Imagine each of those things as a dial on a stereo; you can turn each one up, or down, but we need to keep the music somewhat equalized. Maybe what you actually want looks like this:

Let’s dive into one of those dials specifically: salary. You probably have an idea on how much money you need to survive. Mortgage, food, car insurance… all those things add up. And, at minimum, your job needs to enable you to financially support yourself. Would it be nice to have extra? Absolutely. Who doesn’t have a Pinterest board full of vacation ideas they’d love to stash some cash away toward.

So the question becomes, what would you compromise on to have your wages be where you need?

Would you take lower wages if it meant more flexibility in your working hours? Would you accept higher daily stress levels if it meant the wages made it possible to pay off your student loans faster, to pay for that expensive SAT tutor for your college-bound kiddo?

This can sound pretty conceptual, so let’s see how that can play out in practice.

Even though everyone’s presets are going to look different, I’ll share a bit about mine. Not because you should copy-paste mine, but to share a bit about how I’ve been able to shift my dials over time to get closer to that “equalized” state.
Despite being in a single income household, money is definitely not my highest dial. As an entrepreneur, I haven’t given myself a raise in the entire 5 and a half years I’ve owned my business. Could I have? Sure. But, for me, it made more sense to reinvest that money back into the business. 
My autonomy and flexibility dials are sky high though. Those probably led me to being an entrepreneur. I like being empowered to make decisions. Even if I make a mistake, if I didn’t have all the information, or if something didn’t work out, I know my thought process on why we did something.

The biggest shift in leaving clinical work is actually the interplay between “leave it at the door” and stress levels. I’d like to think I’m a pretty resilient person. I won’t say I always deal with stress well, but I can reset emotionally, and keep moving forward. I’m willing to accept higher day-to-day stress levels when I can also “shut my brain off” and leave work at work (even though I work from home… but you know what I mean). I found clinical work to be highly stressful day-to-day, but I’d also lay awake at night worry if that client would elope to the river again. Or if that family was going to have enough food to feed their family. Or if that mom with breast cancer was going to feel up to going to that IEP meeting that was going to be hell, even on the best day.

Like we said, no job is perfect, but some jobs are better than others. As our skills grow, and our life circumstances change, our dials can change, too. They’re flexible for a reason! As your BCBA career goals change, your presets will too. And, you may need to make more compromises at first and shape those presets throughout your career to get closer to that “equalized” position.

So, as you figure out the dials for your professional values and what you want from your non-traditional BCBA job, here are some questions you should be able to answer: