“Bright and shiny”
My best friend in high school used to compare humans to seagulls, always getting distracted by bright and shiny objects. A new client, in the midst of a career transition, was discussing her latest company, with whom she had abruptly parted ways, as one of those “bright and shiny” distractions; she had believed the hype and disbelieved the warning signs.
It happens to the best of us. If you were to check out my LinkedIn profile, there are at least 2 different positions I don’t mention, positions I’ll never mention unless you’re holding one of my cats hostage. Those positions were the epitome of “bright and shiny”: prestigious, sexy big-name companies that appeared amazing on paper, but then the day-to-day reality of the jobs was…um maybe not so much. You live and you learn.
As long as you do indeed learn, right? As long as after the smoke clears, you try to figure out why things didn’t work, what you did and didn’t do, what you should have done, and what signs, in future, you can anticipate. That is the process of creating a satisfactory, successful life: learning from your mistakes, and moving forward. It’s when people keep making the same damn mistakes, refusing to learn, and choosing instead to stay addicted to their misery, that I start to lose my mind life stops.
“You write your life story by the choices you make.” -Helen Mirren
Understanding what went wrong, and taking responsibility for the choices we make, isn’t easy. There’s a lot of behind-the-scenes psychological drama involved. We get our value from our jobs, from our salaries, from how those salaries allow us to live, and support the people we love, how those salaries allow us to attract the people we love etc.! How many of us have accepted jobs that we knew were going to be horrible, but the company itself was so impressive, or our friends were so awed, or we felt that it was what we should do… that we didn’t dare say no? Or, we didn’t even know we could say no?
Then, when a job ends–especially a job, that due to its predominance, gave you a rare elevated sense of self–it’s so easy to think that you’re the world’s biggest loser, that you deserve to fail, and that all the people who hated you were right, and that you’ll never amount to much. Let’s face it, we live in a world wherein many of us are encouraged to get our sense of self worth from our jobs. When we lose a great job…oy.
But, my dears, this is exactly the time when you have to forgive yourself. Have your pity party, cry under the covers, eat a tub of Cherry Garcia ice-cream naked in bed–oh my god, how good does that sound?! #notetoself–go play with some kittens, and then, like the shark you are, you’re going to choose to move forward. You’re going to be choose to be honest with yourself about what went wrong, and you’re going to choose to learn from your mistakes.
The celebrities you admire…you think they didn’t make horrible mistakes? Oh my lord, of course they did. And the ones who continue to be successful are the ones who learned from their mistakes. Half of the reason this business keeps on growing, is that I’ve spent the past 6 years learning from mistakes, mine and others’. The people who started businesses at the same time I did, but who failed? They refused to acknowledge their mistakes. Unless your mistakes include harming children or cats or voting for Mitt Romney, I refuse to believe that your mistakes make you a bad person. And if you voted for Mitt: HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! (My President is Black)
How do you learn from your mistakes? In the case of a job that didn’t work out, consider: why do you, honestly, believe things didn’t work out? What did, or didn’t, you do? What about your management? What types of conversations were happening? What signs were there? Why did you accept the job? What was the structure of the company? For some people, self-awareness can be as simple as realizing that they don’t do well in start-ups, because they need the established infrastructure of a more top-down company. Is that a crime, or proof of their moral weakness… or simply, their ability to identify their strengths and weaknesses? (Identifying your strengths and weaknesses is not just a bullshit interview question, FYI. You have to identify the issues to correct them.) The people who succeed aren’t necessarily more talented than you, but they may be more talented at recognizing situations that allow them to achieve.
I’m just saying: you’re human. (Sorry if that’s a serious buzz kill.) We live in a world that’s obsessed with labels and prestige and brands. On your journey, you will be tempted by opportunities that aren’t right for you and you will make mistakes. That is not a crime. (Repeat that to yourself as many times a day as necessary: You are not a criminal!) Mistakes are how you learn. AS LONG AS YOU DO LEARN.
