I'm not going to lie, you're going to see a lot of work-related posts in this blog. The fact is I code for a living and it's what I love to do so it stands to reason that since it's not only what I love but what I do every day that I'll have quite a few blogs about it. That being said, I wish to share one of life's lessons with you.
Today - Monday, October 20th, 2008 - I learned a valuable life lesson about trust. As many of you know, trust is hard to gain and easily broken. Trust is terribly fragile and once betrayed, it's very hard to establish a relationship with the person that betrayed said trust. Some people are out for themselves, it's a fact of life. That's not necessarily a bad thing because, in the end, it's simply animal instinct to make sure you come out on top - survival of the fittest, if you will.
You might be wonder what I'm babbling about. It boils down to the fact that I had my 6 month review today at work. I thought it went fairly well. I didn't get the raise I wanted but I got a bonus and I was told the raise would most certainly happen at the 1 year mark, mainly because the company is slowly being drained of funds by unmentionable sources. I left the meeting with a good feeling. I was sure my faith in the company, and most importantly my boss, had been renewed (we had a bit of a blowout last week when he managed to come down on the whole department because he was having a bad week). I knew he had lied to me before but I figured I could get past it and continue a working relationship with him. After all, I'm still getting paid. I found out later in the day that although he presented me with two options during our meeting, one of those options had money attached which was not mentioned. In retrospect he led me to the choice he wanted me to make and I fell for it hook, line, and sinker. Mind you that I have yet to sign a contract with the terms we agreed to in that office and I most certainly won't sign anything until I explore all the possibilities open to me.
I'm very childlike in my mentality. To me, things tend to be black or white. I'm a developer, I guess you can say I see things as binary or boolean, 1 or 0, true or false. I tend to trust those around me. It's clearly not the best practice but at the same time I don't wish to be closed to the world and unapproachable. It seems I merely need to open my eyes instead of needing somebody to accidentally tell me something for it to hit me. Maybe I'm not ready for the real world. The real world is ugly, full of lies and betrayal. It's a place for the battle-hardened. I find it difficult to justify what happened in that office today. I can't comprehend what motivation he had to mislead me (or lead me, in this case). I have a lot of growing ahead of me and a big decision to make in the next few days.
I originally thought of quitting because I can't work for somebody who is going to constantly lie to me and I'm supposed to trust that this person is relaying my messages to upper management and back in the chain of command. I'm not sure I can deal with the pressures of work as well as having to worry about what he's lied to me about today. However I also thought of the fact that I'm not there to understand him. I'm there for me and to further my career. If I make as much money as possible at the company and put as many projects as possible on my resumé it can only benefit me and I'll have a huge stepping stone for my next job.
I'll have to see what I end up doing in the next few days.
