I went to school, did a business degree and now three-quarter ways into a job for which I am academically qualified, I am slowly and painfully realising that I am fighting a battle I will neither lose nor win. A battle I will not lose or win, is this professional limbo?

On the inside, there is a constant battle between two frames of mind: likened to one person trying to walk left and right at the same time. An impossible position to conquer.

I have a big desk, a company-assigned laptop, phone and all or most of the accoutrements of a seemingly acceptable professional status. Looking around at my assigned desk and the mounting pile of unfiled and incomplete paper work, I realise I am drowning in the Pacific of paper. I have regrets and I am also suffering from post-professional dissonance. At this point what do I do?

If one understands the concept of job availability in a developing economy, I guess it could be deduced that I am being ungrateful. Jamaica has a population of approximately 2.7 million people (STATIN, 2012) and of that total, approximately 900,000 (STATIN) are in the labour force. With a contracting economy and massive cuts in human resource across the public and private sectors, is it time to have my head in the clouds?

If only this were a Hollywood-Corporate flick where I lose my professional identity, walk away disenchanted from my job and suddenly stumble upon my great calling, become paid, with some amount of fame and all the accompaniments of finding one’s professional purpose.

Cue: (sigh).

I am awake again. Still at my desk, drowning in the Nile of paper without a lifeboat and no shore in sight. Where is my silver lining? There are days when this all seems so surreal, and I sink back into my delusive state of daydreaming; dreaming that Morpheus would slip through the front door or ring my desk phone and give me directions then sit me down and give me the whole red-pill, blue-pill pep talk. This painfully sublime corporate existence (groans mentally) is as burdensome as the state of Sisyphus after his deceit.

So, really, where is the silver lining? One can always find psychological comfort in comparative analysis — I mean there are millions of people world-wide quite able and willing to work, but who are jobless.

So, for now I am grateful for my job, which allows me to enjoy some semblance of an aspiring proletariat awaiting the next opportunity to climb the next rung of the professional ladder. I am also still dreaming, a little.

Joseph Robinson is a HR professional.