Thanks Anita, glad it helped and if it helps others, good. Interesting about the difference between public and private roles. Most of my colleagues in the US were on a much shorter notice period, usually two weeks max! There is much less union influence here in the UK, though depends on what industry, defn still stronger in the public sector.

Can entirely understand retiring to the woods as it was actually one of my big reasons for enduring with the long commute for so long – it meant I could stay living out in the country and not move into the city. Was worth it for me by far, both mentally and financially!

Michelle

*reposting w/out links until moderator passes them. Thanks.

Hi Tannhauser.

Apols for the delay in getting back, have been away travelling for the night. I also wanted to spend some time reading more about this experience in order to try to better understand.

Thankyou for sharing that, realise it must have been quite scary opening up on a subject you are well aware will seem strange to most, hard to accept, so thankyou for sharing. Whilst it’s good to hear you reached out to your local parish priest I’m not too surprised they weren’t equipped to deal with your situation. The Catholic faith in particular is not exactly renowned for it’s acceptance or even tolerance of anything outside its own teachings. Like anything in life though, what matters is what you believe and value, not what others do. A lot of people’s pain lies with spending their time trying to convince others to believe the same as they do, in order to make themselves feel more secure.

So it is not surprising you will meet resistance if you focus on convincing others of your truth – what matters now though is getting to a state where you are able to exist with it yourself.  I wanted to share this first link of another Kundalini experience/survivor – as it was one of the ones I read that jumped out to me as offering a pragmatic path through.

What I thought stood out in her story is the importance of looking after yourself first, in order to be able to live with this experience.  Being in the best physical shape you can be, eating well, cutting back on the booze, spending time outside, ideally in nature etc – all the stuff that helps us all be strong. It sounds like you will need to be as strong as you can be to get through this, so anything you can do to start a healthy routine is going to help you retain your sense of self whilst you accept this change.

This second link is not such an easy read but an illuminating one from a science perspective of what is happening in your brain whilst these experiences occur. I thought this one was reassuring from seeing how other people have had similar experiences and come through it ok.

I hope they are of some use/interest. I think the big thing for you is going to be to find a way to live with this and look to build the protection of a small ‘Tannhauser’ space whilst you go through the change. If everything you have believed in through your life has let you down, you are going to have to rebuild your own sense of self. It is not that different to any other major life disruption – people have gone through and survived and even thrived, eventually.  Is there something or someone who particularly makes you feel grounded, makes you feel safe?

All the best,

Michelle

Hi Anita,

Sure, happy to try – this is all UK/EU based, US is another law into itself with even less perm rights usually as I understand it.

The nature of ‘perm’ is as you implied earlier on, much less ‘perm’ than most people tend to believe them to be. It’s a big part of why a lot of people in the kinds of industry I worked in preferred to be self-employed contractors – bizarrely more control over their own future. But that’s not what you asked, apols. So in UK, notice periods for new roles tend to be one month, rising with seniority and length at company. Most contracts have 2 weeks notice, some one week and some one month. So at the outset, not a huge difference in notice period between perm and contract.  Perm jobs come with worker rights, as Tom says, re holiday pay, sick pay, training etc etc. It’s the big difference between the two and why contract roles tend to pay higher as you are basically charging the company for your own estimate of those benefits to you.  There are laws around the process to make perm roles redundant as opposed to simply giving contractors their notice. But statutory redundancy pay (in UK at least) is very minimal, good companies pay much higher than they are legally obliged to do.  If the number of roles being made redundant is less than a certain number, it can be a quick process – but it is a process and then you are paid your notice & stat.redundancy minimum. So they are better than contract roles if you are not interested in the flexibility and higher pay of contracting long time but as you said, not a guarantee, still with their own risks.

Correct, no fee if the person applies direct but that’s pretty unusual these days. Most people once they have a few years experience under their belt will move through a recruitment agency, not directly and tbh, I’ve heard of very few people getting hired via LinkedIn not through an agency. Agencies charge differently for contractors vs perms and amounts also depend on how new they are, how much they want your business, usual supply/demand stuff!  LinkedIn is pushed hard by HR departments internally in order to save the agency fees but most manager’s will tell you it very rarely results in finding quality people at the speed needed.

Hope that helps explain a bit – and as said, all based on my own/colleagues experience/knowledge, sure others have much good wisdom too for sure.  Btw – Tom – totally second Anita’s comments on this is your own decision, it’s what you think is the right decision for you.  If you are really worried, you can buy insurance to pay your mortgage in the event of extended unemployment.  A long commute is tiring, I personally found it worth it but that’s in large part because it fitted with my own long-term plan to retire very early. So long as you know why you are doing it, that’s what’s important. Best of luck whichever way you go.

Hey Tom,

Sounds like they have gone out of their way to make this work for you – which is a very good sign. It is not unusual to only be able to offer the contract until the end of the year, it’s how internal budgets work and they will likely be unable to get approval for any longer. The budget process is also often odd in that perm headcount and budget spend are two different things. When I was managing my teams for example I would often have budget for contractors but would be unable to hire perm people because of head count limits.

So, worst case, you are relying on them to have the same budget again next year to extend the contract, which is likely. Best case, whilst you are there they make the case for an additional headcount and you become perm. It is also much easier to apply for other perm jobs once you are in the company just through your increased connections etc. So all sounds pretty good to me for a company you want to work for in a role that will stretch you – as said, all life is a risk but this is a pretty well-balanced one in my view.

Anita, if it helps –  the savings advice is good advice but it applies to both contract and perm people since both roles are at risk. Many perm jobs have very short notice periods these days, though still a couple weeks longer than contract roles. 2-3 months is the average time it takes to find and start a new job, though contract can often be quicker than perm to start. So regardless of which role, pretty much everyone is recommended to have an emergency fund to cover 2-3 months living expenses when possible, though know it’s harder when starting out.  There’s finder’s fees for both perm and contract roles, the level depends on the agency used – some are much worse than others for sure!

Hope helps. Happy to help out on any other practical q’s – as Anita said, I’ve spent a fair bit of my life successfully negotiating these things! Am out now, back late Sat (UK time )

Hey both,

Good to hear from you Kkasxo, hoping all goes well with the move – not too far off now I guess?

Shelby, glad you are getting through the days ok. Yeah, it can be hard when everybody else is pairing up and settling down, especially when it’s the ones you thought would be single with you for a while yet. It used to make me feel even lonelier at times if going out with happily-couple friends. But comparing yourself to others is a one-way street to disaster on anything, everyone has their own path, there is no such thing as where you should be, what you should have done by now etc, despite family/society pressure to say otherwise.  It just takes confidence to be able to ignore those opinions, especially when yours has just been badly knocked again, that’s all.

And if you want any travel advice – I’m your gal 🙂   What does your gut say about what you would like out of trip? How long do you want to go for? I wouldn’t worry too much about knowing what you want next, whilst your life is upside-down again for a while you will be all over the place with go/don’t go I think.  Or you could end up with the “s*d it, I’ll just go try” when you get tired of thinking about it all too much..

Hope you enjoyed your night out/away – sometimes when I least felt like gong out was when it was exactly the right thing to do!

Morning.

Yep, you can’t change a person into what you want them to be, no matter how hard you wish or demand it.  This was always going to be about you eventually either accepting him as he is or giving up on your vision of how it could/should be, accepting the reality of what is, not what you want it to be.

I know you’ve never believed you can have a good future. In some ways I still think you don’t feel you deserve it. But you do and you will. How do I know/believe that?  Because I can tell you are kind, smart, funny, honest – and trying to be the best you can. You just need to look after yourself more. So I know you will survive this, one day at a time. We’ll be here for you.

Hey Tom.

So like Anita says, everything is a risk/reward balance in life.  It sounds like you are more than ready to leave your current role – once you know something inside out it quickly leads to stagnation. I suspect if you tried to imagine yourself doing the same thing in ten years you’d pretty quickly be wondering why you didn’t take the chance.

If you wanted a long-term move into contracting, then absolutely, I’d be saying go for it. But you sound like you would be happiest back in a perm job eventually. It’s not too unusual to start as a contract and then apply for other perm jobs once inside the new company – i.e. use the 6 months on offer to build networks quickly and make it very clear to everyone you are looking to move into a perm role. What do they say when yo ask them about future perm roles – it’s a lot different than just regular reviews as to if the contract is extended or not. What’s the notice period on the contract  – sometimes it can be as short as a week and sometimes up to a month? There’s ways to ensure you protect yourself from the financial risk such as mortgage unemployment insurance and ensuring you have savings to cover 3 months payments – given it’s average time to start new job etc, which can help manage the risk.

Most contracts don’t include holiday as the higher pay is to reflect the lack of that and sick pay etc, all the other benefits of perm roles. So the way to work out if it’s a good offer is to adjust the wage for the same proportion of holiday/sick/other benefits you would have in a perm role to make sure they are paying enough to cover that.

At the end of the day – you need a role which stretches you and something where you are growing. But like said, may be worth talking to a few other agencies/companies proactively before deciding just on this one. You may be surprised how sought after your skills are if you haven’t looked for a while.