Goodbye Indefinitely, Advertising.

I packed a small box which contained my Star Wars figurines, a few pens, a small overly inked calendar, a burned DVD containing all the songs I had leeched from officemates, and a notebook containing doodles and notes from meetings that have come and gone. This was my Advertising career, summarized in one small box.

I looked around the place I called familiar for the last year and a half. To the people that were there, this day was no different from the last to the next couple of days – this is work. Though to me, that night, that was the signal of the end of me being something that was so clear cut. That was the night I stopped following the path that was supposedly mine ever since University.

I looked at the busy faces, heard the hurried steps, felt the urgent typing, and I drank it all in for one last time. I will miss this, I will miss them.

For the duration of my short career, I have always been grateful to have had mentors who taught me how to not only be an Account Executive, but taught me the value of organization, patience, enjoying the little things (like taking a break and eating a piece of chocolate), understanding, and breathing the bad juju away – traits I admittedly lacked coming into the world of Advertising.

I have grown a lot in this world, despite the time I punched in – it was something I enjoyed doing but I also knew that there was something I needed and wanted to do. I needed to walk the Earth and choose the road that was scary and unsure while I still had the chance – where it wasn’t so scary to get scars from leaping into the unknown.

I needed to grow in a new world and find what it means to live outside of a cubicle, answering e-mails, phone calls, and text messages all day. I sat in my chair for one last time, as if trying to convince myself that this is where I belonged and if I had done the right thing, but I knew my feet wanted to go and explore unfamiliar territory. That it was in that moment where everything was so clear and scary at the same time.

I knew that the moment I walked out of those doors, I was walking into a life that didn’t have a steady paycheck, stability, or even health care. But I was excited for the uncertainty because I was exploring and living this life for me now. That for the first time, in a long time, I was fully accountable for keeping myself alive.

As I sat up, I felt like I was leaving a part of me in that chair, in that office. But I was sure that I was leaving a piece of me in every person I loved in those four walls. I felt like crying but the tears wouldn’t come because I knew, even though I wouldn’t see them as often as I wanted, I’d still see them again because the Universe has a very funny way of colliding people to each other, especially when they mean a lot to you.

I hugged all of them. They were selfishly mine for a few seconds before we let go and wished each other the best of luck.

To my mentors and friends, thank you. I miss you all every day, but you are all in my thoughts and you all somehow manifest in how I do work and I will always be grateful for that.

I have been walking this new path for a little over a month now, and it still remains to be scary and unpredictable – yet very refreshing and I have learned a lot about myself and the way life works in just this small amount of time. The road has been hard, and it will get harder, I know this – but I take this route with a bag full of optimism and love.

Sometimes, in order to understand the rain – we must go out willingly without an umbrella; open our hands to the sky and close our eyes. We must experience the world we live in for ourselves, but we must have the courage to accept the consequences of our decisions.

So with this, I bid farewell, indefinitely, to the world of Advertising.

Thank you for all the opportunities and the people I’ve had the privilege of colliding with. Especially the people.