More on grad school
Jun 21, 2009 The Story of My Life, work work work
Apparently this is my 3540th post. I’ve been blogging a long time.
I wanted to write a little more about my grad school decision, which came about in a very circular, meandering way. I was thinking this weekend about mistakes and how I have to make mistakes if I’m going to do something new and how discouraging this can be sometimes. Because I’ll be looking ahead at a Brand New Plan and realize that I will have to bump into things while I learn my way around. I tell the kids all the time that you’re supposed to make mistakes when you’re learning something because sometimes you have to do things wrong to figure out how to do things right but I understand why they kick their feet and whine about it because I feel like that sometimes, too.
I’ve been thinking about my freelance experience and what I loved about it and what I didn’t like about it. It’s taken awhile to figure out what I didn’t like because I kept thinking about it in terms of how I didn’t do this or that well and should have learned to do it better. But the more I thought on it, the more I realized that if you dread a certain part of your job, it’s hard to do it well. And the networking I had to do, I never could figure out how to make that work for me.
There’s a lot of competition for the kind of work I was doing (the consulting part of it) and I’m not great with competition. When Noah first started softball, I remember that he used to let the ball roll right by him. One time I saw him gesture to his team mate, inviting the kid from the outfield to come and get it. I asked him why later and he said, “Well, he wants it more than I do.” This is how I felt about gunning for work.
Don’t get me wrong — I like to work — but I don’t like pushing people around to try to get to a job first. I was listening to a woman talking to another consultant this weekend at PodCamp. She was saying that she was tired of rival consultants inviting her for a friendly coffee and then trying to pump her for information — the same information she was trying to get paid for, right? People do this all the time and you know I never could figure out how to turn someone trying to swipe info into a sale; I’d end up giving too much away. I’d believe people when they’d say that maybe we could partner around this or that and I’d share all my hard-earned info and then never get a call back. I know it’s stupid to give stuff away for free but I like helping people and I always believed (usually mistakenly) that it would pay out in the long-term.
So that was a mistake. But what I learned from that mistake is that I would rather help people then not.
The other thing I learned is that I’m a good listener. I didn’t know this because I do adore hearing myself talk. But I went to a lot of interviews and meetings and lunches and coffees and it turns out that I really like to listen. Most of the jobs I got? I got them because I would start asking my interviewer questions and I’d end up learning a whole bunch about the company and/or project but also about the person doing the interviewing. I’d find out if they liked their job there and what they liked about it and what they did before and if they liked that, too, and how they felt about Columbus and what their hobbies were, etc. etc. I started to love interviews because they were so dang interesting.
But that was sometimes another mistake because sometimes I did more listening than selling. In interviews this worked for me but in those networking meetings? Not so much. Because we’d walk away from each other and maybe they were thinking what a nice person I was but maybe they didn’t have such a great idea of what I had to offer them professionally.
The other thing is that the whole marketing/PR culture is hard for me. A lot of it is very high energy and enthusiastic and contrary to most people, I find cheerleading disheartening. The work was fun; the getting of the work was NOT fun. So the other thing I learned is like a working world that is a little more low-key. (My current marketing job is very low-key, thank goodness.)
There were things I love Love LOVED about freelancing — mainly being my own boss. I am a stop and start kind of worker who gets hell bent on a project and works my own timeline. I like to work that way. I like to lay low and then tear the place apart finishing out a project. I like to spend my thinking time away from my desk and work way into the night. I can’t do that with a regular job and it makes it all a lot less fun for me.
Other things I loved and would look for me in my perfect career:
- Ability to change things up. I get bored easily so I like to have a lot of different ways to work.
- Chance for public speaking. It turns out that I love to give workshops and teach. I want to do more of that. And I’d like to get paid for it.
- More time with people but less time selling.
- Less time at the computer so that I’m not so burned out by the keyboard that my brain hurts when I try to write. (Please note how this blog has suffered as late.)
So like I said, I’ve been thinking about all of these things. I like my job (love my co-workers) and am learning a lot but I know this isn’t the job where I’m going to get my gold watch. I mean, it’s not where I see myself for the rest of my working life. But where then? What then?
A few weeks ago I was talking to someone about some problems he was having in a relationship and he said, “You know, you should be a therapist.” And I said, “Oh people always tell me that.”
They do always tell me that and they have since forever. I’ve thought about being a therapist, too, and have looked more than once at the MSW program here at Ohio State. Thing is, it’s very much about systems and I’m not all that interested in systems, besides which the internship is prohibitive for someone who needs to make a living. But I have gone back and stared at the web site an awful lot wondering if I could make it work.
So digging around, I found another program for a Masters in Counseling Education. You can either prepare to be a school counselor (not for me) or get a masters in Clinical Mental Health Counseling. Either way, you come out of there ready to get your LPCC (Licensed Professional Clinical Counselor). The great thing about the program is that it’s designed for working students so I wouldn’t have to quit my job (there are very limited fellowships so I need to have a back-up plan). I’ll be applying for fall 2010 but I have no idea how competitive it is.
I’m excited about this. It feels like a flexible enough career that I could do a lot of different things and that my career could look a lot of different ways as time goes on. (Because I really do get bored easily and like change even when change terrifies me.) I hope to focus on adoption issues and my dream of dreams is to do something like what Joyce Pavao is doing in Boston only on a smaller scale.
The other thing is that spending less time typing typing typing would be so great. I’ve been professionally tied to my computer for about a decade now and I’d like to earn a living OFF of it so that I can go back to using the computer for fun. My wrists would thank me, too. And certainly it would give me more to write about, eh?
Ok, so that’s my grad school decision — born from mistakes and small epiphanies.
Oh and I am on week 6 of Couch to 5K and looking forward to ending intervals this week and moving on to short but continuous runs. Hope to build up my speed!
Tags: counseling, graduate school, work
Yeah, I’m in hell
Jun 1, 2009 work work work
Work. Life. You know — the usual.
I’m coming to terms with the fact that my days as a true stay-at-home mom are over, never to return and grieving it hard. That’s not to say that I’m not grateful for work and mortgage payments and the ability to bring income to our household but man, I loved the season of being at the beck and call to my children alone. I mean, I’ve been working from home for years but this is a true 40+ hour a week job and even if I’m telecommuting three of those days, it’s a job. An actual job with a schedule and time constraints.
I’ve been trying very hard to ignore my sadness about said job because like I said, I’m so grateful for it (I really am) but I realized ignoring my sadness isn’t doing me much good so now I’m letting it out here on blog where I’ve been putting on a happy face as best I can for awhile.
So …
I’m having a tough time. I miss being a stay-at-home mother or at least having a stay-at-home spouse. I miss being able to playdate at will, fieldtrip at will, clean my house in a timely and efficient manner, grocery shop on whatever day groceries need to be bought, etc. I know this is extra-whiny because I’m damn lucky that for more than a decade I got to do those things but I miss doing them now. And goddamn but I miss having time to write. Because this full-time job is sucking up all the precious brainspace in my head and I haven’t written at all since I started (not counting occasional book reviews and heck, even this blog has suffered).
Thinking about how UNhappy some of this makes me is also making me think about things I can do to bring the happy back but it’ll be awhile because there are some obstacles I can’t get into here being sensitive and stuff (for now).
Anyway. I’m having a tough time of it, tougher than I’ve let on and it’s one reason you haven’t been hearing from me as much.
Ah well.
My life right now is work work work
Apr 28, 2009 work work work
We have our annual conference next week and pretty much every little bit of my free time is spent doing conference stuff. I’m excited to be learning what I’m learning both because they whole thing will be my deal next year so I better freakin’ learn it and also because I want to do that grassroots open adoption support conference (more like a gathering). I realized to get sponsors, I’d hit businesses that would appeal to families that weren’t adoption related like family-friendly destinations (the kind of places first and adoptive families might want to hook up for a visit), kid-friendly restaurants, scrapbooking and other memory making sorts of businesses, etc. So that’s one theoretical problem solved!!
(Speaking of open adoption, you gotta go read Jenna’s thoughts on the AAC conference particularly because of an attendee who spoke directly to Pennie and Jenna. I will let her share it so you will just have to go click!)
I can’t wait until this conference is over so I can go back to thinking about other things because right now I’m living and breathing (and dreaming about) conference communication projects (brochures, programs, annual reports!) and when I finally crash and can’t work anymore I want to get as far away from my keyboard as possible! But the best news I had today is that our boss is gonna let all us worker types have our own hotel rooms, which is music to this introvert’s ears! I LOVE my co-workers (it’s the luckiest group chemistry this side of Cheers casting) but I’m going to want somewhere to sit by myself and cry at the end of the day just as a matter of course. Plus it means if insomnia hits I can read without bothering anyone. Or take a hot bath at 1am to try to go to sleep.
Really there are only two sadnesses about the conference: 1) I will miss my kids and husband but especially my kids especially the smallest because we’re leaving Monday and not coming back until late Thursday; and 2) NO WIFI AT THE HOTEL. I know! It’s brutal! It’s inhumane! And we didn’t find a close-by free wifi spot either, not that we’ll have time to go there anyway. If I was a smart little writer girl, I’d bring my laptop and write but instead I’ll bring my laptop and not write and instead watch bad television and play Tumblebugs, (which I own, I’ll have you know, because I find those three color games very soothing) and decompress from spending all day with lots of people in rooms without windows. I’m excited about the conference just to see it all happen and I’m even more excited for it to be over although I bet I sit at my desk and stare blankly at the wall for awhile trying to figure out how to work again without feeling frantic. We have a lot of ideas though — things we want to do when we have time to do them — and there’s some everyday work that is coming hot on the heels of the conference so I’ll be plenty busy just not CRAZED like I was last week and am right now.
I’ll tell you something useful Julia told me a few weeks ago. She said this whole work/life balance thing? A total myth and anyone who tells you different is lying. She says it’s always a shifting, moving deck and you just try your best to stay upright. Right now Brett’s doing all the cooking, the house is a terrible terrible mess and the kids have way too much screen time. That’s what it’s taking to keep me on my feet and so that’s what’s happening. Do I feel guilty? Oh yeah but I’m training myself to remember that this is just how it is. (And when it shifts the other way and the kids need me more, I feel guilty about work — it’s always something.) So I’m telling myself it’s like when the babies are little and no one’s getting enough sleep and you prioritize then let the rest go. The way I see it, not having enough time is part of most human’s conditions and there are those with a surplus of it just like some people are blessed with more money, better health and houses where the dishwasher always works. But for most of us it’s a rollicking game of catch-as-catch-can. No wonder I like Tumblebugs where I can line everything up and move onto the next level. No wonder I find it so soothing (considering how nuts the rest of my life is).
Tags: cleveland, conferences, work
