As part of my work with Joanne, my career coach, I thought I'd start a new blog to document my journey towards self-enlightenment, reinvention, or whatever else it should be called. However, it is too complicated to keep two blogs, so I'm merging the two and adding this to my regular blog.
Basically, I'm clueless about where to go next, and Joanne is helping me (at $90/hour) to try to come "unstuck". She suggested that I keep a blog to use as practice for my writing, but since I already have a blog (if people want to know the "real me" they are welcome to read it), I think what I'm going to do is keep this as a subset of my other blog, which is more of a diary.
Monday night's session began with a discussion of the career history Joanne has written about me, from our interview of last week. Joanne is writing a book about how people ended up in their careers - by choice, coincidence, etc. I offered to be one of her subjects, (as an unemployed person, I seem to be volunteering for a lot lately), and so last week she "interviewed" me. She sent me her first draft and told me to review and edit as I pleased. I had to correct some inaccuracies, and being the writer and editor that I am, I edited some of it for clarity or conciseness. I told her that I really enjoyed doing the editing - it's something I love to do. I sat there at lunch editing with gusto - pen flying over the page. "... Let's just tighten this up, oh this is not right...it will sound better this way..." I had a really good time. So I told her that, which segued into telling her about the CraigsList posting that I applied to, for writing on-demand poetry. I was pretty proud of thinking "outside the box", and she thought that was great as well. So that opened up a new discussion about exploring writing opportunities.
We discussed my past positions and why I had trouble at some of them - conflicts with managers, etc.. while still being praised for what I did well. Joanne feels, as perhaps I do now too, that I may just be a square peg trying to fit in a round hole. Great to finally figure that out at age fifty, huh?? I know I'm not cut out (was I ever?) for the corporate/cubicle lifestyle - and yet I continued to go after the customer service /call center jobs because that is what I know, and in which I have skills. But perhaps it is time to leverage some of the other possible skills I have picked up along the way, or that I enjoy doing.
So my "homework" for this week is to do the following:
1) Create a "functional" resume, highlighting some writing experience.
2) Start a new blog, to use for more creative writing than the blog I have now.
3) find a writer's group that I might be able to visit.
Exploring writers groups and thinking about writing makes me think of a friend I have who has been an editor for many years. She is trying to break into a writing career, and wants to publish a memoir - (her teenage diaries). But she finally decided she also needed a "real" job, with benefits. She is also a licensed social worker with counseling experience, and found a job that uses those skills. I really don't feel that I want to be a writer, exactly, although I do enjoy keeping my blogs and online diaries (that's actually a LOT of writing). I would rather be a proofreader or editor, but I guess to do that, you need to show command of the English language anway.
Anyway, my first order of business, as is my way, was to go to the library. So today, I took out the following books:
* Bait and Switch - a woman pretends to be an unemployed white collar worker to see what it's like "out there".
* The Butterfly Hunter - adventures of people who found their true calling way (way) off the beaten path.
* Resumes : for re-entering the job market
* Resumes: for the over-50 job hunter.
* 2009 What Color is Your Parachute. I never liked this book, but it seems entertaining and I figure it couldn't hurt to read it.
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