2-3-4 Friday 19 Jan 24

‘Seeking to spark the most potential within you per word of any online newsletter’

1 thought

For those of you who’ve been following this newsletter for a while, you would know that in October 2021, I left my previous job as a social worker.

Not because I was wilful and arrogant, but because I had done so poorly in the job that I had been given a Performance Improvement Plan (a get better or get sacked plan - read what I wrote with TODAY). I just didn’t think it made sense for me to cause more harm to myself (and clients) to stay longer.

But no job came, despite the numerous attempts. 207 applications, and 37 interviews yielded 0 job offers.

Recently I was looking back at how I survived, because it is a miracle that I managed to survive at all.

I stumbled onto Charles Handy’s book "21 Letters on Life and Its Challenges", where he shared this concept I call the horizontal S curve of life.

He argues that with most things, you start off by putting more in, before it gets going.

But life is a cycle, and everything eventually reaches the top, and starts to go down.

A simple example is age. Your body gets to a certain of maximum fitness, before it starts to deteriorate.

The question, is when do you make a change?

Charles Handy argues that it’s when you feel on top of things. Because when you begin your next curve, your salary, skill level, will experience a drop, before it starts growing again.

Today, many call this reinvention, pivoting, whatever.

I just call it surviving.

I was lucky that I set up a company in June 2020, when I was feeling fantastic about my full-time job as a social worker. I thought I could do more with my free time and wanted a vehicle to channel my interests. I started writing, training, and facilitating workshops, not knowing where any of this would go.

Strangely, this sustained me for the period when I was without a job (till this 

date, when I’m still without a job).

Often, the idea of leaving when the party’s still going, is scary.

But here’s a question,

Do you want to do life,

or do you want to let life do you (in)?

1 talk

Figure out what you’re better than most others at, and whether people will pay for that.

Else, keep iterating until you can keep getting paid.

1 tip

Growing up, I had the misfortune of seeing my parents retrenched multiple times. One afternoon, I saw my mum coming home with a huge 10kg bag of rice, together with other canned foods. She told me they were kindly donated.

I didn’t understand it at that time, but being 45, with 3 kids in tow, and a mortgage to pay must have been an incredible pressure.

I don’t think our modernity has gotten any easier. Instead, I see that economic uncertainty now compressing towards the young adult’s earliest years in the workforce, where they are told they are no longer needed.

I don’t say this to spark fear, but to offer a slice of reality as to what might happen sometime in future.

I was 25 when I found myself facing 46 rejected job applications. What helped me was figuring out what I was good at, and whether people were paying for this.

It might help you too.

John

Live Young, Live Well - Work Your Love

Think others might benefit? I’m counting on you. Forward this on.