This week my sweetheart was not well because she was having her period, which has consistently been bad. Nonetheless, she decided to go to work anyway because she needed the money. While I was walking her to the taxi stand, she started feeling worse, so we turned around to return home. As we were ascending the stairs, she could barely walk and I had to support her and help her up.

Once inside, she threw up. There she was curling up and bawling in pain. And in the midst of her cries, she managed to vocalize 'I'm in so much pain. Help me Jonnie."

And there I stood, utterly powerless to help her. I didn't even have a car to rush her to the hospital if needed, money to see a doctor or credit on my phone to call for help. We cannot even afford to get a diagnosis, let alone treat it. I hate feeling powerless due to a lack of money.

FTE. (My censored version: "Forget This!" Event)

 

Damn, that's rough. Reading yours definitely humbled my own life. Hope your sweetheart is doing better.

 

4 years ago I did sign holding for a company in Central California. It reaches up 110 degrees here during the summer. This was my first job job outside of family hiring me.

The first day I went to work, guess what? It was 111 degrees outside. I worked my a$$ off trying to impress the company with explosive dance moves and lots of moving around. I told myself I'm getting paid $2 above minimum wage starting so I'm off to a good start, but as time went on the minutes turned to hours, and hours dragged. The songs on my iPod were on slow mo. The sun kept rising. I got really lucky my mom picked me up during hour 2/5 when I ran out of water. My mouth was dry and I was sweating bullets as I sat back in my mom's air conditioned car. Whoop, 10 minute break is up, back to work.

I layed off the dance moves and crazy movements, but there was nothing you could do to prevent the 111 degree weather outside. Fast forward 3 more hours and I gave my sign back to the manager and drove home. Still living at my parent's house, I took off everything but my underwear at the pool's edge and jumped off. My sister's friend came into the backyard 1 minute later and was like "Are you naked in the pool?" (No, she's not my type).

I dried off in 1 minute because it was still 95 degrees at night. I jumped into my bed and blacked out for 5 hours. I woke up 6 hours later and it was 1:30 in the morning. I don't know if I suffered a heat stroke or I was genuinely that tired, but thinking about it, I could've died and nobody would have known until the next day. The thought really haunted me. The next day it was 105. Not as bad, but I dreaded it just like yesterday. My dad has this saying "If you don't get a degree, be ready to get a shovel". The degree part is irrelevant, but I realize now this is a day I'd never want to forget, my FTE.

 

I am currently halfway through Unscripted and well past the Fte chapter. When I was reading it I came up blank. But today I remembered my fte. Oh it was like a revolution. Thats what fte is. Imagine a state run by a f*cked up government and after having had enough of the givt's shenanigans, millions of its citizens come down the streets to make a change...a revolution...except in this case its not millions...its just you..against some authority or against a majority.

Anyway, here is my fte:

The setting: I am an Indonesian of an Indian descent. My parents are indian and I was born in Indonesia. Now to anyone here who knows how strict asian parents can be, can agree with me that they can be pretty authoritarian. My parents were hitlers. I stayed in their house.

In my culture, the daughter moves out of the house once she gets married. And the son stays in house and brings home a bride. Thats the custom. So for a son to leave the house is a pretty rebelious and can raise some eyebrows in the community. Especially If you are the only son and you have no brother.

Things started taking a turn for the worse when I got married and had kids. At first my discomfort with the authoritarian regime was managable. But then my elder sister got divorce and she had to move in with us. And this is when real trouble started brewing.

I should point out that when I was young my parents had the audacity to let my cousins, grown men, from india to come to jakarta and live with us and work eith my father and earn a decent living. Oh my father is filthy rich btw. Those days of being in one house with grown men who took my mother's and father's attention from me were horrible days. I f*cking hate those days. But wat cud I do..I was 13 years old. So I just shunned myself and found escape in my studies. I got really good in my studies. But oh the misery.

From then on I vowed that I will be damned if I made the same mistakes my parents made by concentrating their attention and resources to their nephews, my cousins. I am never gonna do that to my child. If I had a child I am gonna give my attention and love to him/her. No cousin of him/her is ever gonna take that away.

And when my sister moved in with her daughters...i felt very uncomfortable. Daily misunderstandings between my wife, and my mother..but they got over it and then it happens again and they keep to themselves and there was just this tension building up.

One fine day it got real bad between my wife and my mom. I explained my wife, look she is elder..just let go of your ego and say you are sorry, she will definitely forgive you...we are staying under one roof it is not good to have animosity like this when we are staying under one roof. Finally she relented and said fine she will ask for forgiveness. So she went to my mom in her room and asked for an apology.

5 minutes later she came to me crying telling my that my mom does not want to forgive and told her to get out of her sight.

When I saw my wife cry and heard what she had to say, something came loose in my head.

You cant forgive your own family?
I have been living with depression putting up with all of your bullshits. I cannot even take a f*cking sh*t without considering your feelings, mom and dad!
My daughter and my wife have to go through whatever f*cking sh*t I went through when I was a small boy and you f*cking think I will just sit here and watch....

f*ck. NO.

I am generally a very quite man, and never show my anger kinda like Aggretsuko...but this time? f*ck this. f*ck my parent's mansion that I live comfortably in like a prince, f*ck the maid servants giving me whatever I want that press of a button. f*ck the driver, the car....f*ck. THIS.


Unlike Aggretsuko, who does death metal in her privacy to vent her anger, I stormed to my parents bedroom and yelled at them calling them selfish monsters. Telling them I have had it and that I am moving out this very second.

My mom's reply GOOD! PLEASE GET LOST!

I went out told my wife we are moving out this very second. She was visibly shocked. But she agreed we quickly packed whatever was needed and went to my father in law.

My father in law is retired eith both her daughter married and settled. He takes care of the family temple and stays there with his wife and has given his house for rent. Since he started staying in the temple.

After hearing everything that happened. He told the person who was renting his house that he wont be giving the house for rent to him again as I will be renting it. And so I have been renting my father in law's house, He did not want to take the rent money but I insisted.

Yes my father in law is a very simple man and he is by no means financially rich. However, he is very spiritual and a very free man. I admire him. I used to want to be financially rich. But after getting to know him. I have learned the value of life over money. People mistake happiness for money. It is not.

If it was, my fIL would be a very miserable man.q Instead he is the most free and loving man ever. He earns enough, eats enough and sleeps enough. He is always in the present moment and there is not a wrinkle of stress etched on his face.

Moving away from my parents was the best thing I ever did. We are free to make our own decision and live our own lives as we see fit. We dont need to ask for anyone's approval. We make mistakes but at least there is no dragon breathing fire down our necks when we make mistakes. We simply learn from them and move on. What a f*cking relief.

Looking back at it now. I can definitely say it was an fte. I was living royally. I did nt pay for any house expense, did not have to do any chores. I lived ina huge mansion. I had maids and drivers. But all this means nothing if I, and then my wife as well (and probably my child would too if I didnt do anything), could not breathe without seeking permission and approval. I was just putting up with them for my entire life. Always telling myself that they are strict for my own good. What a f*cking denial i was living in.

Occasionally my wife would tell me that I should nt have moved out, we were living in such comforts. Now that we are not there that big house will surely goto your sister. It should be your house. You are the son.

When she tells me this i always ask her. "Were you happy when you were there??" She can never respond. As for the house I tell her "f*ck the house. I am happier in this shack i am renting than when I was staying in that mansion. Also if you want that kinda house stick with me. We will make a better house than that one day."


My parents who I left have also become more kind toward me. They trest me with more respect now that I am standing on my own two feet. Everything happened for the better.

 

I don't think it was a single event but rather a build up of related events.

Graduating with a Masters (and 60k in student loans). Ending up as bartender.

Doing a sick job. Outworking and outperforming and outsmarting everyone. Getting promoted. Twice. Within a year time. I'm one of the managers running the place now... €0.50 raise.

Hearing similar stories from all my colleagues who also rose through the ranks.

That's when I started seeing how things really were. I also realized that changing employer wouldn't be the end solution either.

I've been interested in entrepreneurship for the last ten years. After graduation I just had to find something to survive and I wanted to develop a career, skills, reputation. But seeing it not paying off really brought entrepreneurship back into focus.

 

Damn! What an FTE story!

Thank you for sharing it with us.
Amazing courage that you have here to do the right thing.

Telling this story to your kids in the future will be something very valuable to pass on.

 

Thank you for your kind words. Yes you are right. it is important to teach your children early on to prioritize freedom before money. And that our money is only as valuable as the freedom it brings us. A beautiful prison is still prison after all.

 

I am sure a lot of you have had FTM's, but do you recall when it all changed for you and you had your FTE? When did the FTE happen? Where were you? Please describe.

For me, I was doing sidewalker stuff, I went on a tour of a lottery home. It was a 5-car garage McMansion. It was very beautiful and it was when everything changed for me. I had imagined what my life would be like when I reached a point where I could freely buy an equivalent mansion and live the corresponding lifestyle and then it hit me how badly I hated my life and where it was going. I needed someway to enrich myself so that I could have a beautiful lifestyle. I never knew that the secret was to first enrich the lives of others.

What was your FTE?

 

Still have not really found my lane to quit my fulltime job yet, but intubating a patient with tuberculosis for little hourly pay is not fun.

 

Sorry boss, didn't mean to give you extra work. Thanks for merging the threads.

 

Thanks MJ. Believe it or not, your encouraging words have made my work a lot easier these past 21 days. I have your reply posted on my desktop background to serve as a reminder to bring me back to those hot days in the sun, and that I'd rather not do that again unless it's for the sake of growth

 

Wowww bartending school has gone up in tuition! (lol my friend had 35K in debt from a bachelors degree in some non-lucrative field and she was bartending then and still to this day)

 

Had a couple.

Working in a call centre with a bunch of other corporate drones, looking around at the floor at everyone with that blank stair like they are already dead. I could tell everyone was as depressed as i was going into work taking 80 calls a day to get abused by customers due to the companies incompetence, caring more about shareholders than customers.

Second was when I left that job for another life suck of a job paying below minimum wage, driving 13 hours a day threw traffic in roadworks to reach all my clients deliveries and only getting paid for 8 hours.

Walked into my bosses office and quit after 2 weeks on the job, i new this is not the life i wanted not at all. After my initial FTM i thought another job would fix it! only put me into further despair. FTE X 100 after that.

 

I work for minium wage now and get yelled at military style in a restaurant...lol craziest thing ever

Tons of fun, management have 0 people skills and are clueless on how to properly treat/train people.

Used to have night terrors Would love to take a dump on my bosses desk and give em a good smack

 

I have FTMs ALL THE TIME at my crappy job.

But then I get that sweet sweet shot of morphine when that paycheck comes in to take the pain away...

 

We must engineer our escape!

 

The last year of my life has been a walking FTE. Not FTM... legit FTEs.

 

Wish I could say I had a profound one.

Over the course of my first job the realization that I need to do my own thing grew stonger and stronger.
Especially the evidence that my health degraded and that I would always be consumed 100% by any day job were profound enough for me that I never gave up on the thought of "starting my own tech company".

Especially after reading "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" and "High Output Management" I started noticing all the bad decisions and thinking processes. I wanted to prove that I could do better than that.
I fear that UNSCRIPTED might be right, though: it takes more than this kind of strong, ambient push and pull towards execution.

Not sure if it just a limiting belief, but I think I have an above average resistance to overcome - maybe so high that it cannot be done. I pretty much never learned how social interactions work because I was always stuck in protective environments. Things got better over the 10 years in day jobs, especially in the two cases where I had to be a part of consultant teams that worked for external clients, but it feels like the trunk of the tree - as TMF puts is - is messed up enough that the branches don't matter now. I feel like there is a barrier in the socializing department that I cannot cross.

 

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KHyMISpE18

 

After graduating from college I landed a job with a huge dental company. After 6 months I was offered a position with a AAP Consulting Firm as an assistant. After 2 weeks of "training" I was told by the Office Manager that the team is behind because I am not catching up. Their style of training was for me to take notes. Every time I struggled they told me to refer back to my notes and I would get scolded for not taking "good enough notes". I left the job and never once did I regret. What kind of company doesn't expect to fall behind for a bit when they hire a new employee and give you the cold shoulder.

What could I have done differently? Stayed. Suck up to them. Learn and put in work for them. F*** that. this is my FTE!

 

I've been having multiple FTEs this year. See, I want to go fastlane but there are some steps involved that need to be in place first. I can't survive off minimum wage. So, I was really trying to push getting into my career (science). I have applied all over, have good experience, etc. The thing with me is I need alone time, space, privacy, and so on or else I can't concentrate. I tried for a bunch of jobs for months and got nothing. I even applied for labor jobs and they didn't even call me. I had a few interviews and I felt like they did not hire me based more on looks/personality and not being part of the "clique" or type of people at their job. This first angered me. Second, I went and did a seasonal job for the US Forestry. I got placed with some a**hole who tried to micromanage, control, was rigid and rushed all the time, tried to be a perfectionist to show off to other people, etc.

I asked the company to move me to another spot, put me with a different partner, or find me a new position all together. They first tried to work it out. We had several phone meetings and an in-person meeting over the course of 2 months. Nothing changed and I kept pleading with them to switch me out. The other thing is I lived with the guy because we worked in a remote area. He was also trying to be a control freak at the house too. Finally, after the management did nothing, I quit one morning.

I went out of state and tried applying for more jobs. In fact, for the last 9 months I have been working temporary, sh*tty, low paying, and unsecure jobs. And there have been gaps too. I moved again, but this time with very few belongings and picked an area I knew would have more science jobs plus the overall environment is more peaceful. Once again, I have been running into problems with finding science jobs. I apply for everything I am qualified for. I have applied for crap jobs too and nothing. I thought maybe if I get my experience and skills up I would be more competitive. I started reaching out to organizations to volunteer for them. After meeting with one group the a**hole started giving me run around.

I got a job at a cannabis farm. After the first day, they told me they did not want me back. So, I thought "was I not working hard enough?" Which I don't believe was the case. The thing is, every single person there was a druggy and a bum. People with poor hygiene, getting high all day, telling stupid drug stories and other lame bullshit stories all throughout the day, etc. No intelligent conversation went on and nothing interesting. I think they let me go because I did not "fit" their little clique there. I was not a druggy like them and it made them uncomfortable. I also noticed they are breaking a few regulations there and I am considering ratting them out to the government to get fined/shut down.

Anyway, the point is, I have done a tremendous amount of work to get myself out there and reach out in every way possible for a job. I have worked hard at jobs, was respectful, communicated, and just did everything right and I see how much bullshit there is. So much politics, games, discrimination in the workplace. That alone made me say "f*ck this". I recently started getting into copywriting and figure this is a start to change.

 

Your beliefs might still be somewhat toxic. It seems like your standards for other people are way out of line and even with your own business this mindset could create friction.

That is what I love about Jordan Peterson. His "negative" way of looking at things - that any person that does not crumble under the pressure of life and any person that decides not to be a lazy thinker or bum in general is a miracle - describes the world more accurately and leads to fewer disappointments.

Sure, surrounding yourself with people that share your growth mindset is still a great idea, but what really is the point of ratting druggies out (unless the violations of regulations endanger innocent people, of course)

 

I think I just had a personal FTE involving my family. So I apologize in advance since this is not completely work related.

Now when I first started posting here, I did a pretty bare bones intro since I felt funny revealing some personal info about myself. So now I will go into more detail. I'm an older woman and a big introvert. I live and work on Long Island for wholesale business my job consists of invoicing, shipping products out and resolving payment discrepancies. Ive been there for several years.

So here's the first FTEs. It happened with my sisters during the holidays. It had to do with politics which I never discuss. However my older sister does so every Friday night. So during this recent holiday just before saying the prayers my sister started this again and was addressing my younger sister. Now I wanted it to stop since it was just not the time or place. So I said something and my younger sister said come on. Don't tell me you like ------. Then I pointed out that for eight years the pendulum was in the other direction and that I never outwardly complained at family gatherings and I didn't see why it was such a big deal. But they didn't back down. At this point started to get angry and I must have raised my voice. I pointed out how I could have said a number of things about the other side (named a few) but I never uttered a peep for many years. At this point my younger sister told me to knock it off. . That I was like a f*****g four year old throwing a tantrum...that I'm always like this....that I had a tantrum at my father's funeral (!????) four years ago and that I should be F*****g kissing my older sister's a$$...that she can talk about whatever she wants. Needless to say it was very ugly

The next day I texted to say that I shouldn't have raised my voice but that I also have the right to say what I want and that I never attacked either of them personally and that her cursing me was totally uncalled for.

Her response was that she shouldn't have cursed me but that she's been holding on to this stuff for years and that' I do throw tantrums...that I make everyone around me miserable.. .that I have issues and that we need to take a break from each other. Meanwhile this sister lives in Westchester with her husband and I see her maybe one a month at the most.

Also I have three sisters. If I was making everyone miserable all these years I should think one of them would have said something sooner.

So that's my most recent FTE. Unfortunately I just feel like a deer caught in the headlights. And I have always battled depression. Part of me feels numb..But I also just cry a lot. I'm just over halfway through Unscripted. Personally I think my FTE just make me feel even more stuck and more like a big nothing.

Anyway thanks for reading this long post