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Life Parallels

 As someone who has changed jobs more times that I like to call attention to in my resume, I have developed adaptations to cope with new job jitters - over the years even learned who to thrive in it. My cousin P asked me a valid question recently - what makes you think that the thing you are going into will be any better or different from what you are leaving? We all know that the interview process (unless you have close personal connections with the hiring manager or people in that organization) is like a courtship - they sell you on the job, the prospects, alignment to your stated goals and so forth. 

The interviewee gets a chance to ask questions to assess if they should believe the sales pitch. But the interviewee must also dance around things they want to gloss over and dive into what they feel will show them off in the best light. It's like the first few dates - everyone is on their best behavior, making the best impression they can in hopes of taking things forward - a committed relationship or a job. I think much is transferrable between lessons a person can learn from a serious of bad relationships and jobs that turn out to be duds for any number of reasons. 

I have found a very strong parallel to exist between by string of ill-advised relationships back in the day and the jobs I was skipping in and out of. There was the same level of disenchantment with both and I was showing the same lack of discernment, unwillingness to probe where I noticed something concerning. If a person is unable or unwilling to expend the energy on diligence and are lazy enough to expect things will magically work out, then only one outcome is likely - in the fullness of time, they will reach peak disappointment and will need to exit the scene. 

Once I got a handle on the relationship area of my life and understood what it took to keep me centered and at peace, I was able to bring some of the wisdom into how I went about looking for the next thing in my career. I told P I felt pretty good and was prepared for surprises good and bad with the confidence that the bad would be containable. 

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