Acting on My Self-Knowledge in the Workplace

Today I did something I’ve never done before.  I turned down a job.

I’ve been interested in going back to work and only became serious about it a couple of weeks ago.  At first, my dream job literally was shoveling horse poop.  I love animals, would love to work with horses, and thought that this transition back to the working world would be a perfect time to do something like this – a dream job – believe it or not.

Well, somehow my interest in that faded and I thought the next best thing would be helping folks out with their groceries at my favorite supermarket.

Somehow as I got back into the swing of things, that began to seem ridiculous.  I wanted to do more.  I wanted to make more money.  Suddenly administrative assistant positions seemed like a good fit.

But then that seemed dumb, too.  I am way overqualified.  It felt like I was selling myself short.  So now I am looking at some more professional/managerial level positions.

I interviewed today for a position that involved a lot of supervising.  Of 41 people.  I really, really wanted to want the job.  At first I couldn’t believe my ears.  I had not exactly applied for this position but it was the position that they offered me.  I had to be sure that I heard the title correctly.  And I didn’t want it.  I knew this.  Almost from the beginning.  There would be no room for error, a ton of driving, multiple layers of supervising, and I could feel myself just feel yucky inside.  I just didn’t want to do it.  At about minute five I realized that I could gracefully express my hesitance by saying something about wanting to explore if this was the best fit.

Somehow those words came out of my mouth and we decided we would talk about it at the end.  And so we did.  They needed to make a quick decision and so I couldn’t mull this over.  I had to decide in the interview what I thought of it.  I expressed my hesitance, they said that they were really disappointed that I thought it wasn’t a good fit, they wanted to hire me, but that my judgement was the most important.  They told me they were really grateful for my candor and that they would like to be in touch again when another position comes up that would be a better fit.  That delighted me.  I didn’t have to fit myself into some narrow opportunity.  We could work something out that might be good for me.

When I got home, I was uncomfortable.  I was wondering if I made the right decision.  I kept saying to myself that there’s a lot going on and this job just didn’t feel good to me.  I would hate to feel the pressure of this job and then be confronted with my grandfather’s death, for instance, given that this job has little leeway and you deliver immediate results or you’re out.

But really all that justification is stupid.  I didn’t want it.  The old parts of me were drawn toward pleasing these people and having them accept me because I accepted their job.  That was the part of me that was feeling like I had to justify my decision.  The old parts still couldn’t quite understand why I didn’t do that, why I didn’t just go ahead and stretch.

But that’s what I’ve learned all along in therapy.  I stretched/was stretched too far, too quickly, when it wasn’t in my best interest when I was a kid.  I tried to be all grown up too quickly but I never was able to know who I was and what I needed.  Today I knew what I didn’t need and could act on it.  I earned my own respect.  I just so happened to earn my interviewer’s respect as well.

I talked with Andrea a bit after I returned home.  She commented that I didn’t have to merge with them.  I could remain differentiated.  I don’t think about emotional fusing so much at work, but it’s true.  If you emotionally fuse in your personal life, there will be emotional fusion happening in your work relationships.

I managed to stay differentiated, stay true to myself, even as I was contending with some manic-ness.  I am pleased.  I figure the old ways, the manic-ness, is a well worn groove.  As I get out in the world, it is going to come back.  I just need to keep knowing what’s good for me and act upon that.  More on beguiling mania in a bit.