I’m a pessimist. I’m a writer, but I have doubts about whether or not I even spelled that right. Or correctly. But I’m also changing.
Two years ago I started a job at an Ottawa marketing company, after years and years of running my own business. I was scared sh*tless about working at an “agency.” It didn’t take long to discover that people hide in jobs where there’s structure and false formality. One of the partners at my old employer is single-handedly keeping that good company from being Great. And nobody will ever do anything about it. Back in April, one of the partners of the same firm told me to choose between my comfy full-time gig there and Project Porchlight. I followed my heart and was unemployed for nearly 3 months.
That was really hard. I don’t regret it for a second.
Today we delivered our 75,000th bulb in Ottawa — 4 million dollars of energy savings and 9 million pounds of coal that won’t be burned and pumped into our air as smog.
I’m 38 years old. And I’m beginning to believe that I can really do good things. It’s not in my nature. And I’m not going to let pessimism and pessimists hold me back.