Sunday, July 15, 2007

Three, Two ...



Hi. My name is Marichelle and I'm a changeaholic. I've been sober for 23 days.

This is a documentation of the beginning of my life, my non-corporate life, my escape from the chain gang. The following is a bit long and tedious but please bear with me. It's important to give you as much background as possible...

I've had 14 16 different jobs in total. Although I wouldn't really count the seven that I had pre-college. I guess you could say I'm the Runaway Bride of the corporate world. I guess it would also be fair to say that my career started out a little rocky. After graduating with a business management degree, I quickly landed a job at a marketing research company. After eight months, my boss decided to start his own company and lured me into joining his new company. After putting me in charge of managing the development of the company website, I fell in love with the Web and its potential. So I decided to leave him to go to Parsons and learn how to become a Web Designer - which I did. And yes, you've guessed it - the Internet crash! I get laid-off. I was fortunate enough to land a job in the international department of a major television network as a web coordinator with minimal design responsibilities. For the record - this was the best job I ever had. But even after four very successful years there - I was promoted twice and was on my way to a third one; the inevitable itch came. After much contemplation, I decided to join American Express to work on a very visible online campaign, I guess I was wowed and temporarily comatosed by the big blue box and the big green budgets. After the first month I started to get THE feeling at the pit of my stomach (quite unusual, I usually get THE feeling after eight months) but I was hoping it was just the freshman blues. After only three months, I gave my resignation and said my goodbyes to the financial district. I then reluctantly accept a great offer to work for WWD/Conde Nast - a job that unexpectedly fell on my lap. I never hid the fact that I just quit a job that I only had for three months. Much to my surprise, they were really understanding and it didn't stop them from offering me a raise and a promotion. How could I refuse that??

After less than 3 months - I decided to finally say good riddance to the corporate world. I decided to take the job at Conde Nast as my final chance. I went into it whole heartedly but said that if it didn't work out it would be my last corporate job and I've kept that promise to myself (it's been 23 days). If you haven't noticed yet, I have a tendency to grow tired of things very quickly and I have no qualms about making changes and I'm definitely not shy about pulling plugs as quickly as possible. This is both my strength and weakness. Lifeflix was born out of my fearless approach to change. Not only am I trigger happy about switching jobs and careers but in life in general ... my motto has always been "if you don't like it, just quit it" -- my ex-husband used to always tease me about this. Some could argue that I'm a coward and a quitter. That may be so, but life is too short ... why spend it doing things that you're not passionately in love with?

Like all things, this blog may only last 5 entries or maybe I'll surprise myself and beat my 4-year record.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

i am glad you did it! - ate

Anonymous said...

i've always understood what's goin' on inside you :-) that obviously
can be attributed to us being in the same category- 'personality wise'
That is what you get for being a sucker for the "arts"... but way to go , sis!!!

I always believed that there are only3 kindspeople in this planet...
Theartists....the boring....and theofficially certified Boring kind...
Yesterday, i had a meeting with mypartners in the business and that
is exactly the message i gave them....been there... done that...i know exactly
how it's like to work without "passion"... i cannot separate them..period or
count me a candidate for depression.

It's tough to live with "changes"...and talk about ..."constant changes" huh!
Life is short..you are absolutely right.... your life to me seems exciting.
'What is important is to have that peace inside you that allows you to get
up in the morning and be able to be yourself again and love it!


:-)
Ces

DFTH said...

Did my note earlier disappeared? Ghostflix!

Anonymous said...

Your'e just doing what other people are afraid to do!!!
Your a risk-taker and completely spontaneous. At least you can say that your damn well great at anything you do!!! You are one talented lady! Hey, now you can add wedding planner to your resume!! HAHAHA!!!!!

Jade said...

Marichelle! Yay you're blogging! I love your blog. Keep writing

jade

Anonymous said...

Marichelle, Why don't you write a book? Your lifeflix blog was actually fascinating to read, a little more detail and candidness will surely create some chapters of your life. Look into it!! Have you read this book about a guy who obsessed in reading the whole britannica encyclopedia? His book became a national bestseller--its the Know it all by AJ Jacobs.-----talk to you later---MJ

Marichelle said...

Thank you for all your support guys!!! Let's see where this thing goes =)

Yuri Bacas Hosaka said...

Hi Marichelle,

funny... I totally understand what you write here (may seem to far from you by now, as it was last summer). I did the same at around the same time. Last year's end of May I quit the corporate world, totally not for me. Although I was an International Project Mgr, all my previous jobs since I moved to the UK have been Web Designer. And let's face it, making sites is fun until you have to deal with some clients, their taste, budget and control obsession...

I then started my own business and at the same time I'm trying to pursue my dream, to live off things I make. So I'm learning to sew and continue making things (I did study Industrial Design but never worked at it).

Anyway, I hope so far you are happy and surviving in your new life. Congratulations!!

Yuri Bacas Hosaka said...

oh yes,

and I love your blog, I'm very much into cooking but you are just TOO GOOD! I'm not showing my bf your site or he'll start demanding!!

Marichelle said...

Yuri & Friends: thank you! It's easy, I'm sure you can do it too! It's funny what you said though, my sister showed the site to my brother-in-law and he started demanding =)

Thanks for introducing yourself, I love meeting and connecting with ex-corpaholics!