I am a big girl. I am an adult. I am talented, intelligent, creative, gregarious, and passionate. I am also a wimp. I am allowing a bully to get the best of me at work, allowing her to denigrate my abilities and erode my self-confidence. And it has to stop. Moreover, I need to approach my attempts to find something new from a position of strength rather than desperation. If only I knew how to do that.
I have been in enough applicant pools in my lifetime to realize that there is only so much one can control, and that ultimately, everything happens for a reason. Sometimes it takes a while to figure out exactly what that reason is, but I know that obsessive attempts to control the outcome does nothing but create stress. Which is where I am now. Within the space of 10 days, I will have interviewed for 3 positions. I am petrified that the one I REALLY want will not be the one to offer me a position, because it's taking the longest to get going. I feel paralyzed by the possibility that I will be faced with a choice I don't want to make. Even worse, that NONE of them will make an offer, and I'll be stuck where I am! Rationally, I know that these three are not the only possible positions out there, but I want out of where I am SO badly, that I am in danger of making a knee-jerk decision. The times in my life when I have done that have had disastrous consequences, and I'm in no hurry to repeat that scenario.
What puzzles me is how I wind up in these situations to begin with. To do it in one's twenties or thirties is understandable; it's part of the growth process and career development. But I've waved the long good-bye to those days a long time ago, and it's still happening. To be fair, my current position was fine until about a year ago, when a new vice-president and her management style became clearly at odds with the atmosphere I was hired into. Then, one of my hiring managers decided it was time to take her PERS and retire in July, which caught me off guard. As much as I knew I would miss her, I wished her well, and looked forward to what a new person would contribute to our office.
Then, by late fall, another senior administrator in the office, whose dry wit and perpetual energy were a delight, decided he could no longer abide the chaos, tension, and negativity in our administration, and announced he would be gone by January 1.
My remaining manager, with whom I enjoyed a great rapport and working relationship, was trying her very hardest not to strangle the VP, and we relied on one another to keep our spirits up and sense of humor intact. Then, one December morning at a staff meeting, she announced she would be leaving at the end of the month. We'd both been looking, and both knew that. Nevertheless, her announcement caught me by surprise because she had nothing waiting in the wings. Now THAT'S desperate - to leave a high-level, lucrative, influential role where she was highly respected and loved, for unemployment. Which meant that I was left holding the bag.
She's been gone for two months now, and I am perilously close to the ledge. The atmosphere is downright toxic, the tension is palpable, and I come home emotionally exhausted and spent, only to wake up and dread returning for one more day. So, my task is to keep myself focused and positive, and not to define myself by the results of these interviews. What's the worst that could happen? That I get no offers? Or, I get fired, which might be a blessing in disguise. I will ultimately land on my feet, and I must keep reminding myself of that fact. I know that karma rules, and I will reap what I have sown. I wouldn't mind a few prayers and good wishes tossed my way, though.....Stay tuned......
