Next chapter

Two years and a half ago, I joined a bunch of geeks to build a better spreadsheet for teams. A few months ago, I quitted my design role at Rows.

Leaving a job feels like breaking up with a partner. Feelings hang in the air, a few words are sealed behind closed lips. In the end, you both go in different directions and wonder the many "what if we...".

Relationships are beautiful when they start, and so are jobs. We fall in love with the romantic idea of something, a promise, what it is and what it can be. We daydream about forever and how we can play an important role in making that happen. We trust people we just met, their words, their values and principles. With time, faith fades, and trust goes holding hands with it.

At Rows, I found myself in a position many would dream of being. I had an amazing team around me, a good salary and a life/work balance, that was not enough. My principles and what I valued was being put to the test constantly. I no longer identified with the organisation. Anxiety went through the roof and started having an impact on my life. I tried fighting it, focused on my work and the positives. The more I stayed, the harder it was to leave, the well kept getting deeper. Work was making me unhappy.

The lightness I felt when I resigned was wonderful. The weeks that followed proved I made the right decision for myself. I started sleeping better, my mood improved, and my overall stress levels lowered. Waking up to work no longer felt like a chore, and I’m grateful for it.

This post is closure. I ended this chapter so I could start a new one, less certain but fuelled with hope. The unknown road ahead is a leap of faith, and I’m moving forward.

I always said to friends and family that a job is just a job. Just work. Although it helps thinking about it that way, I do not believe that to be true. Throughout my life, I've found my best self when focusing on one thing at once. And since I turned eighteen years old, that has been mostly a job. We spend most of our lives working. Where, how and who we do it with matters.

From my experience, the best thing about work is the people you meet along the way, and at Rows that was no exception. Together with this amazing team, we launched so many great features. Sharing publicly, multiple tables, elastic grid, one-click integrations, workspaces, folders, templates, guests, real-time collaboration, forms, buttons and input fields, public workspaces, custom functions, and so much more. We indeed built a better spreadsheet, and the team over there is just starting.

Endings are no big deal. Everything that starts eventually stops. Ends. When something does end, most people focus on the "why". I would rather focus on "how it ended" and "how I felt". That's eventually what paints a relationship, how both handled going different ways. A piece of advice I received many years ago was to write it down. Ever since I found myself in a similar position, I privately write it down. I create these little reminders on why I pulled the trigger and the events that followed. It is handy every time you fantasise about getting back together.

Next chapter, what follows?

I'm young as f***. I want to reduce stress points. And dedicate more of my time to improve my health, body and mind. I enjoy designing and will continue doing so from Porto to the world, remotely. I will give priority to writing, photography, comedy and some forever standby side projects.

I’m betting on myself.