I can’t think of getting old
It only makes me want to die
And I can’t think of who I was
‘Cause it just makes me want to cry, cry, cry
Can’t look back, can’t look too far ahead
I got the point, I got the message

I’m just a little bit caught in the middle
I try to keep going but it’s not that simple
I think I’m a little bit caught in the middle
Gotta keep going or they’ll call me a quitter
Yeah, I’m caught in the middle

I’m going to be a bit brutally honest in this one, only about myself and because I feel like I need to let these things out.

New job starts Friday, maybe. This job offer has gotten to my head a bit, and I’m fearing it’s giving me an ego, and I can’t be a leader and have an ego.

Being offered a job that pays $93k a year, with 2 weeks vacation, and a nearly perfect schedule is a big offer for someone who’s 28. Hell my sister will be 40 in a couple weeks and she doesn’t make that much money.

At first it was easy to accept because I just told myself I wasn’t worth that much money, and it was sort of luck of the draw.

But the offers keep coming. Today I got a phone call from one of the most successful restaurant groups in the city asking if I’d be a manager for them. I also got an offer from someone who was on the list of top 150 most influential Bostonians.

It makes you go from feeling like you got lucky and you’re not worth the money you were offered, to okay well if this many people are interested in having me work for them, maybe I am worth it. Maybe I’m that good.

That’s a mindset I don’t want to have, it’s like having a god complex, I can’t lead from a place of self importance, because at the end of the day the people I’m leading are much more important than I’ll be. Just like every leader I’ve had so far in my career was less important than I was. I directly interacted with every guest at the bars I worked, or the tables I served, that’s more important than the manager walking around with a tie.

So I’m considering doing the total opposite of what any sane person would do. Maybe I go back to ground zero, and find a job as a bar back, work through that to become a bartender, to a bar manager, etc, etc.

Maybe working as a bar back would give me humility and ground me, remind me I’m not the most important person in the room.

It’s funny, sometimes when people believe in you they tell you that you should have more confidence. Confidence is what got me here, self-confidence and ego are realllllllly hard to tell apart in most people. I don’t believe in ego, I think people that lead with ego are shitty leaders, trust me I’ve had plenty of them.

Maybe I’m just a little caught in the middle.

Where the skies are gold not gray,

J.

P.S. I used to be the bartender with the ego, no one fucking liked me because of it. I don’t want to end up down that road again.