Out of My Comfort Zone

Contrary to the popular belief of my family, friends and (former) colleagues, I’m not a total stick-in-the-mud. Occasionally I do take risks and venture out of my comfort zone.

Not too long ago I took on a freelance assignment in a completely new field. I don’t want to bore anyone with the details; let’s just say it was more academically inclined than what I have done in the past.

I took on the assignment during a particularly hellish week of four job interviews (none of which I got, thank you very much) and stomach pains that awoke me during the night. It was not the ideal time to undertake a completely new task. But I have to admit, the prospect of making a bit of cash and the opportunity to round out my portfolio was too hard to pass up. I figured I had nothing to lose by giving it a try. Even if I failed (more on that later), I wasn’t going to lose any money.

So I did it. I stepped out of my comfort zone. And it got me thinking about how often people are encouraged to get out of their comfort zone. You see it on those silly self-help motivational posters, usually of someone standing before a forked road or a cliff (kinda scary, don’t you think?).

Like so many trendy catchphrases, “comfort zone” has a different meaning to each individual and is really quite vague when you think about it. To one person, getting out of their comfort zone might be quitting their job and starting their own business. Or bungee jumping. To another person, it might be as simple as trying a new cuisine.

Ah, food…let’s digress here. My favorite is Italian. After having grown up feasting on Italian food, how could it not be? Is there really any other kind of food? But I do like other cuisines. I love Chinese and Greek. I’ve tried and liked Vietnamese and Mexican. Ethiopian? Not so much. Same with Southern barbeque and Thai. And I don’t understand the prevailing foodie sentiment that dictates only when the food scorches your digestive track from tongue to anus are you truly an adventurous eater. I like some heat in my food, but since I was born with a sensitive stomach I can only take so much spice. I’ll try new cuisines, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to like it.

Which leads back to my main point. Why this near dictatorial mandate that everyone must get out of his or her comfort zone? My feeling is that if someone is happy and contented in his or her life, then there is no real need to change. Demanding that everyone get out of their comfort zone is judgmental and shows a singular lack of empathy for other people. People will not change their lives by being hectored into doing so.

Now, if someone is unhappy in their circumstances; they have an unbearable job or are in a bad relationship, eventually they will come to that realization and take the necessary steps to make their lives more aligned with what they truly want. It’s not going to happen because someone else or some empty platitude told them to do so. Anytime I’ve tried to advise people (okay, I butted my nose in their business) on how to possibly change their lives, I’ve usually found them to be defensive and sometimes downright nasty to me in return. So I don’t do it anymore. Better for all involved.

There is also this underlying belief in society that only when you do certain things are you getting out of your comfort zone. Starting a new business is considered getting out of your comfort zone. Relocating to a new city is another. So is leaving a bad relationship. That’s all well and good and I wouldn’t discourage anymore from those endeavors if that is what they truly want to do. Yet those actions predispose some conscious control on the part of the individual. What about things that happen out of our control?

How about when someone is forced out of his or her comfort zone because of the death of a loved one? Or a sudden job loss, or the diagnosis of a serious illness? Isn’t that person getting out of their comfort zone? Yet in those instances, the individual is never given their rightful credit for venturing out of their comfort zone and building a whole new life.

In fact, I sometimes think my life since the end of 2009 has been nothing more than a protracted, grueling exercise in getting out of my comfort zone: job loss; 16 months searching for a new job; found a job and had to learn a whole new industry; lost that job; looking for a new job that if? when? I get it will most likely entail learning a whole new industry and set of tasks. Oh joy! Oh bliss! Yet rather than seeing me as someone who is dealing/has dealt with some rough situations and is trying mightily to find a job and a new path in life, I’m seen as a loser who can’t tie her own shoelaces. That’s really unfair.

People also fail to realize that simply getting out of your comfort zone doesn’t mean it will go as planned. The way I see it, three things can happen when you make a plan: You can succeed spectacularly; you’ll succeed, but not as spectacularly as you hoped; or you will fail miserably.

Spectacular success is never guaranteed, but neither is utter failure. It’s more likely the outcome falls between those two extremes. For that we should be grateful. Instead, we’re unhappy with nothing less than a stunning triumph and we then fall into a familiar pattern of blaming outside forces. The problem, as I see it, may lie with too-high expectations and too little pre-planning.

We further think if we make one big change in our lives (new job, new partner, new city), everything else in our lives will be better. It’ll all be blue skies and sunshine and happy times. Maybe, maybe not. Years ago, the best and most realistic advice I heard came from a co-worker. She had been through a divorce and was asked by a co-worker who was having marital problems about what she should do. Should she split from her husband? “Same problems. Less money,” was her succinct answer. So a bit of perspective is needed, folks. I know that even if I get a job, it won't change the other deficits in my life (although maybe, just maybe I can move to a new apartment and get a Fiat 500).

Yet that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try. Getting back to that freelance assignment, I did okay. In baseball parlance, I didn’t hit a homerun; more like a bloop single over second base. I did have a difficult time completing the assignment for a variety of reasons, but I’m not going to use that as an excuse. When asked to redo the project, I did so and acted professionally throughout (something, I’m ashamed to admit, I haven’t always done in the past). Because, despite what my former and potential employers might think, I'm a true pro who can get the job done, no matter how difficult, if given the chance.

I don't regret taking the assignment. At a time when my life is overcast with financial strain, uncertainty and repeated rejections, I can take a pinch of pride in trying something new, getting out of my comfort zone, and knowing at least I didn't completely muck it up. That gives me a modicum of confidence to try new things in the future. 

Perhaps the best way to look at getting out of one’s comfort zone is as a learning experience. If it went well, what was it that made it so? How can you replicate that in other facets of your life? If it didn’t go well, where could you have done a better job? All that can only help you in building a better life and making you a better person.

Yet I can certainly understand how habit and fear of the unknown can trap someone in a “comfort zone” that is restrictive and quite possibly destructive. Again, it’s up the person to decide to stay or go, to make a change or not. It’s not going to happen because you or I badgered them into making a life-changing transformation.

So for anyone contemplating a life change, a new job, a new lifestyle, or even trying a new restaurant, I say go for it. Even if it doesn’t turn out as you may have hoped, you will have learned a heck of a lot in the process.

But one thing is for sure: I will never bungee jump.

Shoppin’ With the Oldies

Funny how different life is when you are no longer shackled to the Monday-to-Friday, 9-to-5 grind.

How silent the middle of the day is after workers go off to work (no doubt to be underpaid and mistreated by their employers) and schoolchildren are carted off to school (no doubt to be confounded by eye-rolling, face-palm-inducing Common Core math problems). The only sounds you hear are the bang bang bang of a nearby condo construction project and the church bells that ring at noon. Around 3 p.m., you hear the harrumphing engines of the school buses as they disgorge their charges. In between, it’s complete, unnerving silence.

Yet, being unemployed, I can run errands and shop whenever I choose during the week. I don’t have to wait till the dusk of 6 p.m. or the weekends, when the malls and roads are packed with gainfully employed people who use their sparse free time to shop and run errands.

What have I noticed as I make my own schedule? Well, you can get some pretty sweet parking spaces at the mall. Doctor appointments are pretty easy to arrange, too.

The other phenomenon I’ve noticed? OMG! Holy Depends! There are a lot of old people out there! Where do they all come from?!

I’m not talking spry 60-somethings (who are probably still working to somehow afford a retirement that is increasingly out of reach for them). I’m talking about 80-year-olds with pale, wrinkled parchment skin, teetering on canes or walkers, and sometimes lugging those plastic shopping carts on wheels or even oxygen tanks.

I see them as they sluggishly shuffle from their ozone-busting Buicks to the store; as they clog up the aisles at Sears and Pathmark on their motorized Jazzy chairs. It’s gotten to the point where I pull out from parking spaces oh-so-slowly lest I bump into one of these meandering oldsters. (I think I annoyed one woman at a mall recently when I took too much time to exit the space she wanted. Hey, I have to be careful.)

Please don’t get me wrong. I respect old people. I hope to be one someday. However, with my checkered health history, that’s probably a pipe dream. And I’ll always let them cut in line in front of me. (It’s the right thing to do and you just look bad if you get into an argument with an old person.) I’m just making an observation here, like why do old people wear plaid so much? Did they all go to Catholic school? And please, please, old people, look before you cross the street. I'm a courteous driver (as well as a slow one) so I'll stop for you. Can't promise the same for other drivers.

Yet, given the aversion people over age 62 have to driving at night, I guess it makes sense that these AARP reverse vampires only come out in the daylight. I do see other “types” of people during the weekday daylights hours, such as those who don’t have traditional 9-to-5 hours like medical personnel in their scrubs. Or young mothers pushing babies in strollers. Are they stay-at-home moms, or on maternity leave?

I do sometimes see people of working age during the week, having a lunch, shopping or sipping coffee in Starbucks by themselves. Are they unemployed like me? Or enjoying a rare day off to themselves?

But mostly I see old people. A lot of them. Which makes me wonder: What do you think of me? A person of employable age out in the middle of the afternoon, scarfing down free food at Trader Joe’s?

What must they think of me?

Must’ve Been My Eyebrows

Part of looking for a job is confronting the unpleasant reality of rejection. I’ve come to expect it, and I don’t really get too upset when I lose out on a job. Companies have the right to choose their workers. All we as job seekers can do is actively search for work and put our best foot forward when we are lucky enough to get an interview. As I’ve said before, I’m disappointed when I’m not hired, but never angry. Though it does make continuing to seek work a more daunting endeavor. Sometimes, I hate to admit, I just think, "Oh, why bother going for the interview. They'll just pick someone else."

That's because there are some rejections that sting more than others. A few weeks ago, I went for two interviews for a job I had every qualification the company requested. I even had experience in the industry in which the company operates. Further, I was told several times the hiring manager was “excited” about my background. Both interviews went well (or so I thought). The salary range was set by the company and was well within my requirements. Money was not an issue.

So imagine the slap in the face I felt when I received the email telling me the company was going with two other “stronger” candidates. What the what!?

When I called the recruiter to find out why my candidacy was tossed aside, she was vague and said that “it was nothing negative.” So what went wrong? What made those other candidates stronger?

Again, companies have every right to make their own hiring decisions, which can be, in the words of my old copy chief, arbitrary and capricious, and maddeningly fickle, I might add. We are dealing with humans, remember. It’s very difficult to know why one candidate is chosen over another, and HR people rarely tell a passed-over job seeker where he or she failed. Perhaps they should. It would save us a lot of psychic pain and unfounded ruminations on where we went wrong.

If I wasn’t chosen because I did poorly in the interview, I should know that so I can improve the next time. If I wasn’t chosen because of my age, well, I should know that too so I can make other plans (like what homeless shelter to move to).

I actually considered writing an email to the lady I interviewed with to get a better idea of where I fell short (and offer to do a freelance assignment). However, I thought better of that idea and decided against it (lest I seem like a crazy stalker, even though I fear I’m becoming such).

In truth, the candidate picked over you may or may not be any better or worse than you. Did I have too much experience? Was the company looking for an entry-level person to fill the job? Did my lack of technology skills doom me? Did I unwittingly answer a question incorrectly during the interview? Did I smell bad? I’ll never know.

Nevertheless, the experience reinforced a lesson I should have learned a long time ago: Never, ever get your hopes up for any one job. Because your hopes can be squashed so easily and painfully when you don’t get the job.

As I was speaking to a good friend the other day about this situation, she helped put it into perspective. She said that, in the past, when she or her husband failed to get a job they applied and/or interviewed for, her husband would say, “Oh, well, it must’ve been our eyebrows.”

The point being, there are many reasons why you were not selected for the job, even if you have all the qualifications and experience the company stipulates. Those reasons can range from the concrete (you failed a test; somebody with better experience was chosen) to the absurd (the interviewer may not have liked what you wore that day or the look of your eyebrows).

Despite the rather preposterous requirements companies sometimes demand of job seekers, hiring decisions hinge on the subjective idiosyncrasies of the interviewer. Did she not like my personality? (Too calm and placid?) My character? (Damn those loan-sharking convictions!)

Did I wear a color she didn’t like? (I dress very conservatively. That day, I was wearing black and white.)

Alas, for whatever reason, the woman decided I was not someone she wanted to work with. That’s the painful truth of job rejection.

Or maybe she just didn’t like the look of my eyebrows.

Illusions

A while back I wrote of how different this job search appeared from the last time I was laid off in late 2009, when it took me 16 months to find another job.

And I use the word “appear” deliberately because, as my job search has stretched from a winter of discontent and heaps of snowfall to a chilly, rainy (almost) spring, I’m beginning to think my hope of securing employment within a reasonable time period (six months, say) or even of ever getting a job again are mere illusions. Obviously, I was fooled by being called in for interviews so soon after I started looking for another job. Nothing has changed, really. It's like believing the NY Mets will have a winning season after an above-500 April. (Hey, guys, home plate won't give you cooties.) Pretty soon, it all reverts to the mean, and in my case, that means a long, tedious, rejection-filled job search.

I send out at least two résumés a day. I go on every interview I’m called for; I pursue every opportunity, freelance or full-time, aggressively. Heck, I’ve even ventured to employment agencies, something I vowed I would never do again. Has any of this netted me a job? Nope.

Sometimes the interviews go well, sometimes, they don’t. Sometimes someone is hired with less experience than me, sometimes, with more. There are obvious times when the company hired a recent grad just so they can pay them a meager wage. To be clear, I’m asking for a reasonable salary that is commensurate (and possibly below) my experience. For some firms, that’s fine. Others, not so much: In one instance, when I told the interviewer my salary requirement, he nearly gagged.

After I was laid off in 2009 and spent 16 months out of work, I knew I had to take a pay cut to get another job. And I did...my former job paid me $15,000 less in annual salary than my former former workplace. Even after raises, I was still making $12,000 less than I did at my previous job.

It’s also becoming increasingly obvious that to get work, I may have to take a freelance and/or contract job with no benefits. Or work (again) for a low salary. Oh, and did I mention that in some instances those jobs entail being verbally abused by co-workers and bosses? Nice, huh?

As my quixotic job hunts nears the six-month mark—the mark at which I officially become one of the long-term unemployed, thereby less and less attractive to potential employers—questions and self-doubt seep into my psyche. I wish I were one of those people who think they’re “great” and “awesome.” I can’t, especially when every job rejection is just another reminder of how inept I’ve become. Never something I had in great reserve, my self-confidence is nonexistent. No amount of pep talks and positive thoughts are going to change that, particularly at this time, as I endure yet another long stretch of joblessness. I can barely look at myself in the mirror anymore.

You might be thinking, oh, why doesn’t she take any job? Hey, I would…if I could get a job offer!!! Prevailing sentiment seems to be that unemployed people are pond scum, we must take any job offered, for whatever low salary, and we have no right to basic human dignity. When did employed people become so haughty? Hate to point out that a sudden job loss can happen to any of us.

Am I too old to ever gain full-time employment again? Is my career over? Am I incompetent? I fear the answer to all those questions is yes.

If that is so, what are my options? Do I have any other options? Did I do the right thing...or have I done everything wrong?

For if my career is over, that is something I need to mourn and take time to process. I also have to figure out what my next step will be. That takes time, too.

Do I give up completely? Or do I continue to attempt to jump through the ridiculous hoops employers put us through just to get a job? I've spent days doing take-home tests, only to be told "we've gone with another candidate." Or I get no response at all.

Do I persevere in the face of the discrimination HR people have against laid-off workers? How do I fight the subtle-but-not-so-subtle ageism in hiring practices?

But for now, I have to stop living in an illusion.