How To Move On After Getting Fired

If you’ve experienced the lovely debacle of getting canned, you know it’s a MAJOR blow to the ego. I told precisely no one about it when it happened. Not my parents. Not my roommates. No one. “I quit,” I told them, which wasn’t a total lie. It was a mutual decision.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

I got a job teaching second grade when I was 22 and fresh out of undergrad. I was not, I should add, an education major and did not even kind of have a clue what I was doing. Older grade teachers can fare if they’re not education majors… Not younger. There’s so much intricate literacy involved at younger grades that you really have to know what you’re doing.

Oh, and I should also mention that the pay was around $35,000 per year (roughly a third of the median income) in one of the most expensive cities in the country.

To make a long story short, I hacked it the best I could, babysat after school to make ends meet and ran myself ragged. I was also extremely depressed after college graduation. I had great friends in college and had a very hard time keeping some community in Grownup Land.

So, I didn’t give teaching my all. I was exhausted from babysitting after school. I had a new puppy who kept me up at night. It wasn’t pleasant. To top it off, I wouldn’t shut up about perhaps moving to Rome. When my boss told me they weren’t renewing my contract, I cried, thanked him, and felt like a million pounds had been lifted off me.

Today I thought I’d share some wisdom I learned from getting the boot as well as some photos from my early 20s *cringe*. I hope you enjoy!

Never agree to a salary you can’t live on.

This, hands down, was the reason for my demise. I could not live on $35,000 per year so I had to supplement by babysitting. Supplementing by watching children after you’ve spent your entire day with 25 children takes exhausted to a whole new level. I never should have had to supplement my income and agreeing to this salary was the reason behind it.

I will put one caveat, however. If the job has a lot of growth potential and you can cut financial corners as necessary (having roommates, for example) to afford the lower salary, it might be worth it for a little while.

Always make your 9-5 your #1 priority.

For most of us, our 9-5s are our top income earner. If you side hustle, make it so that it does not interfere with your day job. In hindsight, it would have maybe made more sense for me to waitress on the weekends or something. But I also desperately needed a social life, which was important too. I don’t know; hindsight isn’t always 20/20.

Be willing to learn and grow

Being in survival mode, I did not take advantage of the professional development opportunities I had when teaching and I regret that. A lot of times there are some great ways to learn to garner new skills early in your career and it’s always best to get all the free information you can.

Be gracious when you depart.

While it was certainly tempting to get mad at my boss at times, I knew it was what was best for all parties involved. I remember hugging colleagues on my last day of school and have maintained relationships with many of them!

If you’re not sure if you want to leave, keep your mouth shut about future plans.

Why in the world I felt the need to broadcast that I wanted to move to Rome (I didn’t), I’ll never really know. Maybe it was my subconscious asking to be fired. When an employer is planning on having you around for a while and you’re all but telling him or her that you won’t be, it makes sense that they would want to put a contingency plan in place.

Never underestimate the power of networking.

The old adage, “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know” is beyond true in the professional world. Because of networking and mentorship, I was able to get on a great career trajectory after my time teaching.

Make a list of people you know. Utilize LinkedIn. Make it known that you’re looking for a job with the people closest to you. You’ll be interviewing in no time.

Take time to get your life back together.

I moved in to a house with five other girls (which I swore I would never do), paid only $400/month in rent and really dove in to what I wanted out of life, something I did not really think about when I took the teaching job. While I found that yes, I did like the school environment, no, I never wanted to be a classroom teacher again. I went to grad school and got an M.Ed. in literacy and am now a Reading Specialist. It was the best money I’ve ever spent and, while it’s not my full time job anymore, literacy is something I’m still deeply passionate about and I work with students 1:1 on a part time basis.

Have you been fired? It’s not a pretty experience but many people, myself included, use it as a catalyst to make things so much better in their lives and I hope you can too! Have a great weekend, friends!