A honeymoon period tends to last anywhere between 6 months and a year. The relationship still feels fresh and exciting, and you're constantly learning new things about each other and having first experiences together. But there comes a point when suddenly you've done all that stuff together.
This is what my first few months out of college were like. At the ripe age of 21, I moved to a cool new city with tons of young people, was living in a spacious new apartment with a great new job at a large company that laid out a stable career path for me. I walked into work each day dressed for the job I wanted, not the job I had, and using the corporate card on work trips early on made me feel like I was the most successful woman on the planet, only adding to my naiveté.
About 6 months in, things grew more challenging and I started to recognize some issues that were significantly impacting my overall happiness. This is not to say that going into corporate America will do this to you. I assure you, people get through it. I quickly learned where I currently was would not be the place that would get me to where I truly wanted to be. Right out of college, I thought it would. And to tell you the truth, I am glad I figured it out as early as I did, even though it caused me a lot of stress at the time.
So, that's why I am here. Deemed as the millennial generation, young professionals make up most of our workplace today. That's a lot of people like us in thousands of positions we may not even know about. These are formative years that do not just include the first few years after college, if that is the path we take. Our young professional years are ones that span several years (specifically, from 21 years old to 39) among individuals in different stages of life. We might be just leaving college and see the world as our oyster, where other young professionals are married with kids. Some have dogs – well, a lot have dogs, apparently, and some don't. Some may live in apartments like I do, and others have houses.
One thing we all share is that we are still young in terms of our professional development. So, why not share our stories with each other? It may not prepare us or set expectations for those looking to make a change, but it may just give us a new perspective. That's what I hope you get from this. This is the YoPro Know.
-Kamber
The YoPro Know
