rynling | Do What You Love, Part Six

I resigned from my job earlier this week.

I'm going to teach my classes for the spring semester and help my advisees finish up their MA and MFA theses and capstone projects, but then I'm gone. I've already talked to the leasing office at my apartment building, and I will be out of DC by the end of May.

I feel really weird now. I went to college straight after being kicked out of high school when I was sixteen, so I've been in higher education continuously for twenty years. This is what I always wanted to do, and I've devoted my entire life to doing it.

I don't think I can explain how bizarre and upsetting resigning from my position is to someone outside of academia. It's like saying, Well, I left my job at my law firm after six years, and now it will be all but impossible for me to work as a lawyer again. All of the skills and experience I have are now useless, so much so that I may as well have a blank CV. This situation is crazy, because of course it is, but I'm worried that people outside academia will think I'm crazy for suggesting that this is the case.

Likewise, I don't think I will be able to explain my decision to anyone inside academia. In fact, I'm afraid that most people are going to be openly hostile.

I keep telling myself that academia is a cult. People inside the cult can't see outside, and people outside the cult won't understand.

Still, there's nothing to do but to keep moving forward.