So, it’s been almost a month since I’ve updated this blog!
Yes, this job loss thing really has sidetracked my energy. So since I’ve last wrote, I’ve been expending huge amounts of time searching for another job within the company I work for. I officially become unemployed starting June 1st unless I can land another job. It’s a really self-esteem testing experience to go from working for the same company for nearly 21 years straight and then suddenly preparing to be unemployed.
So I’ve had a few interviews some really great and some where I completely fell short of what they were looking for. And with the great interviews nothing has happened which makes me nervous like they’ve already picked someone else. And so I’m watching my chances fade away.
And to make things more tortuous for me I’m still at times expected to work hard in the remaining time I have left at my current job. They’ve already hired a contractor to replace me! And they would like me to work diligently to get him up to speed. It really upsets me when they want me to bust my ass to pull them out of binds and technical emergencies yet they have no intentions of keeping me employed. They are busy worrying how this new contractor is going to be able to do by job, yet they are so willing to get rid of me! And they want to participate in this worry by doing my best job to insure his success in replacing me. It hurts.
I’m trying my best to be helpful to the people I work with, and not burn any bridges with my current boss, but I need to recognize where my boundaries are and not follow the example of other people. If someone works 90 hours a week don’t make that influence where I think my boundaries are. So if I have a job interview for one hour on Wednesday, I can’t allow myself to be pushed into thinking I can balance my work load around that one hour time slot. “Oh sure I’ll work on this emergency Wednesday morning, go to my interview and then come back and continue working” On the surface that sounds reasonable, but if I work on an emergency that will suck out my energy so I’ll be sub par when I’m being grilled during an interview. And if the interview doesn’t go well continuing my work afterwards will only rub salt into my emotions.
You see I need to be able to scope out boundaries around my emotional time.
God I’m definitely A LONG LONG WAY away from being masculine!!
But the fact is I’m a human not a machine. And so although I’m capable of putting in some tenacious technical efforts and pulling of some unexpected feats, it’s all still influenced by emotions. And if I’m feeling very conflicted like recognizing that at times the harder the work the more I’m helping get rid of my job, then my mind can go blank, my memory flounders and my IQ plummets. And so I need to plan emotional processing time around some of the things I do, most especially when the things I do are all very stressful.
So anyway I’ve had a roller coaster emotional ride with one particular job as a program manager. This would be a manager of managers kind of job. A huge self-esteem boost because of the huge jump in responsibility, far beyond what I’ve ever done. Last Monday I got called about it and managed to pull off a sales pitch that convinced the person I could do the job. The that Friday during my formal interview that person changed her mind and had me interview for a less demanding position. And to make things worse I wasn’t impressing anyone during the interview and I needed to impress someone to have a chance. Finally, they gave me a chance to try again today. I prepared hard and in the end it was for naught. I definitely felt I did my best or as close to the best, but in the end it seemed what the person was asking for was may 10 x more than I could show. So it makes me wonder a bit why they even considered me.
Well I guess it’s a positive sign that I’m doing the right things to sell myself so that I can get my foot pretty far in the door for something I’m not qualified for. So at least I can give myself a hand for definitely doing my best. Many people in a similar position would not have even tried.
But that emotional roller coaster of things happening better than expected only to be dashed not once but twice really pops the air out of my sails. And then in it’s wake there is an undeniable sense of emptiness. My mind focuses on a couple of other jobs I’m being considered for, and starts getting paranoid with each passing hour.
Why haven’t they called me! Maybe I should call right now? No, No. I called on Friday, and they hadn’t returned my call and so if I call now maybe I’ll annoy them. But this silence this waiting even for a day is becoming agonizing. This uncertainty becomes more tortuous as time passes. I feel defeated.
I’m a riled up middle aged man. I’m not giving up the fight, but this kinds of defeats are wearing me down.
I want to go back to Never Never Land. I want to live in Wonderland. Take me to Strawberry Fields. Where nothing matters. And in this place I at the idea of blogging for income feels so far away in terms of effort level. Not that it’s not doable, but that it’s just far away, such a long long walk. I couldn’t do it when I was operating under the comfort of long term employment so now facing the prospect of unemployment now what? But it would certainly be true that unemployment grants me the time I would need, but in a scary undesireable way.
But I guess when you lose focus of the true important things in life you have to be dealt life shaking events, be it a death of a loved one, the loss of a job, or the threat of losing your life.