LEAVING A JOB DURING A PANDEMIC?
8 Years. 7 Months. + Working during a pandemic.
It’s been a weird year. As much as I reflect on it, I still struggle with putting into words what brought me to this decision, especially when the beginning of the year seemed so promising, with so many opportunities on the horizon. During the start of a pandemic, everything changing and the world reacting in response to this new idea of social distancing and working from home, it would change everything for me in a major way. Add in the heightened racial tensions and the uncovering of the disparities that has always there and you come up with a very different outlook especially being affected by it directly.
On one hand you have all of the projects that is within your grasps and in the space of the direction you want to go in and then you have your actual work that is deemed “essential”. While everyone has a work from home plan, that leaves no plan for the essential work that needs to be done on site. All of the projects gets cancelled or postponed and there is no real plan for it to continue and work becomes stressful. You hear about everyone’s experience working from home and how they hate it, and how its hard being at home and its an experience you can’t understand because you’re working, in a pandemic, risking your life and facing the unknown while being tasks with everything outside of your job description. You rarely hear the experience on the opposite side from those deemed essential outside of healthcare. It definitely puts a strain on finding ways to be creative and the time set aside for creativity.
Launching ELSV in 2014 and revisiting it in 2019 with plans for 2020 was a highlight for where it seemed 2020 was going. With a planned event in March, that would kickstart the original goal that helped launch ELSV — creating a space for Black Voices often silenced; celebrating Black stories and Black Creatives and pushing the boundaries of what it looks like to be Black in the future. 2020 has been a year that has brought unexpected challenges. Months into a pandemic and having to take a concerning look at where things are and where they are heading and what is important in a time of uncertainty can be alarming. Being deemed essential but being overlooked, left out and forgotten can also be alarming. So deciding on the plan you had in mind long before Covid-19 becomes easy. Reflecting on leaving, one month later, puts things into perspective. If 2020 can teach us anything, it is the resilience we have when faced with a variety of difficulties — That we can become stronger and adapt and thrive in spite of. So for me, a new city, rebuilding a brand, taking on new opportunities becomes promising. It becomes a step that seems necessary when looking at the upside of 2020.