesn’t benefit me then I know that that environment is not for me. What I realized was that people were telling me to do what they’d do out of fear.

I’d already put in my resignation letter but I still wanted to hear what advice other people had, just to see what they might’ve done differently. I’d always been the type of person to check reviews of something before I was sold on the product, so asking for advice was the norm for me. See what other people would do or are saying about their journey of quitting without having a backup plan and see if it applies to your life. After hearing so many different view points, I understood that nobody really knew where I was coming from.

This is where my problem with asking for advice comes from. We as individuals always feel the need to ask for advice, just to make sure that we aren’t making the wrong decision. But what I’ve come to realize is that we all have different experiences. Although they may be similar in situation in a sense, the amount of tolerance that we have for those situations vary from person to person and what they might be able to handle, you might feel like is too much for you.

The thing that got to me the most was people’s unsolicited advice. There were moments when I didn’t ask for anybody’s input because I honestly didn’t care anymore to hear what people thought about my decision, but they still felt the need to let me know that they felt like I was making the wrong decision. The thing about self-care and making sure that you’re mentally stable is that you’re doing what makes you happy. After I turned in my resignation letter, even without a backup plan, I felt like a ton of bricks were being lifted off my shoulders. I realized that the only thing that was holding me back from wanting to leave my job was the fear of being broke, but fear is something that needs to be conquered.

My desire to be happy and mentally healthy was stronger than my fear of being broke and it was more important for me to make sure that I didn’t exhaust myself at a job that couldn’t care less about my health and cared more about the amount of money they were bringing in. Continuously having to hear “but you get paid so much” instead of “take care of your mental health” was honestly one of the most draining things that I’ve ever had to deal with outside of dealing with the job itself. I could continue to go in there every day and complain for a whole eight hours while constantly either beating myself up or numbing myself just for a check, but what is that going to do for me? Then I realized something…

Why the hell am I taking advice from people who are miserable themselves?

But I’m not saying all advice is bad advice. There were a few (and I mean a small few) people that gave me great advice and understood how important it is for us as humans to make sure that we’re taking care of ourselves the way we should be. You can continue to work at a job that goes against your morals and be stressed out or stay in a relationship that’s not benefitting you in any capacity but what happens when you’ve reached a point of being burned out and your energy has been depleted? How are you going to be good for yourself and for anybody else if you’ve given everything that you had into one thing and didn’t keep anything for yourself? You can’t do anything if you’re dead.

Taking advice from people can be beneficial but ultimately it’s up to you to decide what path to go down and what’s more important to you depending on what you’re going through. People will always encourage you to do the things they’d do based off of fear and hesitation or what the smart decision would be, but nobody knows what the smart decision or the best decision is for you other than yourself. If you’re struggling to figure out an answer or struggling to decide what your next step will be, I suggest you trust your instincts and do what feels best for you.

After I turned in my resignation letter, I didn’t feel like I was making a bad decision and I still don’t feel like I made a bad decision. Being a mental person, someone who tends to think about every possible situation and outcome, I figured that it’d be better for me to leave and be happy versus staying and continue to think that’d I’d be able to handle something I’d failed to handle for the past two years. The great thing about this life change is that my creativity has sparked. My desire to create more has increased and I’m able to pull ideas and come up with amazing content. That’s all I wanted; to be able to create and be happy with the moves that I’m making in life, even if they don’t seem like the right moves to other people.

Self-Care is all about simply caring for self. It’s about making decisions based off of what is good for you and not what’s good for somebody else. It’s about making sure you’re doing what’s best for you, no matter what other people might think or what they’re fears might be. It’s about loving yourself immensely to know that you deserve to be the best version of you and to live the best possible life that you can. Other people’s fears are not yours and even if you are fearful, understand that fear is meant to be conquered and you’re stronger than you think you are. And truth be told, we only have one shot at life so why not make the most of it doing things that’ll make you light up inside?

Just call me Domyanla Vanzant from now on lol.