My new year's resolution and big change

It's time for some big news and for once an entry not focused on game design. As of Saturday 1/22/11 I have left my current job to pursue other opportunities. I did customer support at a cable company which I won't name in case I'm breaking some kind of rule.

There are several reasons for this insane decision. The first being after two years of working there I could no longer stand the tedium of doing the same thing every day. For the first year working there it was not bad as I was learning the different ways of troubleshooting and now have a great understanding of troubleshooting phone, video and internet issues. However after that there was no more learning and now every time I go in there it feels like I'm wasting my time.

Second was I realized that to improve my chances of getting a better job, both in the games industry and outside of it I need to refocus and develop my programming skills. With this job on the days that I work I am too mentally drained to think about programming when I'm done and on the two days I have off it would take me forever to learn programming two days a week.

Finally I saw the writing on the wall that even though I am in a technical support department they only care about sales and selling is where I'm weak at. Because of that I would never be able to move up because selling is considered one of the factors that I was graded on. I realized that no matter how good I was at helping people it would not mean a thing without selling.

What is funny was that in December I had a viral infection that kept me house ridden for 10 days, during that time I was bored and started to think that the job wasn't so bad. I came back to work for two days and by the end of it I was already disgusted with the job to the point that I was ready to leave right then and there.

A part of me wanted to just scream "f$*k you" out loud and walk out of there. However I realized that I have to hold myself to a higher standard and that I had too much integrity to just walk out. So I gave my two weeks’ notice and I can honestly say that the last two weeks there was the hardest I've had in some time. It would have been so easy to completely stop caring and just completely half-ass my way to the end, but I didn't. My work ethic kept me going until the last day.

Where does that leave me now? I'll be honest a part of me thinks I made the wrong decision and another part wants to throw a party in celebration. Even though my income per month has drastically been cut I still feel relieved at the prospect of not going back there for a long time.

It's time for me to be serious for a minute, if there is one character trait of mine that has endeared with me over the years is my reluctance to ask for help. So it pains me somewhat to say the following, if there is one thing I've learned trying to get a job is that knowing someone really does help. This is why if anyone has a job that could use my skill at analysis and game design or knows someone who does, please send me an email, mention my name or give me a call. Even if it is a free lance position in some facet of the industry, writing reviews or working on a game I don't care.

It would alleviate some of the nervousness I have to know that I have some money coming in. Meanwhile besides looking for work I've started taking a C++ programming course from the Game Institute with my goal to produce something for my portfolio.

With that said, happy birthday to me and 2011 is going to be an interesting year.

Josh