December 10 - Wisdom

December 10 – Wisdom. 
What was the wisest decision you made this year, and how did it play out?

The wisest decision I made this year was one that those who would have been most impacted by my decision knew nothing about, but it influenced everything about my relationships with those people.  If you've been reading, you may remember that I was offered another job making quite a bit more money, and I decided to turn that job down.  Just reading that makes me cringe.  Every once in awhile, I kick myself and feel stupid for making the decision.  I say that the drive was too far, the populations too diverse, the parking too sparse, the timing not right.  And this is all true, but jeez I make so little money.

The truth is, I didn't want to leave because I was smack in the middle of relationships with clients that I had spent years building.  I was seeing the fruits of my work - and I was also learning the failures of my efforts.  Both are necessary to learn.  I was also building relationships with people I work with, I was starting to set down roots, and all of this was making me afraid, and so I wanted to run.  Conversely, I was also very afraid of the new position.  I envisioned it like a mountain I was not ready to climb (and wow, it would have been a lot of driving).  In turn, it allowed me to see that my own mountain was slightly less daunting, albeit woefully underpaid.

Several times a week, I think, 'wow, I would have missed this moment with this person'.  I teared up at our holiday party, my heart squeezed when a teenage girl called me for support, when another emailed me because she knew I would be there, when a woman stumbled forward in telling her story.  This is the difficulty in my field:  people trust that we will be there.  I found myself thinking that this was a wise choice, to stay.  Still, I worry because I will need to leave soon.  I just hope that I will feel it is a wise choice then, as I know it will be a painful one. 

So I continue to grapple with the same question:  how do we get to both make a living wage and do what is fulfilling?  Often I think I am not so wise.  I often can't tell the difference:  what decisions do I make that are fear based or out of insecurity?  when am I too involved and need to step back?  I don't know.

ps.  I know I'm behind in posting these, but I'm working on it!

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