Should I? Shouldn’t I?

Posted by Tisha Tolar on November 12, 2007

For me there was no question about it. I was destined to work for myself. I have known that for a long time. Still, I lacked confidence so I worked for other people. But I just didn’t belong in someone else’s office. While the time I spent working in those other offices have been some of the best times of my life, where I made lifelong friends who I treasure more than words can express, working my ass off for someone else’s profit was becoming increasingly more difficult for me. I am too much of an independent thinker – I quality that I felt other people considered negative. Most of my thoughts and ideas were too out-of-the-box for my employers (occasionally for everyone else too). Those traits, however, also became a problem for two reasons:

#1 – My ambition and natural willingness to go the extra mile always left me underpaid and taken advantage of. I have a lot of self-taught skills that, once discovered, were abused. They were also not compensated. Because I always want to keep my skills sharp as possible, I would jump at any chance to put those skills into action.

#2 – My tendency to want to lead the troops instead of follow the “leader” often lead to a butting of heads with the so-called upper management. These were the people who couldn’t form a single original thought in their head to save their lives. For someone like me, it was excruciating. It’s not that I had to always be in control, it’s just that the stupidity of the “rules” and office politics were just something I could not accept the way others seemingly could. Perhaps this is why The Office is my favorite show. The absurdity of it all cracks me up. They have hit the nail on the head.

I also could not function if someone was constantly looking over my shoulder, telling me to do the job and then telling me how to do the job, when they had nary a clue. Even when someone handed over the reigns, I was still riding in their sleigh. I didn’t mind following the rules. I like to play by the rules. It’s just the illogical rules, so plentiful, chapped my ass. In short, I have always known I should be my own boss.

Can you be your own boss? Sure! Should you be your own boss? Well, that’s a different story. There are so many factors to consider. Throw motherhood into the mix and your determining factors triple. Motherhood can be the best reason to start working for yourself and it can be the ultimate reason for not going out on your own. It all depends on you. If you can’t answer the important questions, no one can do it for you. And you shouldn’t let them.

We have a wonderful outline of ideas for upcoming posts on Empowering Mom. We’ll try to cover as many topics as we can, based on our own experiences. Feel free at anytime to bring up a new topic, share a different perspective, ask a question, or comment on anything discussed. We hope you will feel like this is a good place to let it all out – so others can learn from your experiences as perhaps you learn from ours.

Tip of the day: If you are not going to help yourself, no one else is going to help you either.