Something that most people don’t seem to realize is that you can learn life lessons in everything you do. Some of those life lessons came way after the events happened in my life. An example of that is the lessons that I learned after an internship in 2015. Back then I didn’t realize what that period had taught me because I was too busy being depressed. Being depressed is a full-time commitment you know. That 6-week internship would eventually push me deeper down the dark hole and 7 months later I had a second burnout in a single year. I guess we can consider the rest as history.
A trip back in time before I share the life lessons.
Back in 2013, I decided to quit the course that I was following in college. I studied IT for a year but quit as soon as my knee injury (lasted for 2 years) got healed. Back then I had 8 days to take up a new course since I was going to travel with my then-girlfriend to Turkey. A lot of people were telling me what they assumed was best for me. Most people back then wanted me to be a teacher but the idea didn’t entertain me. Eventually, I decided to become an education generalist (there is not a term for it in English, a social worker could apply as well I guess). Why? No idea to be honest. It made sense back then. Looking back on it now I assume that I wanted to help people because I knew deep down that I needed help. I was projecting it on other people to feel better about myself I assume (more on this in the last part).
Back then my reasoning was as followed: I worked a lot with kids when I was a skateboard teacher during summer camps for about 3 years and I liked helping people so I signed up and went to enjoy the sun in Turkey.
[ctt template=”8″ link=”Uj96n” via=”yes” ]Looking back on it now I assume that I wanted to help people because I knew deep down that I needed help. I was projecting it on other people to feel better about myself[/ctt]A road trip to burnout city.
The college system in Belgium requires you to do 2 internships before you graduate. One after 2 years that lasts 6 weeks and then one after 3 years which lasts a whole semester. I started the first one not knowing what I was getting myself into, to be honest. There wasn’t a lot of information about it so I signed up to work 6 weeks with drug addicts and kids with behavioral problems. The weeks were always the same. The kids (teenagers) would come in on Monday and you would guide them through the week and see progress. They would go back to their parents during the weekend and the next Monday you could start again from scratch. This is an exhausting process, especially with the state of mind that I had back then.
At one point I asked my mentor how people kept doing it for so long. She replied that everybody had multiple burnouts and eventually quit. It was normal according to her. After the 6 weeks, I remember that I was longing for a break but I was never able to take the break. I went straight into finals, a new semester and so on.
Heading out of burnout city.
So in the summer of 2015, I had giant burnout, almost killed myself and eventually, all of this led to me accepting that I was completely depressed. All of that made sure that I started taking action towards a better life. Back then I failed a lot of finals so my second internship was postponed for a year. I had 2 pretty chill semesters because of that where I started to turn my life around because I had a lot of free time. At one point I realized that doing another internship was the last thing I wanted. So in the summer of 2016, I dropped out since I knew what I wanted plus I kind of realized that doing another internship would have been pretty stupid because I suddenly learned these 2 lessons.
Life lessons: Helping people is noble but…
Remember that my mentor back then said that burnouts were normal? Most of the people had multiple burnouts because the job is that taxing. A lot of people gave me shit for not wanting to go back. They claimed that helping people was a noble thing to do and I agree on that but… Trying to help people who don’t want to be helped is depressing. You’re walking around with a dead weight on your shoulders. You’re exhausting yourself because there is no progress made. The job would be great if you’d work with kids that want to be helped. Those kids were expelled from school so they had to go somewhere otherwise they’d end up on the streets. They didn’t want to be there and they showed it as well.
After that, I never tried to help people who didn’t want to be helped again. I learned my lesson rather quickly on that one. The ones that don’t want to be helped will drag you down. I doubt they do it intentionally but they do it.
The main lesson here is simple: always try to help people but walk away if they don’t want to be helped. Some people will unintentionally drag you along in their misery and then 2 people are fucked instead of one.
Your environment matters.
People don’t seem to realize that your environment matters a lot. That goes both ways. The kids went home and the root cause of the problems was situated at home or at least in their inner circle. Those kids weren’t making progress because their environment stayed the same. But the same goes for the people I worked with. The meetings were mostly frustrating because the co-workers would complain a lot to each other. They saw it as therapy but the reality is that this had the opposite effect. They were dragging each other down and didn’t seem to realize it. The meetings sometimes got out of hand because people would snap at each other.
The main lesson here is simple: Your environment matters whether you like it or not so pick it wisely. Be aware of the people who could potentially drag you down. I’ve seen people blossom in the right environment or around the right people but they then went back to “normal” as soon as they were back with their regular friends.
Life lessons and this blog.
Remember this sentence “Looking back on it now I assume that I wanted to help people because I knew deep down that I needed help. I was projecting it on other people to feel better about myself I assume”. Well, one of my classmates had a huge drug addiction. Cocaine was the preferred drug and she used her student card to make the lines. I once took her student card, asked her to look at it and told her she was sniffing her future away. She was shocked and I just didn’t care. But you know what was even more shocking?
She did both of her internships in a rehabilitation clinic. I’m not kidding, she reasoned that she would understand the clients better and I agree that experience can help but only if you successfully rehabbed as well. She was still doing drugs, like all of them and pretty frequently.
I’ve seen this a lot in that particular sector. Most people had unresolved trauma and were doing this to feel better about themselves. The same goes for psychologists, they are mostly looking to find themselves. But what does that have to do with the blog you ask?
[ctt template=”8″ link=”KE3uC” via=”yes” ]Cocaine was the preferred drug and she used her student card to make the lines. I once took her student card, asked her to look at it and told her she was sniffing her future away. She was shocked and I just didn’t care. I was only sharing facts.[/ctt]2016 is the start of the Alpha era.
This blog was started in July 2016 very soon after my college dropout and one year after my second burnout. At that point, I realized that I had a pretty crazy story (you don’t even know half of it) to tell that could help other people. I decided to start writing about it because in that way I could help people who wanted to see a light of the tunnel. The ones who don’t want it either post a hateful comment or just leave the blog. Back when I did that internship I was helping people but I was acting out of my interest. Those times have changed and this blog has even changed some lives.
In the end, that’s what it’s all about.
Till next time
Alex
