Sipping on a Starbuck's Mocha, I am working through an emotional upheaval. A promotion at work has been talked about for a couple of months now. It entails my applying for the particular position, being selected by the automated HR system as a candidate and then interviewing. My boss would really like for me to get it; I would really like to get it. The automated system doesn't think I'm qualified.
Yesterday, an HR rep explained to me what was needed in my app to qualify me, my boss told me to get it done. I sat at my computer and remembered an old set of job responsibilities I had not put on my current resume. They surfaced as I thought about a client I worked with for about 6 years. I can stretch those skills, I thought, to fit this job.
And that's what I did; quickly accessing an old resume I attached the narrative to the automated file and checked off the needed boxes and submitted. Done. I would now be selected by the system.
On the ride home however, I began to think about what had just taken place and my insides started to get queasy and I was immediately thrown off balance. Did the experience I had really fit with the requirements? I needed to think about it and I hadn't. I called my boss to let him know that it was done, but that I was going to make changes because I had been hasty in my submission. I called the HR rep as well. Still, I was queasy, and I'll be honest and say why. Because there was a part of me (not so small a part) that wanted to just leave it as it was. It would get me what I wanted, right? Maybe.
Driving to my child's soccer game this morning, I thought about that - about how easy it can be to just stretch the truth into a lie. I haven't had a lot of tolerance when I've seen it in others, but the reality of facing it in myself changed some of that, I think. Suddenly, I got the whole weapons of mass destruction strategy. I mean what was riding on that stretch of the truth? Being able to best George, Sr, giving America a victory, carving a good, strong name for oneself in the history books, lining the coffers of your political base and/or getting the scoundrel who slipped out of your Dad's grasp are probably some or all of the motivations for the stretch of truth that turned into the big lie.
And now I get it. It's an easy trap to fall into. Luckily, I hung in and thought about my role and responsibilities with the organization in question. I realized that in one category I really did not have the experience I claimed. I went online and changed my submission to reflect that truth and the queasiness got worse.
This time I realized my funky stomach was tied to potentially losing something I wanted, to having to suffer the frustration of my boss when he realizes that I (more than likely) will not be selected by the system for an interview, to not being able to clear my debt and buy all the things I've been dreaming of for the past few months.
HOLD UP! Wait a minute! And now, like never before I get present moment thinking and living. Trapped by time, my mind created this horror of consequences. Consequences from the unconscious action of submitting my experience without thinking it through. Then, I imagined the consequences of removing the experience from my application. But, none of those consequences has actually happened. Maybe they will, maybe not. It doesn't really matter. They're not happening NOW.
Right now, I have done what I believe to be the right thing. I think I have also learned something from the experience. Two checks in the "good for me" column.
While the mind links things together (like getting a promotion and clearing my debts), the spiritual reality of Life (as I know it to be true) is that these things are not necessarily linked. There are an infinite number of circumstances that can afford me the release of my debt. From changing my own thoughts about money and the behaviors that result (both of which I am working on) to the possibility of job offers I don't know of yet, there are many, many ways this can work out.
Two blogger friends have reminded me of that lately, Edie (whose space is private, so no link is published here) and David (who's Not Quite There Yet - see links to right). I don't think either would mind if I briefly described my take on their circumstances.
Edie, thoughtful, encouraging and a caretaker, has had enormous change in her Life during the past 18 months. An escalating mortgage (don't believe the low variable APR hype) caused her and her husband to give up the home they had cherished. Then, not long after moving into a townhome, they were told they had to move because the homes were being torn down. Rugs were literally being pulled out from under them left and right.
Yesterday (don't you just Love the timing?), I read on Edie's blog that she and her husband had just marked off the land for a new home they are about to build and for which they have received financing. A brand new home, built the way they want it, on land they appreciate and value because it is family land. How amazing is Life?, I ask you. Life is not linear, there are no fixed routes.
David has been wanting to relocate so he is closer to his piece of land (from Alabama to New York State) and retirement. For the past year or so, I have read on his blog about interviews and dashed hopes. No luck with this or that job, recruiters who lie, companies that simply don't believe he has the IT experience on his resume (cause he's a mature man, not a 30 something fast tracker). At one point he actually accepted a position (signed documents to that effect), resigned from his job and relocated to be told on his first day that there was no job - oops!
Through all this, not without frustration and anger, David kept plugging away. Need I say that he is now much closer to his home in NY, in a new job that he seems to like (though for David, like may be a strong word) and working towards his plan of retirement?
These folk help me understand that the circumstance and the path are not my concern. Where I am headed and my focus on the steps in front of me are all I need to manage. What is the next thing, the best thing to do now and now and now. That's it. Life will unfold and I will Be in it. That's all I can do and that is wonderfully, magically enough.
Love to you all...
Gayle
3 comments:
Wow - being cited on your blog, while being sited (and occasionally sighted) in NY. Now here is my problem with YOUR problem as far as the issue of that one bit of experience you didn't claim/then did/then didn't. You say there is an automated HR system. This means it closely resembles one of those miserable phone calls where if you want A, push 1, if you want B push 2 and so on for a whole list none of which exactly is what you are calling about. In resumes and personal ads, the canny reader allows for a little hyperbole; woe unto the supplicant who doesn't provide it; since the reader, if wise, is deducting a bit here and there anyway. The problem with being painfully honest while all about you are lying their glutei maximi off, is that not only will they get the job or the partner in a crooked world, but that they just might wind up being your boss and they KNOW you know they are full of shit, and that doesn't make them want you around. My take is that if there is an interview process, that is when you gently put things right after dazzling with your general demeanor and your experience in the areas where you WERE as advertized. The trick is to get to the interview. If you genuinely believe you can do the job and are qualified, and if the area where you were light is not a completely closed book to you, I'd say the sensible thing is to get yourself on the list. Automated selection is a crime against humanity. You can morally justify the little bit of exaggeration by reflecting that you will probably keep a bigger liar from getting the job. Really, there is no excuse for automated selection for jobs - are they entirely soulless? Example: I lose consideration for many jobs, despite 35+years in the biz for the sole reason that I don't have a degree, and the underling who makes the first cut just casts my application aside. I do not, on my rez, claim a degree, but I do list the Univ from which I turned on, tuned in and dropped out without mentioning either degrees or graduation. if asked, i come clean. Half they time they assume the degree. In what world would a Computer Science degree, had I got one in 1964, be relevant?? It would be like having a 1950 degree in animal cloning, before anyone had a clue about it. THEY are trying to make their job easy by prejudging (familiar idea?); it is up to you to make them do their job right, by presenting the opportunity to deal with you. It is all stacked against you, hon, any way you look at it. So don't overthink this shit. All this is not my opinion of course if the position is brain surgeon and the place you are a little light is in actually having done surgery. Every bio I ever read cites the crucial time when the now rich and famous writer faked it and got the part/girl/guy/job/promotion.
Dear Gayle.
I have to agree here with David.. he is right on target.. I know in side you think you are not being honest here.. but hey.. the bloody thing is autmotaed.. its not a person.. and like David said.. tell the truth once you are face to face with a real person..
we live in the real world.. a world basied on lies.. true its up to us.. to be honest.. but there is a time and place for all things..
I really do like this new person that I see emerging.. I liked the old one to.. but this one.. wow.. there is a peacefullness.. it fills up the page.. and surrounds those who read the words with hope.. and strength.
been thinking about you..
your right.. all good things come in their OWN time.. we just have to remain open to recive them..
I'm on a harsh journey right now..but the rewards will be out of sight.. I am stopping smoking.. its a bitch.. but I am more of a bitch.. so I win..
grins..
love ya Hope
Gayle. Yes. Inventing future scenarios, or assuming we know what people are thinking, doing, catastrophising - all useless and negative ways of thinking. Leave it in the now, and let us know what the 'now' outcome is will you.
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