Career Considerations And Then Some

.:Today's LSS:.

You And I Both
by Jason Mraz

Was it you who spoke the words that things would happen but not to me
Oh things are gonna happen naturally
Oh taking your advice I'm looking on the bright side
And balancing the whole thing
But often times those words get tangled up in lines
And the bright lights turn to night
Until the dawn it brings
Another day to sing about the magic that was you and me

Cause you and I both loved
What you and I spoke of
And others just read of
Others only read of the love, the love that I love.

See I'm all about them words
Over numbers, unencumbered numbered words
Hundreds of pages, pages, pages forwards
More words then I had ever heard and I feel so alive

You and I, you and I
Not so little you and I anymore
And with this silence brings a moral story
More importantly evolving is the glory of a boy

Cause you and I both loved
What you and I spoke of
And others just dream of
And if you could see me now
Well I'm almost finally out of
I'm finally out of
Finally deedeedeedee
Well I'm almost finally, finally
Well I'm free, oh, I'm free

And it's okay if you have go away
Oh just remember the telephone works both ways
And if I never ever hear them ring
If nothing else I'll think the bells inside
Have finally found you someone else and that's okay
Cause I'll remember everything you sang

Cause you and I both loved what you and I spoke of
and others just read of and if you could see now
well I'm almost finally out of.
I'm finally out of, finally, deedeeededede
well I'm almost finally, finally, finally out of words.

.:Happy Eight Months To Us!!!:.

Amishu, Pomelo!!! ::blushes::

.:Intellectual Elitist:.

If there's one thing that surfaced from my long conversation with Elbert, it's the fact that I'm a blatant intellectual elitist.

Simply put, I don't think I could easily get along with a person who has no stories to share. It's not that I expect a certain level of intelligence, but I seem to implicitly expect a certain level of articulateness from a person I'm dealing with, and meeting that level would be the best way for me to get somewhere with that person. At that point, I may even begin talking down to the person, in a vain attempt to reach a level of conversation that is not as simple as it seems.

I guess that frightens me, in some ways. In the past so many months, I've been having problems with that, as I seem to have some trouble breaking through her shell. I don't know if she's just finding it hard to open up to me, or if she just really is that way. If she's the former, well and good. But if she's the latter, then the fact that I seem to have a low tolerance level for people who are just that way may prove to be a problem.

I really don't know. I don't expect the two of us to be able to discuss the ramifications of Kantian thinking on one's morality, but I'd like to think that asking “How was your day?” will not always yield nothing more than “Okay lang.”

Oh, well...

.:Career Considerations:.

I still want to teach, even if I'd inevitably make my parents feel very disappointed because of what I intend to do in the near future...

But you see, when I met up with Elbert the other day, while yes, we had a lot of serious talks about relationships and mindless conversations that covered everything else under the sun, and mundane conversations about comics, we turned to conversations about career paths.

Elbert seems to want to pull a Dominique and just spend at least half a year taking a sabbatical from corporate work in Manila, probably to stay outside of Luzon. That's all good, truth be told. But then, that'd mean he'd have to resign from Nautilus and do work for that company mostly pro bono so as to maintain his enthusiasm for the comic book industry by doing what he wants with no pressure because it's no longer his official job.

And looking at it, I do want his job.

I've said it time and again that while I do love my work in GMA/QTV, I absolutely can't stand the post-production. There's something about sitting like an idiot for hours while the editor does most of the work with you just observing him to make sure everything falls into place that puts me off. Add to that the fact that I've seen this footage myself live most likely, and you'd understand how sick I can get of the footage by the time it's mastered, and by the time it finally goes on the air. If I were the editor, maybe I'd be okay, but I'm not the editor. Now that I think about it, Hades, maybe if I learned how to edit, and as I'd make more money as one, I could do my own segments instead of having to conform to my editor's schedule... hmmm...

But I digress. While my skills in soliciting sponsors can be rather untested (I do have the tendency to talk down to certain people, as I discovered above...), this is the only job imaginable that allows me WAVE and my masters. I still want to finish my masters, and I don't see that happening for as long as I'm with GMA. Finishing my masters will allow me to teach Philosophy, and thus send me back to my two simple dreams: teaching and being in radio. Nautilus Comics is not only going to potentially help me along in that direction, it becomes particularly integral to me in the sense that in doing what I so far think I'm supposed to be doing there would mean that my skillsets in each job would turn out to be tangent to one another.

It's a convergence that is less obvious than GMA and WAVE, but one that causes less friction and, well, less illness. The uber-long stretches that happen at GMA when I'm sitting at editing or mastering won't happen at Nautlilus, and even if it would in a sense, that's because I'd be handling an event. Gee, I never once complained about the Day Off segment when we're shooting, right? That's pretty much similar, so I guess no issues there.

It's not a foregone conclusion that I'd land the Nautilus gig, but I have to want it if I intend to get it. And right now, I can see that there are compelling reasons to want it, and seemingly equally compelling reasons to prefer GMA, especially if I wanted to be eventually rich. It's an option I have to weigh not because I'm sure I'll land it, but because it's an option that definitely is worthy of consideration.

One might ask, “Why not drop WAVE instead?” Well, I wouldn't do that simply because dropping WAVE still provides me with no time whatsoever to do Nautilus anyways. I'd just take a huge cut in my monthly liquid finances, and doing that is crazy. All I did was throw away money instead of trade one opportunity for another.

It's not that I'm money-hungry, per se. But I sure as Hades don't want to be hungry period. Working on a GMA-powered paycheck alone is liable to do that because you don't expect to make it big in GMA overnight. Neither does everybody make it big in GMA, either. Therefore, there's no reason for me to drop WAVE, from a practical standpoint. Sure, the time I work for WAVE is horrible, but the actual working hours (16 a week.) aren't. And I've been with WAVE for almost two years already. That should count for something. As much as I'm not a fan of my current standing in WAVE, it's not so bad at all.

Here's a pros and cons list that I compiled on the two jobs, though. Lets assume for a moment that I really had to choose between Nautilus and GMA already, for argument's sake.

GMA-7:

Pros:

+ Will yield long term security. You are connected to the number one TV network in the country, after all.
+ If I play politics well, getting ahead might not be too hard. My mom's very good friends with Mike Enriquez.
+ Sticking it out with GMA will yield not only financial security, it may lead me to finally work on-cam instead of behind the cam, essentially eliminating my sole gripe about GMA: post-production. The moment I don't do post-prod by being an on-cam talent is the day that I will find nothing to complain about with GMA, and thus hold onto the job, more likely than not.
+ The clout of being on GMA knows no bounds. Trust me.
+ The small window of opportunity to actually move to DWLS instead of WAVE so that I can truly bring together my TV and radio work.

Cons:

- Financial security is secondary to being alive. It doesn't matter if you make 50K-150K a month if you're dead already. GMA has been preventing me from so much as recovering lately, because every time I have to take a leave from WAVE, I can't do the same with GMA because I have this shooting or editing or mastering to do.
- Sticking it out with GMA does not guarantee I will be in a setup where I will no longer need to do post-production. Research work does not involve post-prod (Most of the time.), but that line of work doesn't appeal to me. By the way, I'm also horrible at politics.
- Even if I could find myself on camera in a matter of time, it is not very unlikely to assume that the process takes more than just a year. Two years is actually a fairly brazen estimate to climb the ranks of no longer needing to do post-production.
- A promotion could mean I'd become an executive producer. Being an on-cam talent is not necessarily a promotion. Ergo, doing well in my job could mean that not only am I in charge of the whole production process of the show, I would have to be present in post-production as well, no questions asked. That's not what I want to happen.
- I will never finish my Masters for as long as I'm working with GMA. Next schoolyear is my third year out of five for me to wrap it up. Failure to do so would mean I'd have to do it again from scratch. No freaking way.

Nautilus:

Pros:

+ Will give me competitive pay for what I currently get from GMA. Not a bad tradeoff, since I'll be working way less hours than I would be with GMA.
+ Flexi-time allows me to still pursue my masters, and perhaps even be a teaching assistant! And at worst, my health should be better in a setup like that.
+ I'd work around people I'm familiar with, and have a new line of work that is rather interesting, if only for the fact that it's akin to the work I used to do for Ranulf in Slycesoft. I'd be working for a (sort of) pioneering company again, which, if you think about it, is relatively low-risk/high-reward in that if it succeeds, then amazing things would follow, and if it fails, it's not a monumental catastrophe. At least not for me.
+ Allows me to build a new network, as that's what my job description requires me to do. That new network includes working for a Cojuangco, which means the company's relatively stable in a fairly volatile cottage industry.
+ If it allows me to finish my M.A., then it indirectly gives me some long-term security because it allows me to establish my teaching career.

Cons:

- Will most likely never be able to provide me with the kind of long-term financial security that only GMA can. You don't expect to ever sign 1M annual contracts with a comic book company, which is not a knock on them at all. You don't expect that of 90% of all other companies, anyways.
- Will definitely not generate the kind of automatic buzz and clout working for GMA does. Which is why I considered dropping WAVE instead of GMA for a while...
- The job description requires me to acquire as of yet untested skills such as sponsor solicitation. There is no guarantee I'd do well with that, considering how that's one of the things that turned me away from being a researcher for GMA, although the paperwork is the bigger thing that scared me off from that position.
- Might burn my bridges with GMA if I leave so soon. Which is sad, because the best but still feasible thing to happen to me would be me working for RGMA and teaching, as RGMA allows me to have my foot in the door with being a TV talent without having to deal with post-production in the meantime, all without sacrificing my teaching career. I might actually not go through with Nautilus if it means that I'm screwed from ever setting foot in GMA again. It's that big a factor.
- Quite frankly, until I get a feel for the job (Which I should before I finalize whether or not I'd leave GMA.), then I really can't see where working for Nautilus falls into the greater scheme of things. I've seen that for WAVE, for GMA, and for teaching. But so far, not for Nautilus, and not for Slycesoft, as it didn't last long enough for me to find out, in the first place.

So there you have it. The factors I'm considering about this potential change of work. While I do love GMA, I just don't think it's worth getting myself killed over, and dropping WAVE to save my life is out of the question, simply because I've already established quite a bit with WAVE, and it won't open up new opportunities for me, either.

What do you jabronis think? Where do I go from here?