Let’s put it straight, this site has stayed pretty dormant this year despite my best intentions. Even though I had grand plan of putting this little creative outlet at the front and center, the progress has been slow. Even my previous quarterly review got published late.

While a lot of the struggle could be pointed to the travel infused and hectic schedule at the beginning of the year, the more recent development is much more serious. Our organization at work went through some major changes, and the resulting dysfunctionality is driving me towards a burnout, plain and simple. The past few months have probably been the worst time for my mental health during my whole life so far. It’s not even that timetables are tight, and the work itself isn’t all the complicated per se. But once you’re constantly set out to obvious and repeated failures by your own management, it will start to take a toll on you. When even the customer says “I would rather not deliver, than deliver something that doesn’t fucking work” should be a sign to any sane person, that something seriously needs to change. For some odd reason it’s not.

I lack the internal agency due to external pressure, and there’s no easy fix in sight. Except the one that I know: leaving. I don’t even bother to talk about three pillars this time, because there’s only one priority at this point: finding a new job.

Fortunately, I’m experiencing different kind of external pressure as well, not the suppressing kind, but the enabling kind. I’m at a point in my professional career where I’m approached by recruiters rather frequently. I’ve had some interviews, and some processes are ongoing. Maybe in the most absurd twist I’m even being considered for two different ‘Head of…’ level positions. Only because I half-jokingly gave a tad high salary request for an engineering position? I don’t yet know if the process is actually heading anywhere, but I’m certainly considering the positions if I get an offer. At least I learned that sometimes being bold and audacious can pay off.

The next twist is that none of the positions are actually in Switzerland, so any of these opportunities would require me to relocate abroad once again, with some exotic locations included in the list. Just a year ago international relocation was on my ‘someday’ list, now it’s seems like an integral part of my life that I can do without a second thought. I certainly have a feeling that I’m running away from something that makes the change easier, but I still take the momentum over stagnation.

While the idea of relocation is certainly stressful, especially in my current mental state, it still offers me some excitement. Not a lot, but excitement that I haven’t felt for a while. And I hope that excitement once again breaths new air into The Spongia Project, as I feel a new chapter in my origin story is starting.