I love work. This may sound foreign and a bit on the crazy side to most people, but working helps me relax and clear my mind. When I was 14 I got my first job as a waitress at a small restaurant called Wild Bill’s, located in the middle of an undeveloped desert valley in Arizona. I worked there for a little over a year, before I took a full-time nanny job for six months, then eventually started working at a high school Taco Bell. I was home schooled during my childhood, which gave me the opportunity to start working early in life. Many people have disagreed with the idea of me starting formal employment so young, feeling that I should have concentrated more on just being a kid, but I am truly grateful for the love it instilled in me for hard work, and a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction at such a young age.
Over the years, my work transitioned into more career related jobs. I began a job in social work that involved working for the county in which I lived, assisting the elderly that had no family to manage their money and avoid being taken advantage of. However, after I married and had my first child, I knew that I wanted to stay home with her and be a full-time mother. My mother stayed at home with my 7 siblings, and me and I was taught that a woman’s most important role in life was as a mother and wife. While I do agree that those roles are the most important to myself personally, as my focus in life is on creating meaningful relationships, I have also had to come to terms with and accept that part of me that loves the challenge of a career of some kind.
I used to feel guilty and that it was a fault of mine that I wasn’t completely content focusing only on being a wife and mother. Thankfully, over the years I’ve learned that for me to be the best wife and mother I can be, I need to be fulfilled as an individual person, because someday my children will move out, and because you never know what life has in store, I could end up alone in my later years. Once I came to that realization and embraced it, I gave myself freedom to explore what type of work I love, and, found that I have the most joy working for myself, from my own home on projects that are important to me personally and that benefit other people as well.
In 2007, my brother and I started an online job board that helps people drill down and locate their own careers that can be done from their homes. The challenge of creating something online, accessible to literally the whole world was very stimulating and exciting to both of us. Almost 7 years later, we are still excited to start ‘work’ each day. I find personal fulfillment and more meaning in my life as I create online and contribute to the rest of society on a daily basis through my work.
Now I wake up around 5 am each morning, excited to start the day’s projects and get a little bit of work done on my website before the kid’s and my husband wake up and I switch back to wife and mom mode.
