What Can You Trust?

I am a teacher, and I love teaching!

Little less than four years ago, I joined an organization, simply to develop personally & professionally. I was always good at mentoring, hence the graph of my promotion moved high and fast. Soon, there was pressure of performance, targets and visibility, which made me cross my own ethics! Soon, I was two living personalities, doing well in none! My social contacts started getting scanty, people started missing me, whereas on the other side, myprofessional network side went higher and higher!

The parents of the organization being highly passionate and goal oriented, the pressure went so high, that it started making me realise, i was not working for my development, but theirs! What I ran for, ignored my family for, compromises my health for, our my own profession at stake for was not my goals, but theirs! I also realised, my core values never matched theirs, and feared becoming someone I never wanted to!

CORE VALUES - Core Values are like bricks which put together one by one, make up the wall called vision of life! This is what caught my attention. I wrote what attracted me the most, reaching to my own clarity on my core values! Alas! I realised, the mismatched core values of the organization brought me farther and farther from my own life ethics and visions!

I wrote the pros & cons of discontinuing, and the pros were far higher than the cons! This was a turning point. Shared and talked with two of my family members and three friends, who helped me back my list as well as decision! Left the organization! I miss that, a lot, but it is same as missing the high calorie butteryfood while on a diet and gym regime! We know, 'No pain, no gain!'

Your words speak to my journey also but not in the same way. When does the new choice and direction bring you the peace and satisfaction of the road 'not to be followed'? You have given up a lot to become more of who you are meant to be but at some cost in a worldy sense. When does the diet and gym route no longer grip you like a 'have to do' and become a 'glad to do'. I dont know how to explain myself better.

My 2 cents: To cross one's own ethics is a point of losing self, as I guess you discovered. To cross with one's own ethics can work. I think of my core values and ethics as my boat carrying me through very rough seas of expectations, pressures, false images, etc. I've gone overboard a number of times in my life, and then got back on board. Congratulations on getting back to your core values.