Why I'm quitting my day job:

Well, it’s done.  I’ve put in my notice of resignation and I have an official last day coming up; only 3 shifts yet to work and I’ll officially be unemployed.  After all I’ve said about our financial disasters this may seem like a big plunge, a huge leap of faith.  Although not entirely monumental it is a “jump”.  It’s a jump that has been prayed about, thoughtfully considered, planned out, monetarily “funded” so to speak and has finally been put into play. 

I’ve been a nurse for almost 10 years now; it’ll be 10 years in May.  While grizzled veteran I am not, I do have considerably more experience than I did a decade ago; experience that extends far beyond skill sets and functioning within a clinical setting.  I have emotional experience, spiritual experience that has marked me for the rest of my life, experience that one day may lead me back to nursing; when my situation has changed and my children are much older. 

I’m leaving a group of people, of fellow staff, that have changed my life.  Each of them is a person of quality, of extremely decent and noble character.  Each of the women I work with I’d trust with my life, and in part have.  I’ve had all three of my children delivered and cared for with their help.  I’ve worked in other industries and in other hospitals and nowhere else have I found quite a niche for myself nor a cluster of such fine people; the kind of people that support each other through trials, work outstandingly as a team with a higher purpose and can not only relate to each other personally but laugh with each other, eye-watering, side-holding belly laughs.  I will miss these people so very, very much and see myself making regular salsa deliveries just to visit.

So, for “why” Wednesday, that’s the question:  Why would I leave something I love and people I love and just quit? 

While I’ve just discussed the value and meaning of my job it is far less weighty, far less meaningful to me than investing, true to personality and my own gifts and leanings, in my family.  I understand this is not the case for every mother, let me just state that disclaimer.  I know plenty of working mommas who take outstanding care of their families and what they’ve got going absolutely works for their family.  It has become very, very clear it’s not working for mine. 

We never spoke about it, but long before we had our first baby my husband and I both assumed it would be best for me to stay home with our hypothetical future children.   Not only did we not speak about it we continued to live and spend as if we would always have two healthy incomes.  We’ve learned a valuable if not late lesson over the past two years and that it is extremely costly to not live within your means.  It is a stress on your marriage, on your kids that stretches far beyond not being able to pay for this that or the other. 

Not only were we not living within our means, we had no plan, no focus on our goals.  They were far off and unreachable.  After all, it was common knowledge that we, like so many others, would always have debt, always be working to keep up.  We knew what we wanted, for me to be home with the kids, to grow our family business, to someday have some land to live on, but no plan to get there.  It was all a far off dream.  After struggle, prayers and a dark time, we came out the other end and there was light.

I won’t discuss the mechanics of that, I’d be here all day.  I’ll just say that while our finances are not where they need to be yet there is shining illuminating hope in our lives; something we dared not even dream about before.  (Financial Peace University, I can’t stress that enough).

So, why now?  I truly assumed it would be much, much longer until we’d come to a point that we could make some changes.  This brings me to breezes.  When the cool air barely shifts and tall blades of grass stir?  Or flutters tiny petals of little flowers?  Or when crunchy leaves or dusty dirt swirl around just above the ground, enough for you to stop and take notice?  You didn’t feel the world around you before until the breeze came. 

Do you ever do that?  Maybe you’re focused in on a task and somehow you just stop and notice the breeze?  Then, suddenly you hear birds chirping that you didn’t hear before?  You suddenly notice how green the trees are or how they are gently swaying in the wind?  God has been sending me breezes that stir something deep down in the depths of my soul.  They cool my face and prick at my ears and make me take notice.

I took the kids to the park the other day.  Josie, now a spunky 4 year old, had brought a packed lunch and declined chick fil a so she could eat at the park.  She sat at this mushroom shaped little table on an acorn chair in the middle of the playground eating her peanut butter crackers and opening and closing her little metal Minnie Mouse lunch box with such pride, her sunshine blonde hair wild in the breeze. 

I was watching the boys play on the playground, so big and strong now they don’t need help climbing anything anymore and simultaneously chatting with her, sharing her mushroom table and another acorn chair.  A little girl, no more than 18 months with little brown pigtails sprouting out of her head toddled past us in tiny denim jeans and her mother briskly followed her.  This made me turn to Josie.  How is she so big now?  How is time moving so fast?  Why am I not spending every single moment doing things like this?  Going to the park on a gorgeous day, investing all I have in these kids God has blessed me with?  Investing all I have in my kids, my husband and my home? 

I answered my inner struggle with the same old response, “Not yet.  Someday, maybe soon, but not yet.”  The moment stuck with me though, a little breeze that stirred my thoughts.  The breezes continued and they were sometimes not so cool and refreshing.  Sometimes they were warm and stormy like when I was getting the kids up at 5:30 in the morning to take them to (the awesome, loving and kind) babysitter.  When the kids asked if it was a Mommy or a Daddy day today.  When I have to leave home and the mess therein behind to go to work, hoping I’ve done enough prep so the husband and kids have a peaceful day. 

In my experience these breezes have always evoked change.  Sometimes I’ll pray and choose a path and I know full well that God is with me and that I’m going where he wants me to go.  This happened with homeschooling.  It was right for right now, a deep seated satisfaction set in, knowing that this was right and good. 

A couple of weeks ago I took the kids and our schoolwork to the nature center.  We had a great day but one that was sadly overshadowed by the fact we’d have to get home, clean up, do housework and get ready for one of my work days the next day.  I wasn’t feeling well.  I had a sinus infection and a headache and all of my kids were struggling with allergies by the time we headed home.  I texted my husband and told him I thought I might have to call in sick the next day.  “Follow your heart.” He texted back sarcastically and I told him if I followed my heart I’d quit my job.  This started a discussion and sparked a reviewing of our budget and our goals and before I knew it, in this glorious moment we realized I could, actually follow this yearning that we both had for me to be at home with the kids.  It was possible.    It was actually possible.  Not wanting to jump too fast, knowing full well rash decisions had burned us in the past, we slept on it.  We talked, we prayed, we slept on it again and then I put in my resignation. 

There have been a few times in my life when a decision transcends emotion and logic and all the best possible consideration.  It is a decision that plants my feet on higher ground, as the song goes and not only feels good and makes sense, it stirs a deep knowledge that you are doing exactly what you are supposed to be doing. 

Sometimes things are not that settled.  Sometimes you jump and pray you’ve made the right choice; it’s a true leap that takes faith.  Other times, you know exactly what you’re doing here.  It’s solidity and firmness that does not come from within oneself it is rightness; a truth. 

Now my path has taken another turn.  I’m a little nervous but I know that this is right and good.  The truest of rights and the noblest of good. 

I will miss my friends and coworkers but I am overjoyed at the idea of finally doing what I feel called to do in this season of our lives. 

(The above picture is my grandmother's coffee mug.  I remember her drinking coffee early in the morning, reading her bible and watching the hot air balloons out her back porch window in Albuquerque.  I drink my coffee out of it when I'm feeling contemplative.)

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