Sylvia's Journal

After a very long run, nearly 32 years, it finally happened: my position at my longtime employer was terminated. After the phone call I was a little dazed, as if I was in the middle of a heavy fog, like the ones I remember from my childhood in wet Holland. And then I started to think about what it all meant. There was a bit of, why me (and then why us when I learned a colleague who does similar work was also let go) but it didn’t last long. It is true, when a door closes, all you need to do is turn around and all sorts of doors appear, some already slightly ajar, and some with the key in the lock, requiring only a simple turn. And then some wide open.

The more I thought about what my new life would be, the more excited I got. I called up people, I posted on facebook and LinkedIn and the requests for my CV and personal email address came flooding in. Best of all, some of those are for assignments I would have loved to take on but couldn’t in the past because I was full-time employed.

And as the days went by more and more doors opened. I can now babysit in the middle of the week, go skiing next winter when the rates are low, mid week. I don’t have to get up at 4:30 anymore; I don’t need to count remaining vacation days and I don’t need to deal with performance reviews and such, corporate requirements that are no longer relevant to me. Freedom and liberation are the operative words. I feel like a kidding a candy store – I can do whatever I want.

After my last day in the office, sometime mid June, I will have just a few days before my first consulting assignment, that was thrown in my lap by a longtime friend from Holland who retired after a career at the WorldBank. We will be together in Saudi Arabia to help the Crown  Prince with the reform and reorganization of the health sector and I get to teach about leadership, change management, emotional intelligence or I know not what. It is very exciting.