Cows. Cows everywhere. Cows in fields, cows in barns. Cows sharing fields with sheep. Lots and lots of cows.
The rain. It rained this morning, it rained this afternoon. It was supposed to hail, but it did not.
Eateries that claim “Pizzeria and Tex Mex” as their concurrent food genres. That sounds interesting (and highly suspicious).
It is so, so green. I can only think of Rey, in the latet Star Wars movie, when she says, “I didn’t know there was this much green in the whole galaxy!”
Also, my housemates are pretty awesome and chill, and I live on the end of a long (paved), narrow road framed by trees drooping with vines. Did I mention how green it is??
The weather really isn’t so bad. It was great today (though with high humidity), and my room has a window AC unit, so I’m set at night.
Now… if we could only banish the stinkbugs, carpenter ants, earwigs, and spiders from the house, I’d be set.
Did I mention that I live in a house that was originally built in the 1840’s? Yeah, pretty cool. Except it has only one (unoriginal) bathroom, and the light switches are in random places. But it is a bona-fide old house, complete with creepy basement and attic and a servants’ stairway and a both-ways swinging door to the dining room. It’s so cool, and weird.
Tomorrow I start my actual job (eep!), and actually get to figure out what exactly I will be doing! Flexibility and fluidity have been really important, and thankfully I’ve accrued the ability to be so, but not having set plans or objectives really stresses me out.
Here are a couple other pictures. I hope all my peeps at home are doing well… I miss you guys already! ❤
The sunset tonightBunnies have much squarer noses here!
When I entered 2015, I knew it would be radically different than 2014. I wouldn’t be graduating with my Bachelors degree. I wouldn’t be spending my summer in Amman, Jordan, soaking up the culture and sun like a thirsty sponge. I wouldn’t be finishing a thesis, or finishing my essay to enter into the Persona.
2014 felt like a year of successes, and of reached goals; I thought that 2015 would look vastly different. It felt only appropriate to expect the opposite from 2015 that I had received from 2014: failures.
Failure is one of the most terrifying words for me. I don’t deal well with it, and I was scared of confronting it, and also excited because I knew I would grow from my further acquaintance with it.
See, I’m the kind of person who won’t do something if I know I’ll fail (with few exceptions). I’m the kind of person who lets fear of failure keep her from trying things, who keeps her fear of the unknown outcome closer to her heart than the fear of the missed opportunity.
I can safely say I failed a lot this year. Failed writing jobs, failed queries, failed friendships, failed relationships, failed attempts at half marathons, failed attempts at writing on a blog every week (ha!) and many, many failed attempts at trying to keep everything together.
In honor of the new year, I’ve decided to write about my favorite failures of the year.
I failed to sustain my misguided belief that I have to be perfect.
This one is the failure that I am probably most proud of, and has also been the most difficult failure to deal with. I went through some very dark weeks, fighting this false ideology at its core. I still struggle with perfectionism… a LOT. But, thanks to some special people (you know who you are; or maybe not), I have come to the realization that imperfection is… wonderful. freeing. exhilarating. And to be honest, I cringe a little speaking so highly of imperfection still. But perfection is a stingy, cold, unforgiving, merciless, unfeeling, vituperative master. But the God of Grace is kind, loving, forgiving, and loves even when we are nothing but a fetal ball of tears and mess-ups. Perfectionism still calls my name daily, but now… I’ve started to ignore its beckoning.
2. I failed in my attempts to keep God’s love at bay
Despite my best efforts. Folks, I am freer and more alive in Christ now than I have ever been. Let me tell you, that is super exciting stuff. God will only stay away if you force him to. If you open up your heart a crack– He will slip right in like afternoon sunlight and warm your soul from its gelid status.
3. I failed to become a freelance writer
This one hurts to say, partially because I tried very hard to become this, and partially because I don’t think I tried hard enough (again, because of fear). I did get a lot of writing done, however, but most of it will probably never see the light of day. Baby steps.
4. I failed in relationships.
But, at the same time, I’ve succeeded. Because even in failure you learn something. I’ve learned a lot about people. I’ve learned that sometimes people you love dearly will hurt you, and that people I love will be hurt by me. I learned quite a bit about myself, and how things should and should not be. And that has been invaluable, albeit painful. I also learned that puppies are always a good bet when you’re low on snuggles.
5. I failed to become completely free of shame and guilt.
This is a hard one to admit. While I’ve made much progress in personal development in 2015, I’m very much a work in progress still [I’m painfully conscious of this right at this moment). I’m starting to discover that whenever I think I can take a day off from everything– including passionately pursuing Christ– that’s when I start sliding back into the old patterns including dark clouds of shame and guilt and reliance on my own performance rather than God’s grace.
If there is one thing that God has been speaking to me in the last few months, it is that his strength is made great in our weaknesses. He has placed people in my path when I am weakest to guide me along the way, and God has been present in my life, heart, and mind like never before. This is why I share these failures with you today; because I know God will use them better than any post I could write about how 2015 went well for me, or how I succeeded this year.
And yet I am motivated to put some words around them– not as a faithful rendering of the actual events, but to conjure up the evanescence of memory later on… memory made more clear by the recording of words.
My to-do list is screaming at me, but I am learning… or rather, trying to learn that I must tune it out to do what really matters. Sometimes. Other times, I really ought to tend to it more.
Lately I have been subconsciously dealing with a lot of “sufficiency” issues. I say subconsciously, not because I haven’t had these issues smack me in the batooky before, but because I didn’t recognize them in their insidious form this time. I merely recognized their manifestation as a deep, pervasive dread and fear of going to work.
I’m not afraid of hard work. I actually tend to enjoy it, once the initial hump of torpor is passed over. But the stresses, challenges, and sheer enormity of what awaited me at work after fall break made me tremble. I was so terrified that I couldn’t look through my fear to actually analyze what was making me so afraid.
So professional, right?
I managed to muscle my way through my first day back, thinking a mixture of “this isn’t so bad” and “this is so bad!” and, more prominently, “what am I missing and doing wrong?”
Thank(God)fully, I decided to stop by and talk with a much older (and wiser, and more experienced) teacher. I shared the more professional version of what I had been experiencing, and she told me something that I had apparently forgotten:
It’s okay to say no.
It’s okay to make mistakes. It’s okay to not be superwoman. And please, stop being so hard on yourself.
The only person being that hard on you is yourself.
It was a wet slap to a numb face.
I had unknowingly, almost arrogantly, allowed my perfectionism to creep up, and had placed before myself ever-mounting goals and ideals that I, in my wilted, rookie, imperfect state have no chance of attaining. And so, naturally, I despaired. And so, naturally, I grew afraid of facing the fierce giant armed with a nuclear missile and a cute puppy (both of which are disarming, but in completely different ways).
Sometimes (okay, a lot of times) I forget that perfectionism is not a good thing. It is the stubborn malfeasance that gives you the audacity to think that you, of all people, know exactly what’s best— in every circumstance, and even more than God.
Yeeah.
Oops.
After work today, I decided to take a walk around my neighborhood. (My sedentary life lately has been, well, too sedentary.)
There’s a dirt road I walk down that has several families that own horses. At the end of the road is a small ranch with stables, and along the road there is a large corral which is usually empty. But tonight it wasn’t.
My heartbeat quickened when I felt the staccato thump-thump-thumpthump of hooves before I could see into the pen– I knew that a horse was cantering around the corral. I walked down the road, to where there were no bushes obscuring my view, and sure enough– a beautiful thoroughbred-quarter-horse mix was gamboling up and down the corral, having a wonderful time. A woman in a pink shirt walked towards the horse, and I thought she was trying to get close enough to the horse to bring her in. Then she started backing away while whistling, clapping, and talking to the horse– and the horse listened.
I watched in awe as the mare started galloping (okay, somewhere between a gallop and a canter) along the edge of the fence– dangerously close, especially when rounding the corners and turning around. It was amazing to see how the horse responded to her master’s cues– claps, “good, good!” and “easy on the turns.” Then there was the horse itself– pounding the dust into the air, breathing in quick snorts (longer ones as the exercise continued), gleaming in the fading light, proud of her strength and glorying in the activity and her prowess.
I was amazed at all the horse was able to do under the tutelage of her owner– and yet, as I watched, I realized that what she did was not too much of a stretch from her natural proclivities and propensities. Yes, the mare was diving and turning with far more finesse than she would in the wild; there were just inches between her and the fence. But she was still diving and turning like a horse ought, not growing hands and changing the tire on a car.
The thought rushed on me as she rounded the pen once more, thundering towards me: I am quite a bit like this horse.
God gave us natural proclivities and propensities, and natural aversions to other things, and while he may very well stretch us and grow us– tell us to gallop very close to the fence– he is not going to tell us to jump the fence and start a mariachi band. I think I have very much been trying to be something I am not– I have been leaping over fences, and expecting myself to suddenly possess the knowledge and know-how to take an engine apart and re-build it for street racing. Which doesn’t seem that realistic to me (even if I wasn’t a proverbial horse in this scenario).
And back to my original dilemma– Work. Teaching. Learning how to teach.
I can’t expect myself to become a world-famous mariachi musician when I’m barely learning how to round the corners. So instead of feeling like a failure because I can’t jump the fence and join a band with really swirly dresses, I’m going to listen better to the One who is telling me to take the corners a little easier, and to make those turns a little sharper. And who knows– He may eventually teach me how to stomp in time with mariachi music.
Coffee and Christ. And philosophy. And writing. Must needs I say more?
Here’s my story of learning about the things they don’t tell you in a college brochure or in any acceptance letter.
The New York Times has a front page article today about the suicide rate and propensity of suicide in high-ranking schools [Campus Suicide and the Pressure of Perfection]. It tells of a high-achieving freshman at UPenn who sinks into a depression and nearly commits suicide when she realizes that as a straight-A student, sorority member, intern teaching elementary school-aged kids, and a participant in additional extra-curricular activities, she is simply not doing enough. She has no time to think, rest, develop as an individual or possibly consider that all these higher achievers around her are feeling as equally insufficient and overwhelmed as she is.
I remember when I got my first B in a class at the University of Arizona. I was distraught and it bothered me for months. I resolved to never let it happen again. I assumed at the time that this failure was a lack in motivation, studying, and dedication to the task at hand; but looking back, I doubt it.
I thought I was a generally good student, and definitely a high-achiever. I was enrolled in the Honors College. I was taking Arabic, and I was good at it. I was a double major in Creative Writing and Linguistics. I was slated to graduate early, despite the double major.
I thought I was in good shape until I started meeting students who were not only taking a 17-20 credit course load (I was taking 17), but were also working part-time, had one or two internships and independent studies, were taking trips to local attractions on the weekends, and were already applying for positions to launch their career into the stratosphere post-graduation. I met double-doubles: people who had two majors and two minors. I met triple-majors, who would graduate with a B.S. and a B.A. I met people taking two, and three language classes per semester. I met students who were already so buddy-buddy with their professors by the time the semester started that it felt like I was fighting a lost cause to introduce myself to them.
I was barely managing my straight A’s and a part-time job at a fast-food restaurant on the weekends. I was a transfer student who was shy, and the idea of asking a professor for independent study opportunities was enough to give me a panic attack. I felt under-read in literature when talking with my English buddies, and I felt under-exposed to cross-linguistic typologies and languages that my linguistic friends would discuss with gusto after class or over dinner.
The impression that everyone around me was doing twice as many things as I and with double the finesse and efficiency exponentially increased my feelings of inadequacy and failure; which in turn incapacitated me with fear and anxiety that kept me from pursuing opportunities that would help me more than graduating with a 3.94 GPA would.
I wish I’d done things differently. I wish I’d plucked up the courage to do more independent studies (I did do one year of thesis-focused independent studies), to engage with my fellow students more. I wish I’d done more than just percolate my fears and inadequacies into an ever-strengthening brew of self-disgust and hatred that recursively confirmed that I was, indeed, a failure, and that I would always be one.
I wish someone had told me that straight As don’t get you jobs after school- practical experiences and connections with professors and faculty did. I wish I’d pursued relationships with people who were more knowledgeable and smarter than me, who I deemed off limits because I wasn’t “cool” or “advanced” enough.
When you base your identity in excelling in academia and your best efforts are not enough, your identity takes a major blow. You find yourself crying in the library bathroom, or having a difficult time deciding where to go for lunch because you don’t want to risk running into someone you know who will see “I am a failure” written on your forehead just like you do. You will find time to marathon-watch a season of a TV show but not to work on your next project, because the mere thought of failing one more time leaves you paralyzed.
I started to come out of my shell in my final year of college. I went to Jordan to study Arabic, even though it didn’t contribute to my major or minor. I busted my butt on my thesis (though I still consider it a shadow of what it could’ve been). I took a job as a specialized learning tutor. I deepened friendships with professors. But it still didn’t seem like enough, and as I look to applying for grad school, it definitely doesn’t seem like enough.
When you base your image and identity academic excellence and that image is destroyed by failure, you begin searching for another source of identity. You start to realize how much your own identity is fused with the idea that you cannot fail. You start to realize how destructive and absurd an identity is based on a vacillating estimation of success.
You start fighting back against the feelings of anxiety and inadequacy, armed with the knowledge that you were created by a perfect God, who delights in you even when you can’t stand yourself. You start to realize that life is far more fulfilling when lived caring for others regardless of what they can offer you in academic circles. You realize that treating others as the unique, complex and imperfect individuals they are rather than treating them as competition or as a mere obstacle to your next goal makes life worth living again. You realize that you are starting to grow up.
Today I went up to my favorite resting place; Mt. Lemmon. It is a huge relief to be able to escape from the desert floor and rise up into the pines like a fresh wind. I know the curvy road up the mountains so well that I drive it one-handed. I roll down my windows and inhale the scent of wet earth, resin from the trees, and enjoy birdsong from the anonymous orators in the trees.
This morning I was feeling drained and raw, my brain stretched in so many different directions the night before that it had snapped and now lay in a proverbial pool in the base of my skull.
So I went hiking. Walking through the forest immersed my mind in a salve, the greens and browns mixed by the slanted morning light, the birds’ varied notes falling on my heart like raindrops.
And I saw this wizened old man along the trail, bent over by old age and possibly scoliosis. He twisted and bent over, and at one point tendons unraveled, giving a view through them. He has seen better years. He had a tumor (two, actually) that clung to his neck.
I felt sorry for him, but he wasn’t completely twisted and broken. He had a bright green tuft of leaves at the end of this long, curved branch.
Next to this elder, only a few feet away was another figure. She was tall, long-limbed but curved with age. Gone were any external adornings of youth; only the spartan beauty of wisdom and a arms held out in a long-sustained desire.
They are old, and overlooked among their younger, healthier counterparts. They are two in a forest of two million, but today they both caught my attention. It is a strange gift to not have deadened the pangs of longing even in old age, like these trees– a kind of longing described by C.S. Lewis as a desire to find “where all the beauty came from.” There is a kind of beauty in the longing of these two broken figures, a beauty more apparent quite possibly because they are more broken than most. It takes a great deal of strength to deny death in ones exposed bones and bring beauty in a broken world; and yet, these trees do so naturally.
A dead tree becomes the foundation for a carpet of green moss; a bowed limb is the most amiable of rests for an avian opera.
It was hot in the open-door falafel shop near the seventh circle in Amman. As we entered an Irishman looked up from behind the counter, and shock mixed with the mouth-watering scent of frying batter embraced me. He had dark red hair cropped short and fair skin lightly splattered with freckles. The illusion was shattered when he greeted us in Arabic with an accent that was different from the lilting, distinguished city dialect. He wore an emerald-green shirt emblazoned with the word “CALIFORNIA.”
I sneaked a picture of him while he was making the falafel… He looked up right after I took the picture, and he didn’t look real pleased but he basically ignored me.
I expected him to laugh at any moment, and in a staunchly American manner, say “Just kidding, guys! I’m not really Arab. What’s up?” But he didn’t. Instead he stared blankly at us while we fumbled through our Arabic dictionary to find the right words.* I forced myself to find the right words, combatting the oppressive June humidity and communicated to him that we needed some 40 falafel for the evening meal.
I watched him scoop up the falafel batter into a half-sphere mold, shaping the top of the ball with a spoon in his left hand, trimming the excess dough with six sharp movements. The spoons clacked together with each movement, six clicks forty times over, popping each ball into the sizzling oil. The rich smell of greasy, deep-frying falafel filled the air.
We learned that he was from Syria, and he’d come to Amman two years before to work in his brothers’ falafel shop. We didn’t ask him if it was the war that had forced him to move, mainly because we didn’t have the vocabulary to do so; partly because he didn’t seem open to discussion. He didn’t seem very chatty, beyond our initial conversation. He was reticent, focused on the task at hand. But half of Syria’s population has been displaced in the fighting that has enveloped the country; there really wasn’t much of a question as to why he was there.
Today I learned of the suicide bombing in Syria attributed to the Nusra front: two dozen loyal to Al-Assad were killed in Aleppo. ISIS has also retaken the city of Ayn Issa (which means “eye of Jesus”) in the past few days. I thought of the Syrian falafel maker I met last June; I wonder if he lost any friends or relatives in the latest skirmishes. I wonder if he had anyone left to lose.
You can learn a lot about someone by their actions; more so than by their words. So when I watched the Syrian make the falafel, forming the mounds with as much efficiency as a machine and far more grace than one, I got a glimpse into who this man was, if not what he’d been through.
As the falafel finished cooking, he handed us samples. The falafel was so hot it burned my fingers through the paper wrapping he handed it to me in. Once I got it in my mouth, it melted, a perfect crispy shell crystallized by the hot grease, surrounding a soft center gritty with spices and full of flavor.
We thanked him profusely in our horrible Arabic, and as we left a hint of a smile pushed up on his mouth.
Postscript: I have recently been doing a lot of reading on the conflicts involving ISIS and resistance groups in the Syrian and Iraqi area; this post is the result of that research (and my time in Jordan, of course). One of the reasons why ISIS has been so successful in its advances is the general instability that has plagued the region for years—generations, really. Factions, tribes, and religious sects have been largely unable to unite for a very long time, and ISIS, with their focus and drive, has taken advantage of the splintered infrastructure to gain holds in Syria, Iraq, and even along the Turkish border (not to mention Libya). This is to say nothing of the political strife in Egypt, or further east in Afghanistan and Iran. Pray for the people of Syria, Iraq, and all of those living in the region; pray for relief workers and resistance groups. Most of all, pray that many would be exposed to the peace of the Gospel and come to know Christ.
*As this was only my second or third day in Amman, Jordan, I had no idea that red hair and fair skin is actually not a horribly uncommon combination to see in the Levant, esp. (?) for Syrians.
Three years ago I transferred from a community college to the U of Arizona to major in Creative Writing (and Linguistics; that’s a whole ‘nother blog series). I began with the idea that I would specialize in fiction (at the UofA, there are 3 specialized tracks: Fiction, NF, and Poetry). However, I decided to take an entry-level non-fiction class, and I was hooked. Despite my heart never losing the desire to write fiction (I prefer surrealist, fantasy, dystopian stuff steeped in philosophical consequences), I decided to specialize in non-fiction, and I am not sorry. Here are some of the reasons why:
1. I wanted to learn something I wasn’t good at
When I started my first non-fiction course, I had no idea how to even construct a creative non-fiction (CNF) piece. I thought it either had to be something akin to a journalistic writing (which it sometimes can be), or a tell-all diary (which it also can be). More often than not, one takes a slant that is somewhere between the two.
Through learning to write CNF I discovered that there really is less difference between (good) CNF and good fiction. The writer still must go through the process of drawing out a storyline/plot, developing characters, and deciding what story one wants to tell.
2. I thought CNF would make me a better writer (it has).
Land sakes, it has! Though I’m sure that specializing in fiction would have honed my writing skills as well, in the CNF program I was in, I learned how to make Each Word Carry Its Own Weight. That is, if a word does not contribute to a sentence, to the paragraph, to the piece, in a unique way, then chances are it isn’t necessary. This emphasis on efficacy has been very important for me in improving my writing, because I am a writer who loves to write simply to feel the words spilling off of her fingers (as my blogs can often bear witness to).
I often don’t sense the same utilitarian attitude in fiction writers. This is probably because I mostly read science fiction/fantasy/surrealist fiction rather than literary fiction, and there are too many authors to number that don’t take each word they put on the page seriously; losing the trees for all the forest, so to speak.
3. I had excellent teachers.
I can’t stress this enough. I enjoyed my CNF teachers far more than my Fiction teachers, and this was the final factor that went into my choice. My entry-level fiction teacher was meh, and I didn’t learn much in the course, whereas my first CNF class was a blast. What also contributed to my choice of CNF was that since I was more or less a stranger to it, I learned so much more from each teacher. However, the encouragement, feedback, and verve my creative non-fiction teachers displayed played a large part.
My previous post was on why Inside Out made me cry; this post is about what happened when I cried.
I tried to pretend I wasn’t crying.
I mentally berated myself for taking so seriously the death of a furry, pink imaginary friend who chatters like a dolphin and cries candy.
After the movie, my sister, niece and I were walking out of the theater when I heard my sister say, “Man, I can’t believe I cried!” I was quick to assent that “I cried too!” and my niece softly chimed in “Me too…”
I was so relieved to find out that my niece had cried at the same time as I had in the movie. But I had tried to avoid and hide the fact that I’d cried; so did my family. But what was the big deal? Why did I feel such a pressing need to hide my emotions? And perhaps more disturbingly, why did my 11-year-old niece already have a similar compulsion in place?
There is a huge societal stricture in place that tells us we must not show our (true) emotions in public (or even at all). There is this obsession with appearing happy, even when we may not be. This may seem an extreme statement to link with shedding a few tears over a kid’s movie, but if I don’t feel comfortable showing my emotions in such an environment, why would I be at ease showing emotions in more “adultish” situations? I think we in the western culture are consumed with the idea that everything must look at least alright, good, or preferably, perfect. If someone peels away the false nacre of superficial happiness, we immediately scatter. We call it depression. We avoid “those poor people.” We call it a “phase.”
We are scared to admit that our lives are not perfect when our lives are comically, Michael-Bay-is-helming-the-next-Oscar-winning-drama- far from perfection. We refuse to abandon the hallucination that the world is okay, that things are fine. Things are not fine. This world is f—ed up. There are more mass murderings, more slavery than ever before in history, more human trafficking, more wars, diseases spreading every day, and it doesn’t stop. It has never stopped. This world has always been messed up. And only when we abandon our false idea that the world is ‘okay,’ and only when we acknowledge the sheer, quivering morass of depravity of our world can we maybe turn from our delusions of ‘rightness’ to the real solution.
The solution isn’t more government; there have been good governments and bad governments, but they all fail. The solution isn’t a redistributed social or economic structure. It isn’t religion; religion has been used and tried and found as empty as ever.
There is only one thing that I have ever found to still my trembling heart, to take the weight off my soul of a million sins. And that thing is a relationship with Jesus, the Christ, God’s son. I don’t mean Jesus as some paint him—the harbinger of hatred and doom. I don’t mean Jesus as some milquetoast man who preached a vague sermon on acceptance and love that accepts everything, even things that will kill the soul. I’m talking about the Jesus who loved fiercely, extravagantly, and who hated sin and death, those things that would dare steal away his beloved, messed up humans who he died for.
It says in Corinthians that the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are dying, but to those who are being saved it is the power of God. So maybe it is foolishness (or seems like foolishness to some) to place my trust in Christ, but when compared to the choice of trusting in a world that has always let us down, is always broken and decaying… Well. I don’t think I’m the foolish one.
American Ninja Warrior (ANW) has become a recent obsession. It’s thrilling (and hilarious) to see these well-muscled, fit-beyond-belief contestants take to the course, and fail miserably– or– thrillingly– traverse the course and climb the Wall at the end, to press that red button. It occurred to me that those who travel through the course experience much the same things that a job seeker does. Don’t see the similarities? Well. Look no further. Below is a Venn Diagram of the similarities in job searching and ANW. It is, a bit crude, but I think it gets the general idea across.
As you can see in my highly-detailed Paint drawing, a stick figure is plummeting from the obstacle hanging over the tank of water and is about to receive a swift soaking in the waters of failure.
While the above diagram shows a general intersection of ANW and Job hunting, I’ve drawn a few specific data points from the shared characteristics pool and display them below for your perusal.
Data Point 1: One takes many months, and even years training in Special Places [Gym, College] for the Special Event [The ANW Course, Interview for a Desirable Job]. There is an extensive vetting and thinning out process that occurs before the event takes place.
Data Point 2: You tell yourself, if you do even get to the Event, you should feel a certain degree of success, simply because you beat out so many other candidates. When/if you fail the Special Event, this previouspep talk does nothing to stem the raging tide of disappointment that floods in.
Data Point 3:When the Special Event arrives, you wear a Special Outfit [Business Suit, Sporting Clothes]. This Special Outfit displays your fierce skillfulness that you put on display during said Special Event. It also does some minor thing to assert your personality in some (superficial) way: accessories and clothing labels. You might even be wearing a Special Pair of Shoes [Stuart Weitzman stilettos, Nike Fly-word Shoes]:
Note that each contestant wears similar attire on their faces– A smile– in order to appear inviting and totally bad a-s at the same time.
4: At some point, you realize that it is your turn at the Special Event. You prepare yourself, quelling the panicked voice that is starting to shriek in your head, taking a few deep breaths, and taking survey of the challenges ahead. You anticipate Special Challenges [Swiveling Monkey Bars, Explaining Why You Left Your Old Job] within the Special Event, and try to develop a game plan for dealing with it. Of course, chances are that when the Special Event [The Course, The Dream Job] Interview actually begins, adrenaline and panic will set in completely, keeping your mind from coherence.
5: There will be Moderators [Commentators, Interviewee] who will be watching your every move, and providing feedback to a Third Party [The Crowd, Management]. Chances are that unless you are a Star, and probably too good for this job anyway, the feedback will be either ambivalent or negative in some way– not necessarily because of your individual importance, but because the Moderator has seen variations on your performance hundreds of times before and really just wants to go home.
6: Chances are you will biff it– and maybe not even on the Special Challenges. You infinitely analyze and wrack your brain afterwards to discern what went wrong. Was it that your foot slipped? Or maybe that it slipped out that you don’t have positive things to say about your previous management? Let’s be honest; chances are you won’t even know what happened to make you fail the Special Event. It could even be something that passed under your radar, like the fact you don’t have enough experience to handle the Final Event [Final ANW Course, Actual Dream Job]. Either way, you walk away feeling embarrassed and certain that you could have done better.
7:Afterwards, you give yourself a pep talk, and like a dodo bird that survives falling off one cliff, gets up, dusts yourself off, shaves a few words off your cover letter, and you begin the search anew, with a bizarre hope based on the bold fact that if one keeps trying, one’s probabilistic chances of finding a job in finding a job [it’s just “a job” now; dreaminess are no longer a necessary trait] must increase until the likelihood of not getting a job are slim.
From Personal Experiences; may not apply to the General Public:
1. Instead of staying up late watching Netflix, you get up early and look forward to (an unapproved) naptime.
2. You sniff the milk and instead of saying, “EW! I think this is spoiled, I am NOT going to drink it!” You think “Hmm, well if it were totally spoiled I don’t think I could even stand sniffing it.”
3. Starbucks morphs from your coffee stop of choice to last resort.
4. You start giving benefits and 401(k)’s equal weight with the potential “adventure” factor of any job you apply to.
5. You stop telling yourself, “I can do anything!” and start asking yourself “Can I do something?”
6. You start a blog that discusses said experiences as a twenty-year-old just out of college.
7. You start appreciating that friend or coworker who, instead of being the loud life of the party, is the quieter, subdued, and (as you gradually discover) far more thoughtful person who is far less prone to doing crazy, concerning, or hurtful things.
8. You realize that the literature label “Young Adult” isn’t meant to apply to you at your current age anymore—but you read books from this category anyway.
9. You use and re-use dishes and utensils in ways that are not optimal to save the trouble of washing them later (Example: Last night I used a huge soup ladle to scoop ice cream, and proceeded to use said huge soup ladle to scoop the ice cream from my bowl into my mouth).
10. Coffee still doesn’t keep you awake at night like “old fogies”, but if you drink it in the morning without eating first it makes you all jittery.
And an eleventh as a bonus:
11. You realize that you’re an adult but you have no idea what you’re doing—and, by extension, conclude that most adults are in the same boat and don’t know what they’re doing either. You also realize that this realization does nothing for relieving your own stress about having no idea what you’re doing in life.
Six Months Later 