New Job or New Continent (with No Job) for solving Career Frustration? Easy choice …
In 1997, I’d HAD IT.
Eight frustrating years. Two jobs, in two industries that didn’t come close to scratching the itch.
Fired from the first.
Given my all to the second, but knew deep down: I would never be a World Champion Mechanical Engineer.
My employer was an environmental startup that had gone from near-bust, to boom, and now I suspected to near-bust again. (I was proved right.)
My gut’s alarms bells were ringing. Ignored them before. Wasn’t going to repeat that mistake.
But with a wife, one young daughter (another on the way), and a mortgage just 2 years from being paid off …. I had to choose:
1. Get another job, as nearby as possible?
The economy was on the up. Plenty of job vacancies being posted.
2. Do something CRAZY?
Like …. sell the house and invest the proceeds in another degree, in something that REALLY excited me? Over in the Olde Country?
Obvious choice, eh?
Yep. I picked CRAZY.
So on Oct 4, 1997, I kissed my heavily-pregnant wife and daughter goodbye, and boarded the flight to Heathrow. (They rejoined me 6 weeks later.)
Sitting in the back row of that 747 was the loneliest, most terrifying moment I can remember.
If there’s just a thing as a Self-Doubt Attack, I was having it.
What. On. EARTH. Was I DOING?
I’d just have to buy a return ticket when I got to Heathrow ….
END OF PART 1
