I’ve been reading Kasie West’s Split Second, which has me thinking back on Pivot Point. In Pivot Point, Addie lives out two different paths of her life. She can see how one decision can change everything. That got me thinking about my own “pivot point”.
In September, I quit my job. I had that job for like a week, and then I quit. Because of that one decision, the whole rest of my year changed.
Suddenly my visa was due to expire in one year instead of two. I went back to school to finish my final year. I got engaged. I moved in with my fiancé.
But none of that would have happened had I not quit my job! Just for fun, I spent a moment thinking about what my life would be like right now if I had kept that job. Well, right now I’d be working in a stuffy office instead of laying in bed with hot chocolate at 11:45am (hah). I wouldn’t be able to live with my fiancé because he works in Cambridge and my job was in London. I’d only be able to see him on some weekends. But we wouldn’t even be engaged!
I just really got thinking how crazy it is how one decision can change everything. And looking back at that moment, I feel like I definitely made the right choice, and that’s a good feeling!
Definitely. I had been set up on a date by some friends whom I’d comp’ed into a play I was doing. Found out a couple of weeks later that the man was married … when his wife returned home from vacation with her 19 year old boyfriend in tow! Within a few days, the woman accused her husband of abuse and he was arrested. Several nights later I got a knock on my door. I knew it was him. I also had a back door where I could have escaped. But I let him in. A week or two later, I found out the woman was at the very least a liar. A friend said that this man had been arrested again a block from the house for waving a large gun at a policeman and was on his way to jail. Trouble was, at the time this was supposed to have happened, I was with the husband in a local coffee bar. Hmmm…
Of course, if this had not happened, I may not have met my current husband, nor had any of my children. It was a scary time, but I would not trade a bit of what I have now.
It is kind of crazy when you think about how one decision can influence (possibly) the rest of your life. I’m glad you feel as if you made the right one! 😀
I don’t know if I have a a decision that suddenly changed everything but the one big decision that could have led to me life being VERY different was what I studied at university.
I chose to study science (marine + wildlife biology) with Honours, because I’ve loved animals since before I can remember. I also wanted to study creative writing at university, but I didn’t think I was a good enough writer to be able to rely on my creative side for a career.
Back when making that decision, I had absolutely no clue about the publishing industry. And since I’ve started book blogging, I realise that I wouldn’t have had to solely rely on my writing if I had studied writing at university. I could have gone into publishing – which I would absolutely love to do right now.
So now, even though I am graduating my degree at the end of the year – I don’t really know what I want to do. Maybe it could have been a lot clearer if I had chosen to study writing at university rather than taking the science route as I did. I know I would have met different people, and my career most likely would have been completely different (even though I haven’t started it yet).
So yeah. I don’t think it was a decision that would have suddenly changed things, but I definitely think it was a decision with a whole lot of implications.
Anyway, super personal comment – sorry!
I’ll probably be completely lame and say deciding to go into blogging really changed things for me. I have NO idea what I’d be doing if I wasn’t into reviewing/blogging. I’d be writing still, but blogging is my go-to for relaxing from tormenting my characters (okay, lol, totally just didn’t admit that) and writing WAS kind of driving me crazy when it was my only creative out-let.
This is so interesting to think about!
I think, for me, my “pivot point” was staying in the town I graduated college from. I got a job offer, and I took it. If I hadn’t done that, I’m not sure where I would be now. I think by now I would have found another job, sure, but it would have been in a different city most likely. I’d probably have different friends. I’d be working in a completely different field.
That’s awesome! Sometimes bad things turn out to be good things after all 🙂
I have a pivot point, too! I quit my job (I was miserable) back in November of 2012 to go stay with my grandma in Florida for 3 months. When I came back, I wanted to look for a new job because I didn’t want to go back. I didn’t have any ideas of where to go, so I just sucked it up and went back anyway. I had a pretty good relationship with my boss (of 6 years), and she had a son that I knew – not really well – but thought was pretty cool. I’d gone to a concert with him and his sister (who also worked with me) once and had fun. My boss suggested one day that I go to Buffalo Wild Wings with her to celebrate her son’s birthday. 11 months later, I’m engaged to that man – the love of my life! I think if I had decided to find a different job, I would have never been at that restaurant and maybe wouldn’t be where I am today!
I think it’s definitely interesting how one spur of the moment decision can precipitate so many good things in life.
While I sometimes think “what if I didn’t do….” and think about the possible outcomes, I’m mostly happy with the decisions that I make. I think my own pivot point is the decision to blog. I’ve done it for so long now that I can’t imagine my life any other way and it’s been a fun journey. I’ve discovered a lot about myself and the things that I like. It’s also opened my eyes up to the world, which is always a good thing.
Wow it’s definitely crazy how one decision can change your life and you may not even realize it until many years later when you look back at it. But yay for quitting your job and then getting more time with your fiancé!
I feel like I haven’t experience any of those moments yet, although maybe I had a moment like that when I was deciding what high school I wanted to go to. My town lets you either apply to a private school that the town pays for you (it’s like a vocational technical high school) or just go to the public school, and even though the private school offers you more academically, I just decided to go to the public school. I think it was because I felt that I would make more friends there or something, because at the time I felt super lonely and all that, but now I have a pretty great group of friends and we always get to go places and I’m so happy that I didn’t go to the private school because even though I still have some friends going there, I feel like I’d still feel like a total outcast.
Fantastic post, Ashley! <33
I love how one little moment can be that moment that changes everything and you not even realize it at the time. I love that your decision to quit your job turned out to be a good one and lead to so many good things.
I’ve had several of those moments but unfortunately I made the wrong decisions. I did things that I knew I shouldn’t do and years later I’m still trying to climb out of that mess. Just one little decision can change everything. If you’re young and don’t think you’ve had any of those moments yet then try to remember this. Some decisions can lead to good things while others can lead to bad things, don’t ever do anything that you know or feel to be wrong. I made all the wrong decisions for all of the wrong reasons and those decisions sent me a down a very long and hard road.
I used to wish I could go back and redo things but not anymore because no matter how hard that road was it eventually led me to right here. I am very happy with who I am now and I don’t know if I would have ever found this happiness any other way but I do like to warn others. Those pivotal moments can be both good and bad and they can have some very far reaching consequences so try to remember that when that little voice in the back of your mind is giving you a warning.
My decision to redo my fourth year in high school instead of switching profiles. Otherwise, I’d never have met my boyfriend and I wouldn’t be able to do this awesome study – or the job I’ve been dreaming about for so long 🙂 It’s great how one decision can change our lives so much!
Giving up studying and looking for a job related to video games.
In the early 2000’s in France, that sounded like the most foolish thing to do. It was a hard decision, since I was raised with the belief that without a degree, you couldn’t do anything with your life.
Well, thanks to this decision, I became a developer, I met my soul mate, which in turn led me to move to Canada… and have a happy life I would have never hoped for in the past.
(Don’t get me wrong: studying IS useful. I was just in a particular case – and time – where this could be a good decision in the end).
I think about the what ifs every so often. There are a few things that I wished had gone differently, but if those things had gone better then maybe the things that went well for me wouldn’t have.
I sent a Tweet to an author of an e-book series that I really loved. It was the first independently published series I’d ever read, but I just fell in love with it. I had no expectations Tweeting at her, but she responded almost immediately and we’ve become really close friends. She encouraged me to start blogging, then told me about BEA. And the rest is history — and that one little Tweet changed my whole life. If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have gone to NYC, I wouldn’t have started blogging, I wouldn’t have figured out what my new dreams are, because at that time, I was in between surgeries and feeling like I was just floundering. One Tweet changed that all. Less than 140 characters. 🙂
When I joined the Army!
The way I was going, I’d prolly be single, living in a shitty apartment in downtown Houston, with a dead-end job, maybe even doing drugs, who knows? A change for the best, definitely.
I’m glad you seem so happy with the direction your life has taken. :]
There was a time when I had to make a decision about what I wanted to do with m life. My undergrad is in vocal performance. I worked really hard at that degree, and my voice instructor really wanted me to keep pursuing music. I think I could have. I love to sing, and I was chosen to perform at our university’s honor recital. BUT! I had a boyfriend of three years that was here. I didn’t want to travel. I didn’t want to spend half a million dollars a year on graduate school either (all the good schools were crazy expensive). I decided to explore other options and came upon library science. I have a kind of passion for what I’m studying now that I never quite reached when I was in music school. Singing will always be fun, but librarianship and information studies spark something in me.