WWMD: Fun vs. Fulfilling life choices

[Egon]

Ignoring the career mumbo-jumbo, the doctorate, the loan obligations, the original post makes me think of the point, usually a few months into any relocation from a long-established "home base," when people go into retreat mode -- I miss my friends and family; I miss my old colleagues; I miss what I used to do in my former location/my old routine, everything was perfect, etc.

Happened to me both times I moved west, and both times I moved to Europe. If money or job situations hadn't been an impediment, I probably would've raised the white towel and headed back to where I was and what I was doing beforehand. The way you're describing the situation in such extremes -- I "hate" Lake Placid/I "miss everything" from Montana -- reminds me of how glad I was that I stuck it out long enough to get past that impulse.

Very good advice here.

I found myself in a similar situation moving from SLC to Cleveland a few years ago. I had a really bad attitude for a while, and I wanted to quit my new job (which I happened to like) and move back. Before long (over a year) I realized there were lots of things that I actually liked about Ohio, I just hadn't given the place a chance. I tell people it was two years spent "resume building," but it really was much more valuable than that because I learned a lot about myself that I probably wouldn't have had I stayed in the familiar old surroundings of SLC.

But life is so short right? Outside of sleep, I'm guessing most of your time left on this earth will be spent doing your job, whatever it ends up being. I can't understand why you would choose to do something you find unfulfilling just for the instant gratification of moving back to montana. That's not to say better opportunities couldn't come along in montana, just seems a little short sighted.

[focus]

I've got more empathy than wisdom for you. I spent several years in retail management - selling shoes, even.

It could be fun. I never dreaded going to work, but I know exactly what you're talking about as far as it feeling meaningful. Perhaps more importantly, I also didn't find it particularly stimulating - even the team leadership and interaction aspects got pretty rote.

I left retail and an opportunity to nearly double my income for a paycut, but for something that actually uses my degree in a more cerebral way. I second-guess that decision every time money is tight, or I review our meager savings, but I have faith the upside is going to be there someday. In the meantime, I work 36-40 hrs/week instead of 50 and actually feel smart at the end of the day.

I vote skip the retail gig - retail sucks out your soul and has a way of trapping you. Stick it out in Lake Placid or find somewhere else that has the vibe you're looking for with the right kind of employment.

[tone capone]

Get out before you become acostomed to living in shit
I spent 9 years back east chasing the carrier and more money.

I am a mountain man, I did not thrive away from my element.

Regardless of the money I made and lost, I consider my time away from the mountains wasted time and lost years.

Go where you are happy and make it work

This guys speaks the truth.

[knumbskull]

Take the job, move back to MT and look for a job in your career field in a better place than Lake Placid while you're skiing pow instead of ice.

[nihiles]

Lake Placid isn't the worst place in the world to be stuck, you could be in Jersey City.

WTF is wrong with jersey city?

[stash searcher]

can you get a relevant job in a better city? how much have you looked into it? maybe not bozeman, but another ski town?
either way, at least you're in lake placid, and not georgia, as far as snow is concerned. ice is better than jungle grass for skiing...
don't go back to the retail.. just not worth it. it always has a habit of becoming a longer-term job than you meant it to...

[Wandrin*]

If all you can do in Bozeman is be a retail manager then that is definitely just a step back into a comfort zone. You have some experience and an education that should enable you to come up with something better there or in a handful of great towns for outdoor activity. You may have to get up and go to be considered in some areas. SLC is the biggest little town in the world, and if you don't have an address there you are usually not considered for employment. They don't want to deal with relocation at all.

By the way, it is Physician Assistant not Physician's Assistant. You won't make any points with admissions committees with the second one.

[lobstahmeatwad]

I have not read all these responses but I have been thinking about your dilemma.
Get your dr. take on debt and move to a place you like, be a bum. Be happy you could die or be stricken with disease any minute. Make the other people pay for you and your health care. fuck it.

[Woodlandclown]

You seem to really dislike this area, as I have read in past posts. I think you have already given it time. Maybe a career isnt what you want. Maybe you would rather be a ski-bum. Which is totally cool. You need to figure out what is more important to you--work or apres work. For me, I would rather be happy and fulfilled in my job since I spend 40 hours a week doing it--more time than anything else and retail would certainly not be what I would want to do.

BTW - I hate tourists too--thats why I dont live in Lake Placid--but i work there. Bugs, I have lived in NE my whole life so I am used to them. No snow--again used to it, but last year was also a particularly bad year (really bad), but even in a good year, coming from Montana, you would probably think it was bad. Whatdija expect?

[Woodlandclown]

Very good advice here.

I found myself in a similar situation moving from SLC to Cleveland a few years ago.

I dont care how much the dude hates the adirondacks--I would not equate SLC to cleveland the same as bozeman to Adirondacks. Nah

[XtrPickels]

I think you have already given it time. Maybe a career isnt what you want. Maybe you would rather be a ski-bum. Which is totally cool. You need to figure out what is more important to you--work or apres work. For me, I would rather be happy and fulfilled in my job since I spend 40 hours a week doing it--more time than anything else and retail would certainly not be what I would want to do.

I know that I want a career, which is the issue with moving back to MT. It potentially kills the career track. But at the same time you never know.
Edit: I've been looking for jobs like you wouldn't believe, in SLC and Denver and Idaho and Jackson. I've sent out at least 100 applications and have heard back from two... both of which were temporary part time positions. I ended up in LP because they were the only ones to respond to my initial round of applying after grad school when I wanted to move on to bigger and better things.

I moved to LP last August. When I got here, I told myself "Do it for a year, withhold judgement and then make a decision." Well, here I am. I came into a very bad situation with a Shady Shady man who was both my boss and landlord. I quit my job within a month because it was a liability, which if you know me is completely out of character. I am clean-cut and very moral and frankly I had trouble sleeping at night knowing what was going on at my place of employment. I've never worked a job for less than 2 years and to quit in a month is testament to my unhappiness with it. It took a long while to recover from that and the subsequent unemployment. Currently, I like my job quite a bit. I was, however, relatively depressed when I was working this job for less than 10hours per week.

I grew up in NH and did my undergrad at Ithaca. Up until that point, the northeast was all I knew and it was perfectly fine. Since moving to ColoRADo and MT, I've been exposed to different things and had my horizons expanded.

I say that I both love and hate LP because its true. I can't imagine a better place on the east coast to live. There are certainly things that I dislike... namely the humidity and the rain (among other things). The reason for that is "athletic based". I'm not good in the heat and humidity, I understand that it can be tough on everyone, but some are overly sensitive. I ran a race 2 weekends ago on a very humid morning. I ran the 5k course minutes slower than my average in training and I suffered the whole time. This is a course next to my house that I run on a weekly basis. I know it like the back of my hand and Ive done it enough times to understand trends. I love to run and bike, but the fun is zapped out of my favorite activities because my body cannot cope physiologically. Thats frustrating.

At the same time, I've had some moments of "There's nothing better than this". They usually come during runs or bike rides and my faith is renewed. I like the small town. I generally avoid the tourists and I cant live in a place where I don't walk or ride my bike (one of which was stolen) everywhere. The skiing got a little boring, So I volunteered with NYSEF in the mornings and skied the afternoons which made it fun again. So its tough, I both love and hate it here. Days like today, Sunny 60's and low humidity... I'm loving it and as soon as I finish this silly monologue I'm headin' out the door.

I think in the end, I'm choosing to stay here for a while longer. June will be 1 year that I've worked in cardiac rehab, I think that'll be a good time to reevaluate. I felt really anxious about leaving on such short notice, because I'm a dependable person. That'll also help me out career wise and give me time to get money in the bank and plan the next step. Things are only as permanent as you want them to be and I'm choosing to delay any sort of move a little longer.

Thanks to all for their advice. I've read all the posts and thought them through.

Woodlandclown- we should get together at some point this year for a few times. I'll be gaping it up on tele-gear again (another thing I did to increase the "fun factor" of whiteface).

[Ringo]

Doesn't sound like you're completely committed to Exercise Physiology and are considering other options in medicine, many of which have good job prospects throughout the country. Taking a year or two to sell shoes so that you can figure out what you really want to do is not an outlandish idea (RN, PA, PT, etc). If Exercise Physiology was your true passion, you wouldn't care that you were in LP.

I'm about a year away from having a bachelor's in International Affairs. I love it. But I also know it'll most likely mean me having to move to DC in order to pursue any kind of related career path. That's not an outcome I'm not willing to accept. I have no idea how I'm going to make rent after I graduate but if it means I get a chance to live in a place I love, I'm willing to take the risk.

[XtrPickels]

Exercise physiology is most certainly my passion, but it may not be practical. With a master's working in exercise physiology I'm lucky to get 40K / year. I'm on my way to earning half that this year (only part time work). I have 100K in student loan debts. I want to pay my bills. I want to be an upstanding citizen. I can do the exact same thing I am now, literally, but with an RN next to my name I get a) 60K or so a year b) countless job options c) still have all the knowledge (and more) from my love of physiology. How do I know this, because I work with an RN who does the same thing as me and this is our situation.

I've been where you are. Honestly. We're one in the same.
I said F it all, I'm doing what I love and I don't care what it takes.

I've sold my quiver and my mountain bike and my tent and essentially everything of value that I have. So that I can make rent. So that I can attempt to pay bills on time. So that I can pay off the credit card that covered this move across the country.

Its easy to be idealistic until you're in the situation and you lose sleep over it. I made the choice to enter the medical field because I love it. Give me 20 million dollars and I'd be doing research in a lab, not laying by the pool. I understand that this is coming off defensive but don't question "my true passion" until you know me. At least until you've been there.

I've worked through most of that. I'm almost working fulltime and I'm dealing with a bit of residual debt and trying to get on top of it. Hopefully in the spring I'll be financially stable. An RN was because I can't pay my bills now, A P.A. was because if I'm going to school for 2 years, might as well get a PA. These are the lesser of evils because I don't have to leave the medical field. Once I'm paying my bills on time, I may not have the need to look for another field.

[jrosendahl]

You should listen to this guy. He ahh, has has a surprising amount of success considering how much he really wanted to be doing something else.

http://ecorner.stanford.edu/authorMa....html?mid=2217

[lobstahmeatwad]

Nurse pickles sounds dirty.

[KQ]

You've got a lot of well thought out detailed replies here with many things to consider. Let me add my two-cents worth and tell you what it came down to for me:

I found myself visiting wineries and vineyards and saying time and time again "wouldn't it be great to do this?" then I would go back to my job in the big city and sit behind my desk jumping to the demands of unreasonable clients all the while staring out the window at the clogged freeway and smog filled sky thinking "wouldn't it be great?"

Then one day I said to myself "I don't want to get to 80 and say 'wouldn't it HAVE been great if'......" and that was it. I set my sights, started making plans, bought some property, hung up a calendar with the target departure date circled in red and now here I am in the heart of Washington Wine Country. Sink or swim I'm in and I can honestly say there isn't a day I wish I was back behind that desk.

Best of luck to you!

[Woodlandclown]

I
Woodlandclown- we should get together at some point this year for a few times. I'll be gaping it up on tele-gear again (another thing I did to increase the "fun factor" of whiteface).

If you dont like the rain, move to Keene Valley, its a banana belt. often times 10 degrees warmer and probably sunny 20% more than Lake Placid. LP is surrounded by mtns and it just traps the clouds. Srsly--we have had a really bad summer this year and last and a bad winter last year. it will be better. what about backcountry skiing? Where do you mtn bike? Have you been on loggers loop, new trails in wilmington? Do you know the plans for wilmington and connecting all those trails? probably not like montana, but its not cleveland! I wanted to take a picture of the Dix range last night on my way home from work and post it here and say this is what he is complaining about!

We should get together--i know we have some common friends. If you worked on Norams last year we probably even met. We do have Alpine Nationals this year--thats a reason to stick around, no?

[XtrPickels]

If you dont like the rain, move to Keene Valley, its a banana belt. often times 10 degrees warmer and probably sunny 20% more than Lake Placid. LP is surrounded by mtns and it just traps the clouds. Srsly--we have had a really bad summer this year and last and a bad winter last year. it will be better. what about backcountry skiing? Where do you mtn bike? Have you been on loggers loop, new trails in wilmington? Do you know the plans for wilmington and connecting all those trails? probably not like montana, but its not cleveland! I wanted to take a picture of the Dix range last night on my way home from work and post it here and say this is what he is complaining about!

We should get together--i know we have some common friends. If you worked on Norams last year we probably even met. We do have Alpine Nationals this year--thats a reason to stick around, no?

Perhaps we have met, I was certainly at NorAms and Royce is already getting me excited for nationals. I think I'm going to commit to the volunteer gig and work out the season pass situation instead of doing day vouchers like last year.

I've ridden loggers loop and the like, but haven't ridden the trails in Wilmington. I sold my mountain bike last fall to have $$$ for first / last and a deposit on my apartment. I've been hoping to save some money for a new bike and almost a year later it hasn't happened. I'm bummed that I haven't mountain biked in a year.

I didn't do any BC last year because I had sold my AT setup and wasn't comfy enough with Tele to venture off the groomed. So that means all my days were liftserved at WF / Gore. Hopefully I'll have enough skill to venture in the BC this year.

After I posted last night I got a quick ride in on the roadbike. Heading down River road was absolutely beautiful. Took a nice walk with the pupper last night and to work today. Days like this rejuvenate me.

Thanks to all, including those who've pm me job leads and pushes in the right direction.

[Woodlandclown]

Do you have set hours at your part-time job? Maybe you would be interested in working event logistics for Winter? Comes with a free pass and is mainly weekends.

edit to say that its paid, not volunteer too (although not all at WF)

[Anxious Mo-Fo]

I sold my mountain bike last fall to have $$$ for first / last and a deposit on my apartment. I've been hoping to save some money for a new bike and almost a year later it hasn't happened. I'm bummed that I haven't mountain biked in a year. I didn't do any BC last year because I had sold my AT setup.

Let me get this straight... you love to mountain bike, but sold your ride a year ago; you didn't do any BC because you sold your AT setup. You don't think this might have something to do with your present state of mind? Or is it easier to just blame everything on Lake Placid?

Is there any other relevant information that you've been withholding? Christ, I'd shoot myself if I couldn't mountain bike during the off-season.

[Jumper Bones]

If you need a certain pair of skis to bc ski again I could make that happen. They even have the same holes in them.

[XtrPickels]

If you need a certain pair of skis to bc ski again I could make that happen. They even have the same holes in them.

I think those bastards are too big for the lines out here. Besides, I hope I never touch another pair of naxo's.
Sorry I'm a dick and haven't called you back, I'll get on that.

[XtrPickels]

Let me get this straight... you love to mountain bike, but sold your ride a year ago; you didn't do any BC because you sold your AT setup. You don't think this might have something to do with your present state of mind? Or is it easier to just blame everything on Lake Placid?

Is there any other relevant information that you've been withholding? Christ, I'd shoot myself if I couldn't mountain bike during the off-season.

Yeah, that could be playing a part in it ... but its all part of "living the dream and living in the mountains and staying out of city life like people suggest."
Right?

[Woodlandclown]

Let me get this straight... you love to mountain bike, but sold your ride a year ago; you didn't do any BC because you sold your AT setup. You don't think this might have something to do with your present state of mind? Or is it easier to just blame everything on Lake Placid?

Is there any other relevant information that you've been withholding? Christ, I'd shoot myself if I couldn't mountain bike during the off-season.

too true! You know pickles, I know plenty of peeps who would probably loan you a backcountry set-up or sell to you pretty cheap. I can certainly ask around. Also - dont necessarily say the sticks that your friend is offering are too big for the lines out here, maybe you havnt been shown the right lines yet.

[snoweater]

I don't know you so don't take it personally, but if you want to bike & ski, there is almost nothing to keep you from doing it but yourself. I was the poorest dude i knew when i first graduated college and moved to VT, but still managed to scrape enough $ together for skis and a bike (skip a loan payment, they aren't going anywhere!).
If there aren't enough trails in your area, chances are you aren't the only person who would enjoy some new singletrack, so get out there and talk to the forest service/community about building trails on public lands. If you are responsible (sounds like you are) and can show community support for a trails project, what's to stop you? I've seen many places go from nothing to something cause one guy got sick of riding the same old logging roads all the time. If upstate NY is anything like VT, there are already old roads all through the mtns. all you have to do is trim it, rake it and ride. (then build jumps and berms of course)

Congrats on finding a job that makes you happy and feels worthwhile, but don't kid yourself that a good job is all you need. You have to keep doing the other things you love that balance out the work. IMO

If you're tall and you want an old Specialized fsr frame & cranks (size XL) for cost of shipping from CO, pm me.