Hi Cleo!
I know it sucks to be misunderstood and judged when you’re a Thriver — if only everyone could understand that not everyone needs to care about their career to the same degree! It’s tempting to feel ashamed and hurt, but I hope you’ll take heart in the fact that you are totally normal, and it’s OK if some people don’t understand your desires. Ultimately the goal of life is just to be happy. So if you achieve that, regardless of how you do it, you’ll be more successful than at last 85% of the population, for sure!
So I have a few thoughts after reading your post:
– It’s totally understandable why you’d hate a call center job. That’s a lot of people-facing interaction, plus pressure to perform. It doesn’t sound like your ideal Thriver position at all!
– I’m not sure I would totally rule out HR. It makes sense why you’re assuming that HR wouldn’t be a good fit for you, but I’m not sure you can generalize that far given how diverse the HR profession actually is. There are HR departments in almost EVERY business. They can’t all be the same. And I bet there are some that may be perfect for a Thriver. So maybe don’t write it off too quickly!
– I do NOT think that what happened in that temp position is about you AT ALL. Shaming people for asking questions is a REALLY dumb business practice, if you ask me. And it makes me wonder why they needed a temp in the first place (maybe no one wanted to work for them, given the environment, and they had a lot of turnover?). It’s natural to wonder if this was about you, and it’s good that you’re willing to take a look at your own patterns and see if there’s something you could have done better or differently, but I think you’re likely taking way too much responsibility for how this went. I could almost guarantee that this was more of a problem with them and THEIR toxic situation than with you. And I think a better employer might treat you completely differently. So I hope that one experience won’t turn you off from those types of jobs, in total, especially if you’re still interested in them.
– As far as the other options you’re considering, it sounds like you need to do some research about all of these! It doesn’t seem like you’re at the point yet where you can make a totally informed decision. So it’s time to go get informed! I have clients do this type of homework all the time. Usually they make a spreadsheet of some sort with all of their options, and then they create categories based on their non-negotiables and what’s most important to them. And then they do a lot of Googling, LinkedIn stalking, informational interviews, etc., to get as clear as they can about what the job might actually be like and how well it would align with their needs. I think you could delve into something like that for a little while to help you rule out some of these options (and potentially rule some of them in, too).
Let me know what you think! 🙂