You know that feeling, when you try to make a joke, and no one laughs or even acknowledges you said something?
That is what I feel like everyday at work.
My job is killing any confidence I used to have – both regarding my personality and my intelligence.
Hi! I'm Kim, a 34-year-old living in Chicagoland with my husband, Steven, and our cats, Khali, Apollo, and Starbuck. I work in the design industry (architecture), follow a vegan lifestyle, am addicted to running, and am an ACE certified personal trainer (working at Essential Fitness, LLC ("Efit"))! I write about a variety of topics, and consider this a "life" blog - a place I can share anything that's on my mind. Please visit the "About" page to get a better idea of who I am! :-)
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I think you’re HILAAAAAAAARIOUS!!!!! 😀
Find a new job, asap.
Miss you 🙁
~Bobbi
I know that feeling very well. It’s why I quit so long ago and totally changed my track.
WHY does your job make you feel that way? What sort of things are happening?
(and if you just need someone to talk with, I’m here and you are more than welcome to email me! Seriously.)
That’s just not good. I’m sorry you feel this way about it and that it’s breaking your spirit so badly. But remember, it’s only work. Don’t let it affect your life outside of there. Take your work self, ball it up, and leave it in your desk drawer as you walk out. Sounds funny, but it helps. Really.
Life is too short! Find a new job with a company that appreciates your efforts!
I fourth or fifth that motion. New job. Nothing that does a number on your confidence is good for you at all.
“…any confidence I used to have…”
Fie on that, never speak of your confidence in the past tense. It is smooshed down, but will spring back up to life under healthy circumstances. You have earned all the confidence you have accumulated in this life so far, and it is not going anywhere.
that’s awful! if you can leave, leave as fast as you can. no one should have to feel that way!
Don’t let them undermine your confidence, you know perfectly well what a great job you are capable of doing! And you have a great personality and are very witty – maybe some of your co-workers are devoid of a personality and are in complete awe of your awesomeness.
I’m really sorry you are feeling this way. *hug*
I guess I am wondering if it is the job or just the first job out of college? Because that transition (I know) is so, so very hard.
Either way, do what is best for you, because you are very important to all of us! 🙂
I had a job like that back in September and I quit. I just could not take not being me anymore.
I am so sorry you have to feel that way every day. I know that feeling all too well.
i agree with everyone else!!! i think you’re a wonderful, smart, and witty person!!! (i laugh at your jokes and i just read them, i don’t actually even get to hear them! :)) Manny said it best: maybe some of your co-workers are devoid of a personality and are in complete awe of your awesomeness!!! because you are awesome!!! (Steven, Data, the company you work for, and all your blogger friends know that!!) 🙂
and if you ever need to vent i’m here for you!!!
The trick is to get out before you start believing it…
Ugh – I’m right there with you. I hope you find something else soon, because you are very capable and should be confident in that! And, now I need to go and take my own advice…
Thank you everyone, for your comments, compliments and suggestions. I am surprised and touched by the amount of comments.
Obviously, I can’t get too detailed because this is a “work-related” issue, but the general problem is that I feel like I don’t belong.
I noticed this became an issue when I couldn’t leave my “work self” at work, like kapgar suggested. I used to be able to come home, have fun, and completely forget about work and live my life, but I was starting to get stressed out.
When I started, I was confident, friendly and outgoing. I tried to talk to people, tell jokes, voice my opinion, etc. But I didn’t feel like it was well received. Nobody said anything too harsh to me, but everyone else in my office was so quiet, it made me feel like an outcast.
So I tried to cut back with being so “loud and talkative,” but I found that I couldn’t help myself from making jokes and chatting and so on…
It got to the point where I started to second guess everything I said because sometimes people would receive me well, and sometimes not.
It is probably more of a “them” problem than a “me” problem. Our styles just may not mesh?
All of this made me feel like a not-talented employee, even though I am, and I work my ass off, staying late, and meeting all my deadlines, etc. But feeling low on personality seemed to affect how I felt about my performance too. No one said anything like this to me, in fact, I know they are pleased with me, it is just that the office atmosphere made me feel so down and low.
I am being vague, and I apologize, but I have decided I am going to just keep being myself and forget what other people think – which is where I started out in the beginning!
Yes, shake things up in that place! A new co-worker of mine came up to me recently and said, I love hearing you laugh with your office mate – it makes the office feel alive and totally brings fun into the atmosphere. That was kinda cool to hear. Be yourself, Kim. You’ll thank yourself down the road.
If it makes you feel any better, I don’t think that anyone in my lab had laughed for months before I had gotten there. Everyone was so serious and only talked about work all the time. It drove me crazy. Slowly but surely, things started changing. As of next semester, a co-worker will have a published dissertation with a an acknowledgment thanking me for teaching him to not take life so seriously. If you are going to stick out the job, just remember that your co-workers attitudes can change, but it takes some time to get some people to change their long established poor attitudes. Good luck, Kim!
If you’re not funny and fun, then how come D and I laugh so much when we’re around you and Steven? 🙂 Seriously, you’re a hoot!
Dave is right too though: don’t let your job destroy who you are. I don’t know how much experience you have in your field, but if it’s at least a year, I would argue for looking for a new job (preferably while still on this one, if at all possible). If it’s less than a year, it might still be worth looking (especially if things are as bad as it sounds like they are).
My best friend is a lawyer, for example, who is stuck in a job that works him 60-70 hours/week every week, and of course he *hates* it (not just for the long hours, but the nature of law he practices too, and the unsavory way law in private practice is run). But despite having only about 6 months’ experience practicing in FL and 3 months in IL (he’s licensed in both states), he indicated to me yesterday that he’s going looking for a new job in less than 2 weeks, and I totally support his efforts.
I’m pretty mercenary about employment: whoever offers me the best combination of work/life balance, pay, interesting work, etc. gets me, and I have no qualms about jumping-ship if it makes me better off overall. Life is too short to spend 1/4 to 1/2 of it doing something you dislike…
Also, is it possible that the current environment at your job is just temporary? There are lots of financial and regulatory pressures that come-down in the last quarter of the year that cause managers to scramble to fulfill them, and this often translates into ugly times for their employees. For example, I was under pretty hefty pressure (enough to wake me up in the middle of the night Friday morning in anxiety) this week to help my manager fulfill an audit item that came up, which I did…
Anyway, keep your chin up. Whatever your co-workers may think and make you feel like, clearly you can see from all these comments that there are plenty of us who think you’re a blast to be around. 🙂