I hate job hunting. There, I said it out loud for all to hear. It is the most ego-busting experience you could have. And I should know. I have been actively job hunting for a full-time job for the last three years. In fact, I have more rejection letters than I can count. Hmmm, maybe I should contact the Guinness folks and see if I have beat their world record. And today, the rejection letters tend to come via email. It used to be you got an actual letter in the mail signed by the person rejecting you. At least then I believed they knew my name!
When Riley went to first grade, I decided it was time to leave the part-time-low-paying-never-feel-respected world of part-time work. Or should I say, indentured servitude. Dont get me wrong. I was forever thankful for part-time work I was blessed to have over all those mommy years when my children were at home and young and needed me to wipe their mouths and their rear ends. Now I feel like the rear end.
I started out looking for a job in industry. I used to work in marketing long before anyone called me mommy. But I guess being home for 17 years didnt do me any favors. After applying for a dozen marketing jobs and not receiving a single interview, I gave up.
Then I decided to try to become a full-time professor, since I had been teaching college part time for 17 years. Well, they want you to have a doctorate for that and I only had an MBA. I did backdoor myself into a full-time instructor job at one school but that position only lasted two years. When enrollment declined, I was clearly the lowest man on the totem pole. Last in – first out, as they say.
Since I am a get it done sort of person, I began to work on my doctorate in management and I went back to teaching college part time. Let me just say that I am the queen of part-time work. I can get part-time jobs, in fact I now have three part time jobs concurrently.
But the pay is so low I might as well flip burgers at McDonalds (no offense to McDonalds).
Over the last three years, I have applied for a teaching position at any university within a 50-mile radius of my home. In fact, I have applied to many of them multiple times and been rejected multiple times. They probably see my name and think, Oh no, her again? Why wont she just leave us alone?
But, like the train chugging up the steep hill, I continue to mumble to myself, I think I can I think I can I think I can and I keep job hunting.
After the latest round of rejections, I began to wonder if maybe there was some sort of typo on my resume that offended people. Maybe my qualifications are so intense that they intimidate people? Or maybe they just dont like me. It does feel personal, I have to admit.
So I have become the queen of job hunting. And if only I could find someone who would be willing to pay me to job hunt for myself, I could make a decent living at it.
Until then, I will just keep on keepin on. And I will try to find the joy in job hunting.
And not let the rejection get me down.
