I’ve never stayed working for a company for more than three years. I think the longest was 3 ½ years.
I’m sitting with my team for our end-of-year lunch and they are telling me with being with the company for 10, 14 and 18 years.
Whoa! I can’t see myself working somewhere for that long.
This has nothing to do with me still looking for a place that I belong, but more that I don’t want to grow comfortable somewhere.
I’m just at my 3-year mark and already I feel the comfort set in. Getting acclimatised and assimilated to the culture. Getting the satisfaction of a regular paycheck every month. Even the feeling that if I leave that there is nothing better out there, or that it’s gonna be hard if I leave.
This is the cognitive bias of loss aversion at play. This is the bias where people hate losing more than they like winning and will do more to avoid losing that to acquire equivalent gains.
Ever took a free trial and continued even though you hardly ever use it? Or do you have subscriptions that you know you should cancel, but there was that one time you read something useful? That’s loss aversion.
There’s little you can do but accept it as a way of feeling and keep pushing for possible gains. Focus on the possible good.
It’s hard though. The negative feeling creeps in, and never subtly.
But I know that the things that I want to do I won’t be able to if I stay in this position for too long.