Want a quick way to lower your self-esteem? Try looking for a new job.
In the past month and a half I've sent out more resumes than I can count and I've only heard back from 2 people. One wanted to pay way less than the work is worth and the other was willing to pay a decent wage but only for 4 hours a week.
I guess 20+ years of administrative work isn't worth much these days. I seriously wish I could have a do-over. I'd never have listened to my mother to "take typing and shorthand so that you'll always have a skill to fall back on." I've been "falling back" on it ever since...well, not the shorthand, that was a BIG waste of time.
Of course I've picked up a few more tricks along the way. Nobody really cares much about typing speeds anymore...which is too bad because that turns out to have been another big waste of time (when I could have been learning about astrophysics or something) and I really kind of enjoyed typing tests. But now I'm also good at planning big events, keeping volunteers motivated, bookkeeping (well, Quickbooks is good at it) and small graphics projects.
Really, I'm quite a catch but nobody else seems to see that. It's probably that I'm such an old catch, they see too many years on that resume.
It's not like I like office work anyway, I kind of hate it. That's another reason I'd like a do-over. I would go back and study to become a marine mammal researcher. I didn't even know that kind of job existed when I was going through school, locked away in the typing dungeon. And don't tell me it's not too late to go back and work for that dream because, yeah, it is. There are many ways I can reinvent myself at this stage in my life but that's not one of them.
And I guess that's what it's all about - reinvention. If I'm not going to be an office worker than what, realistically, can I be? There are many things that I love to do, how can I get paid for doing them? I wish I had answers.
