should i leave this job?

it's difficult for anyone else to make such a big decision for you.

what sort of career do you think you would enjoy? what are your strengths? what sort of things do you enjoy in life?

Specifically what do you hate about teaching?

(eg. Is it teaching *undergraduates* in particular? Would you enjoy teaching at postgrad level?)

Can you think back to the time when you first entered your teaching career? What drove you then? Can you remember why (or if) you were passionate about teaching as a job?

The two posters above raised good questions. If you have accurate answers for those questions, you may be able to solve your dilemma easier.

I agree that it is tough when you hate something so much and you still have to do it. There are a few things you could do:

1. Take it or leave it
2. Fake it until you make it
3. Find something to motivate yourself by looking for inspirational/motivational quotes to encourage you

I found these two quotes very helpful to me:

1. “The meaning of life is to find your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away.” - Pablo Piccaso
2. “No matter how you feel, get up, dress up, show up, and never give up.” - @INSPIRINGTHINKN

lostwoman wrote:i hate my life, my job, my lonliness...

Doesn't strike me as a good idea to leave your job while you're also hating your life and your loneliness.

It's very stressful to get up in front of an indifferent class, and it takes a lot of energy to struggle for their attention, so you need to have a Safe Person... such as the one you go home to each night, and both of you download the frustrations of the day and replenish each other's spirits, then you have a drink and a cuddle and whatever gets you through the night.

So why is it you "can't do anything about being alone"? Where are the people you trained with, your family, old school friends, neighbours? Do you talk to other teaching staff where you are now? If not, why not?

It sounds as though your Love Bank is overdrawn, perhaps leaving you so exhausted that you can't drag yourself to the kinds of places and activities where you might meet great people.

The alternative to finding good company is to look for a more fulfilling job before leaving the old one. It might suit you better to teach adults who are in class by choice, rather than the captive audience of bored schoolchildren who can't wait to get out. The job may be casual and the money not so good, but you'll be among peers and there's no restriction on what relationships you can have with any students you fancy.

Also, it might do you good to fail one or two of your worst students. Why be "too soft"? Because, presumably, you're desperate for them to like you. If you think back to your own schooldays, which are the teachers you most admired -- the ones who couldn't control a class, or the ones with the energy to make damned sure everyone was listening?

Who knows such things? My advice? Get back to work? Or win the lotto.

Win the lotto... good idea

lostwoman's comment about the job having a good salary, yet she hates the job, reminds me of a quote, that goes something like:

"The greatest obstacle to a great life is a good life".

whybotherwhynot wrote:1. Take it or leave it
2. Fake it until you make it
3. Find something to motivate yourself by looking for inspirational/motivational quotes to encourage you

I found these two quotes very helpful to me:

1. “The meaning of life is to find your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away.” - Pablo Piccaso
2. “No matter how you feel, get up, dress up, show up, and never give up.” - @INSPIRINGTHINKN

good idea..
i think i can fake for one semester ... and gonna find another job in mean while...

i'm living on quotes for one year and two days now... quotes do nothing for me now...
thanks for your post .. i needed that..
hugs!

ahung wrote:Win the lotto... good idea

lostwoman's comment about the job having a good salary, yet she hates the job, reminds me of a quote, that goes something like:

"The greatest obstacle to a great life is a good life".

its more like getting out of my comfort zone...
i have been teaching for three years now...which i completely consider a waste of time

Sorry to give you yet another quote! :p

It can be daunting to leave a comfort zone.
But it is possible to do it "stepwise", maybe by gradually taking up other (non-teaching?) duties, management, etc., that gives you greater transferable skills to eventually make the leap to another work environment.
Nothing is ever a complete waste of time, there's always something you've learned from the experience that can be used elsewhere....

Why do you take life serious? I mean this in a good way. But no one cares. Now I don't mean about you specifically. What I mean is that every human being you will ever meet doesn't not care about his or her own life to a certain degree. A wider picture then paints itself that the world doesn't care either.

Why?

Because life itself is a slow suicide. Its like a game show where the bring out the prize and tell you "Look what you could of won!" and then cart it back off stage and it leaves you holding the booby prize. Nothing against you or anyone who is reading this.

Life is like look but don't touch. In my experience no one I have meet has thought life through to the very end. No one. They usually go ahead and go to work, get into relationships and make a whole mess of having kids, a mortgage, a job they hate, drinking problems and drugs and THEN they WONDER. Then you see when all is going bad, they get this feeling "hey something is wrong here." Yes because no one took the time to THINK about life and what the **** we all are doing here. To take any step in any direction of life without first sorting this fundamental question is a waste of everyone's time. But ironically this isn't far from the truth because life is wasting time. You spend your time doing whatever it is you are doing so that one day death gets you.

The world then therefore is a trap and no one sees it because they believe they have to pay some bills or get married or have kids and THEN their life would be great. Its a trap because some people can't see that they are in a trap. Its a trap because you can't get out of it. Its a trap because you can't really be in control of it. Its a trap because you can't really get involved in it, if you do manage that you find yourself in a ball of trouble. Once in looking out you create more and more mess. Like waves on the sea forever rippling out and in. Now comes the moment of faith. Real faith is letting go. Jump off the cliff and take to the sky.

So you have a problem with work/job and you believe that once that is sorted out then you can start having a good life. But you won't. You can't. Because there is something wrong with every human being. They are a "mistake". There is something wrong with the actually act of living. It feels odd. It feels weird. Its like a itch you cant scratch. You try and convince people that there is this itch, that there is something wrong but they shake their heads at you as if you are crazy. Because you can't prove the itch is there. You can't reach it yourself. But you can feel that it is there.

So what are you going to do? If you think people online can help you out. Wrong place to look. If you think a doctor can help. Wrong place to look. The only real place is the journey within.

Cpt Yossarian wrote:no one took the time to THINK about life and what the **** we all are doing here.

Feeding and breeding, Captain. Each generation discovers new stuff that builds on what's gone before. All species do that -- keep abreast of environmental change -- but only Homo sapiens (so far) can imagine, and reach for the stars, communicate precisely and escalate its progress exponentially. That's Life. What's the alternative? Nothing. Life is all there is.

Nature is wasteful. A sea turtle lays 100 or so eggs every fortnight through the breeding season, and just 7 out of 1000 offspring survive to breeding age. The rest are food for other species. Feeding and breeding. On and on.

Survival of the fittest. For Homo sapiens at one time, and other species still, fittest meant exactly that: physical strength, health, capacity + sheer luck. It's much more complex now, and becoming more so at an ever-increasing, dizzying speed. Make no mistake, our intra-species competition is stiff. My money's on the counter-culture, because that's where I am. I'm not competitive and I have the wisdom to know it. Like the Beatles, "I don't want to march for money, because money can't buy me love". And love is all that matters. People you love and who love you are infinitely better than money in the bank.

If you think people online can help you out. Wrong place to look. If you think a doctor can help. Wrong place to look. The only real place is the journey within.

Yes, quite.

"There is no cure for birth and death, save to enjoy the interval." -- George Santayana

One thing we know about our species from one generation to another: everything changes, and everything stays the same. The things Maslow defined as basic human needs/drives don't alter; the means of meeting those needs do. Some people have what it takes to feed; the rest of us feed them. Stay on the roundabout or jump off. You always have a choice.

Cpt Yossarian wrote:
So what are you going to do? If you think people online can help you out. Wrong place to look. If you think a doctor can help. Wrong place to look. The only real place is the journey within.

you are right...
atleast a Dr. couldn't help in my case...
ya, i never stop and think for myself ... i always thought of others first...and now i regret of my choices...
i end up with lots of cats in my life...and due to those cats...i can't even finish my life...

sometime it sucks to be alive...

I agree completely with Cpt Yossarian.

"There is something wrong with the actually act of living."
I believe you've summed up the problem of existence.

And I agree that you *should* "THINK about life and what the **** we all are doing here."

But that's not possible. There's no reason we are here. This thread illustrates a problem many of us seem to have (I consider myself one of the worst example of this).

A discussion about job satisfaction has ballooned out into agonised outpourings of existential angst. I believe that to be happy in life, we really must *stop* thinking. We humans are not smart enough to think ourselves to happiness! We don't have the brains to figure out the purpose of life. We are, however, horny, greedy, and stupid (Scott Adams). To be satisfied in life, that is probably how we should live- we should live according to our characteristics, weaknesses though they be.

Yes leave the job.

Yes go for it. Leave that dam job.

Take my advice. Do what I say.

Thanks

The Cpt.