So my employer has given us another raise - they have bumped our salaries up again in accordance with the increase in New York salaries. I say again because they already did this once this year - effective January 1. Now they have done it again - which makes 4 pay increases for me since I started working there 14 months ago - and it isn't an insignificant amount.
Frankly, I think they might have lost their minds. As I said before in another post, most of us would gladly give part of the money back in exchange for some of our time. Then again, we have it really good as far as hours go. Of course I am not complaining about this, though I have some concern that it is going to mean we have to work harder and I already work extremely hard as those of you who know me are aware of.
Anyway, I am tremendously grateful and also excited about this happening - though I feel like I shouldn't admit that. It's okay to be excited about getting a raise right? I already feel like people judge me and make assumptions about me for being successful and in some ways I am almost ashamed to admit it. I should be proud of myself and not ashamed of it. I deserve it right? I don't think most people would be sitting here having this debate in his or her head. They would just say thank you and enjoy it.
People always say that money doesn't buy you happiness, and I can tell you that this is true - cause I've experienced this first hand. Trying to buy happiness or find it outside of myself, in people and things - always believing that some other thing that I just have to get my hands on will make me happy. It isn't true. But I would be lying if I didn't say that it makes life easier - that it buys you freedom and it buys you options and that I would be less happy under different circumstances. Surviving breast cancer though has really made me appreciate what matters in life - and it isn't anything that money can buy.
I feel like people think I am greedy or selfish because I am excited about this (or maybe that idea is planted in my brain because my mother started telling me that when I was 8 years old) but I do have an appreciation for everything I have - because everything I have I worked for and got all on my own, with no help from anyone, and in spite of a horrible childhood and an utter lack of support. People always tell me that it is amazing that my brother and I are both successful and functional given the way we grew up.
Anyway, like I said, I have earned everything I have and gotten it all on my own. With the exception of my sobriety that is - my sobriety I owe to more people than I can count, and AA and God. Of everything I have, and I have been blessed I think, my sobriety is the most important. My sobriety and my health. Everything else is icing on the cake.
2 comments:
Hey...do appreciate the raises now. Just don't blow it all on silly stuff like so many young lawyers I know do. They think the money will last forever, like a river of gold...and then they decide to quit or they get sick or they just want to buy a bigger house and they need the money---and darn they realize they've blown it all.
Sort of like my hubby, 15 years after his call to the bar he's thinking maybe he didn't need the made-to-measure suits for so many years. Just something to keep in mind---I'm pretending to be everyone's pseudo mother this week, don't mind me.
Oh you don't have to worry about me blowing it all - I'm a money hoarder - almost to the extreme!! I save as much as possible! :)
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