Discovering the silver lining: life lessons from a dull job

“You can find out a lot about yourself up a chimney.” Did you know that the actor Bill Nighy comes from a long line of chimney sweeps?

Sometimes we can learn a lot about ourselves from doing a boring job in unusual situations.

Before I went to university I worked for a few weeks in a warehouse. It was dark, there were hardly any windows and it felt a little like being trapped.

My job?

For 8 hours a day I was standing on my feet repricing clothes. VAT had recently changed in the UK and so there were lots of clothes needing repriced.

Every day Radio One was on.

Everyday Radio One please the same songs.

Sometimes it felt like in the same order.

Every day I would find myself doing the same simple routine and mind numbingly boring work: unpacking clothes wrapped up in plastic bags, removing tags and with a pricing gun, replacing tags.

I can still hear the clicky sound made as I rattled through box after box of clothes.

The value of great colleagues

What saved me?

I was working with another soon to be student and we kept each other sane and chatted and laughed away. I’d soon be going to study in Scotland and she in Wales.

*Her name was Felicity Fitchard, she had long red ringlets, the palest skin and green cat like eyes.

Kind of like an adult Pippi Longstocking.

We talked about big things and small things, important things and silly things.

And her company and chat made the job bearable.

Learning life skills the hard way

What did I learn about myself?

That keeping my brain active and stimulated is important never more than than when I find things dull.

And that as an introvert who occasionally has ambivert days out, I prefer to talk about things than just shoot the breeze.

What boring job have you been in where you’ve learned something about yourself?

*Felicity and I stayed in touch for a while. But if you’re reading this and you are Felicity Fitchard or you know her, do drop me a line!