How do you keep going on?

Naa... Just need to master the work/life balance and stop living to work.

 

I'm doing short 300-600 miles run now and still like for the most part. Now I work for a company that's about 80% drop and hook. I have a auto shift transmission. Pulling dry van and no Northeast no touch freight. It not perfect. Their home time is only 34 hours. I can't go out west anymore, but I'm getting paid every week. I have a guarantee minimum pay no matter what happens. They pay detention pay after 2 hours but I never really request it because with 80% drop and hook I almost never sit more then 2 hours.

Doing these short 100-600 miles trips I think the new auto shift transmissions are nice. We go to same customer that get kinda boring but it's also nice knowing were you going. I really like the guaranteed minimum pay every week. I don't have to worry about low miles or if truck breaks down.

 

Gotta get you one of or two of these.

 

look for a better company as one suggested. if it's high dollars you want, then go for that. if it's shorter work hours, then go for that. after many years, i myself went with shorter hours, but just as good money.

it takes time to find a job you can retire from. many of us HAVE GONE back to our former careers/jobs, but came back to trucking.

once you learn/realize nothing is perfect, you just settle in and do your job, till you either retire or die.

simple.

 

i HAVE always been, A LOVER OF CATS!

 

You need to learn to enjoy the little things... The smile the waitress at the truckstop gave you this morning, the little kid pumping his arm for you to blow the air horn, things of that nature.

When I started my current job, I was the youngest here. All the older guys had their gravy runs and there was no way I was getting that. I was given one of the crappiest runs we had at the time. Every night, all year long. I was delivering into a Redi mix cement plant that nobody wanted to go to. A normal night at this place involved putting knee high boots on and finding the shallow end of the lake that always seemed to be there, right where we had to unload. Every night I'd be in the lake slopping around, while watching one of our other guys up on the hill, dry as can be, with a shorter unload time, making more money than I was. Used to really tick me off. I considered quitting numerous times that summer.

Then one night, it all changed. I had two loads in there, and it had rained all day. When I arrived with my first load, the water was over the trailer axles. Needless to say, I was pretty upset. I laid a ladder from dry ground to the back of the trailer, so I didn't have to get soaked while I hooked the hose up. So there I was, on a ladder above a foot of muddy water. Well, due to unfortunate circumstances, I fell into the muddy water. Now I'm soaked, head to toe, and ready to quit. Fortunately, I had a change of clothes in my daycab.

I left there after I changed clothing, got on the big road, hell bent on driving to the shop and quitting. I stopped at the local Sheetz for a coffee, and there was an old man, looking very down and out. He said he didn't have money for food, and was hungry. So I bought him a sandwich, and we sat and talked a while. Of course I told him of my dilemma. He laughed at me, and gave me the best advice I'd received in a long time.

" Go back in the store and buy some ice cream, you'll understand later"

Corny, right?

I did as he said, and my mood improved 1000 percent. Just stopping the rat race of the night, saying screw it and enjoying something so simple made all the difference.

7 years later, I'm still here, going to that same place, dealing with the same lake. And I do it willingly. The pay raise I demanded in return for being dedicated to that customer helped.

Just slow down and enjoy the little things. And when it gets really bad, stop for some ice cream. It really does help!

 

Really good post- I ask this a lot.

It almost seems like the Schools AND the carriers they go to work for almost "Suggest" to them to operate and Live in a truck like it's "Survival of the fittest"

Your going to go completely crazy if you keep living like that- GET OUT OF THAT TRUCK!!!!!

Make Friends out here while your away from home- Quit being a hermit with an xbox and smartphone.

Join us for a cup of coffee at the Counter after a long day........Etc Etc

 

Yea, I know a place over by your house where you can rent one! lol

 

“Yeah, live in a truck. Work for peanuts and eat PB&J for breakfast and lunch and ramen noodles and summer sausage for dinner 7 days a week. Want to make money? Try our certified moneymaker lease program. Can’t make any money at $.90/mile and FSC? Then you need to be a trainer.”

If you don’t have a grand a week hitting your bank account, somethings wrong. Not gross, net a grand a week. They are going to pay you $.90/mile to operate a truck, and pay all expenses. They can’t operate a truck for $.90/mile and pay expenses. But you’re supposed to. If they could operate their trucks at $.90 a mile, they wouldn’t have any lease operators. They wouldn’t need them.

“But Six, it’s a walk away deal. If I don’t like it, I can walk away.”

That’s like playing poker and going all in and then folding before the hand is dealt. The time to walk away is before you bet all your chips on that one hand.

Find something you like doing first. Then, bet the entire pot. If you are working for a crappy company, not making money, why in the hell would you do a lease? That’s like marrying your girlfriend who won’t put out. A commitment is going to make things better?

If you are not enjoying life, you need to change your life. Go do what you enjoy and see if you can get paid to do it.

 

Trucking sucks.
Just jump from place to place until you find some B's you can tolerate.
There is a reason 97 % turnover rate at nearly every company.
Trucking sucks.