A senior engineer asked me in our meeting last week what to do about being told she needed to 'set the agenda' for her team - local and wider. And I asked her if she had nobody telling her what to do what she would do. And she told me she'd do the thing that's been on their roadmap for years that just got deprioritized. And I tried to be nice but my brain was screaming 'you have seen countless incidents and have your ear to the ground in this group and all you can think of is the thing other people decided was important 3 years ago? After some prodding in that direction she mentioned another path. I wrote them both in out notes doc but left feeling unsatisfied and kinda like I had looked in a mirror and not liked what I saw. Luckily I'd find out this week she had presented this other idea she had in the forward looking meeting and everybody loved it and wanted her to lead it up....so she is good at setting an agenda with prodding and permission. And we all know those two things are like training wheels - you ditch them pretty quick and stay upright on that bike.
The next day I decided last minute to join a course on financial moxie. In it I heard a bunch of women say 'I know my vision and my goals but I don't have the discipline.' and I thought - I'm exactly the inverse! I know where every cent is and how it got there and all my predictions based on past averages....but I have no idea what I want for my future besides... this? but more?
Luckily the coach made us write down intentions and mine was to add a new piece to my morning routine. I didn't know what to add yet but I wanted something.
On Sunday night I decided to finish the sentence "I want..." as many times as I like (but at least once!) every morning. On Monday I started and it was rocky. I felt weird and awkward. But I was trying.
Also on Monday I hosted a little get unstuck session for the women engineers on the East Coast. We talked about burnout in the senior engineers. And we were so lucky one of the junior engineers felt comfortable sharing her struggle around moving up the ladder. She said 'In order to get promoted I feel like I can't work on what I want to work on and there's this hustle to get to the next level and then I feel like once I do that I then have to hustle to the next level and then maybe I can do things I want to do?" We of course consoled her that she can push back against the rush - with examples of those who have and the timelines, etc. But it rang the bell in my head. I had just heard senior engineers complain of burnout - of not really being interested in their work anymore, in losing the joy and curiosity and intrinsic motivation in their jobs. And now I was almost pushing the rewind button and this junior engineer was playing the ghost of engineer's past. Her exact plight was one we had gone through - despite us assuring her she didn't have to feel that way. We had felt that way. We had tamped down our intuitions and our desires to do certain kinds of work or take chances/ opportunities in order to move through the ladder. And now here we are with our bright shiny promotions behind us and feeling like husks that don't what we want. But we're senior so we must know what we want and it must be the thing we're doing....so why does that thing make us unhappy? ah because we're 'burned out'. So I advised all of the junior engineers: Stop putting down your own intuition of what you want. Bring those things to your manager - try to get them scheduled! If nothing else write them down so you can remember. Don't do what we did.
And so I continued on my journey to writing what I wanted.
And unexpected things came out of me. I had recently been thinking about how timesaving it was that I'd traded my hour long pilates classes for 15 minute morning routines. But when 'I want' was on the page my fingers typed out 'to keep doing hour long workouts'.
And conflicting things came out of me. One morning I was feeling frustrated with my partner and I wrote 'I want to tell him what to do' and then the next line I immediately wrote 'I want to not tell him what to do." - internal struggle was afoot. But I let go of my frustration - it obviously wasn't bringing me peace or clarity. And 4 days later I don't even remember what it was about. Phew - glad I avoided that relationship quicksand.
That wasn't the only change I made from the list. One day I wrote that I wanted to read more again (over the weekend I went to NJ and got through 2 full books on the train. Damn it felt good). So one night I was settling into the couch and grabbed the remote, bracing myself to do the Netflix infinite scroll. And suddenly I was like wait...why am I going to scroll for 20 minutes then reluctantly watch a shitty show? I'll just go read. This week I have finished another 2 books and I don't miss the unwatched streaming at all.
Plus, it reminded me to celebrate. One day a consultant I had booked texted to say she could move my appointment up a month. I was excited! The next day as I went to write my wants I saw that the last entry from the previous day said I wanted to have that appointment sooner. Maybe the law of attraction really is a thing!...Or at least I took a moment to be extra grateful that I was getting what I wanted.
Anyway - I don't think this just happens to women senior engineers. We all can get a bit lost. And especially in covid when we may have finally had enough boredom to get to the top of that 'someday' list only to find checking off the someday ideals we made decades ago leaves us with the 'is this it?' feeling. We need to reconnect with what we want. I believe all skills and traits are practiceable - even things like creativity. So why would wanting be any different? I want to want things again. I want to know what I want. So every day I try to let the little wants bubble to the surface, hoping soon I'll want bigger and bigger things. But in the meantime, just 6 days had proved this habit worth keeping for at least a bit longer!
