When the best thing to be is a little bit selfish

116 Days until TASTE TEST meets the world!

 

Everyone makes choices – it’s a part of life. When you’re lucky, those choices guide you into greatness. Pick the right college or the right major and you can have a career you love. Pick the right guy/girl to go out with and you can fall in love for life. Sometimes the choices we make are based on what we think is right or just or necessary.

 

And sometimes, the choices you make are selfish.

 

I made a selfish choice today. Not a bad choice. In my mind, it’s probably the best choice I’ve made in a long time. But it’s a choice that has a lot of openendedness to it — the future is extremely unclear. Today, I told my principal that I wouldn’t be coming back next year. As of June 19th, I will no longer be a high school teacher.

 

There are things about ourselves that are identifiers. For me, writer and mother are the top two. Wife is up there. Certainly daughter and sister. Then, considering my love of food, there’s baker/chef. And then there’s teacher – pretty far down that list considering it’s been my career for a decade.

 

So, that was clue number one — when I realized that teaching wasn’t an intregal part of my self-makeup. But there were other signs. My stress. My unhappiness. My attitude (shitty) and my anxiety (high). There was literally only one reason I was staying for the job, and that’s money. That’s it. While I love my teacher friends, I will still see them after I leave. While I care about my students, they aren’t a reason to commit my life to a cause I don’t want to be a part of. No, I was staying for the salary and the benefits. I was too afraid to imagine what life would be like without that twice monthly paycheck.

 

I’m not sure when that changed, but it did. One thing that did sort of knock me around for a few weeks was the fact that I wouldn’t be there to see my little boy get on the school bus for the first time for Kindergarten…because I’d be at my own school, teaching. That was a gut wrenching prospect. But there were other things – I parted ways with my literary agent and found a new one, I have a manuscript in the works that I really love, I’ve got proof edits for TASTE TEST and the draft for JUST LIKE THE MOVIES. I’m legitimately working two full time jobs. My husband, my son, and my body’s apparent weigh gain are the biggest losers in this scenario. Every evening and weekend, I’m at home writing. When I do make an exception and go for a hike or something, I end up feeling guilty for it.

 

Something had to give. So, first, stable income started feeling less important. Then, I realized that, if money were no object, I’d have left teaching already. And I wouldn’t have looked back.

 

I will miss my friends. I’ll miss interacting with the kids — that’s what I’ll miss most. But I won’t miss teaching. While I am a great teacher when I am on my game, I’m not on my game very often any more. I have to save that for the keyboard and for the page. Worst of all, I was starting to resent them – the kids, I mean — for taking me away from what I really want to do. And that’s what finally broke me.

 

I have this saying taped up around my house and at school that says, “That which you desire, which is in line with spirit, is on its way…no worries.” I’m a huge believer in the law of attraction – one of the tenets states that, if you feel good and happy and like you could do what you’re doing all day long, then that is what you are supposed to be doing. That its in line with the universe’s plan for you.

 

Since I decided I was leaving teaching, I’ve never been this happy. Well, at least not in years. I feel like I can breathe. I feel like a weight has been lifted. I feel sane. I am writing with prolific speed. My happiness is pure and true.

 

I don’t want you to misunderstand the intention of my choice — I’m putting it right out there, that it was a fairly selfish move. My husband works hard and is a great provider, but taking away my salary and benefits could put a potential strain on our family. But, as my every-present law of attraction states, that which you put out, you will get. So I’m having complete, undeniable faith that I will sell books and make money. I know like I know like I know that I will be a successful working as a full time novelist. I might have to teach some adjunct or online classes, sure — and we’ll certainly need to cut back on expenses. But nothing changes my outlook and nothing changes my elation. I did what I had to do because I don’t want to wake up in five or ten or twenty years and realize that I have a great writing career but I never appreciated it because I was so busy teaching high school at the same time.

 

So I did it. I put in my notice. I told my principal and my department. Now I’ve got six weeks to soak up all of it before I’m gone for good. I’m hoping I can appreciate this time rather than resent it. I think I will do that. Now that I know there’s an end in sight, it’s impossible not to be a happier person. I’ve wanted to feel this way for so long. I’m so glad it’s finally here.