The 2007 Student Affairs Job Hunt

In Medias Res #4: Three Variations on a theme-Stress

It seemed as if my last couple of posts were too cheery. In honor of Blue Monday (1/22/07) here's a meditation on some things that are causing me stress. (Click the link for a classic new wave track to cheer you up afterwards)

1: Motivation, or In Search of Lost Time

The last two weekends I have been intensely focused on the application process. This has been a good thing for my job search. I’ve at least got enough pokers in the fire that if half of my resumes get responses I’ll be in a good position. However, it’s been a bad thing for my academic life. The last two weekends I was supposed to be working on a couple of major projects that come due soon. I literally set aside blocks of time on Saturday and Sunday (and two Mondays past, since it was a holiday) to get ahead, and instead I did resumes and then rewarded myself for doing resumes by relaxing.

I’m not a procrastinator, so this whole lack of academic motivation has been a little weird for me. I don’t feel like I’m procrastinating though. Everything I’ve done has been productive: applications, cleaning the apartment, laundry, uhm…applications. In fact, there’s always something better to do than homework.

Now it’s not as if I’m behind on any of these assignments or my reading. But I do know that the longer I wait to get started the more that these responsibilities will bump up against my work responsibilities and my job search. And this will result in stress. And I know that I’m going to be stressed out either way. So why compound it?

By not working, I’m also giving myself more time to just sort of ruminate on the transition I’m going through.

Here’s the thing about the job search: your grad school friends get it and they’re willing to listen to you complain and they are just as happy not to talk about it. Everybody else though? It’s all they can ask about. Every time my parents call the first thing they ask: “So what’s happening with the job search?” My brother: “Anything cool?” My partner: “Anything close?” Despite the fact that I’m willing to blog about it on a weekly basis, I don’t really need a constant reminder that nothing’s going on.

I did catch up with some friends over the phone this weekend, and it was nice to hear other people complain about work, relationships, and apartments. One friend’s supervisor just got arrested under suspicion of homicide, and the prospect certainly got me out of my head space for a bit.

2: Limited search; or My partner? My ball and chain!

I have been dating someone for the last five months. When we started dating I made it clear that I was graduating in January, and while I have loved going to grad school at my current institution I don’t want to work here. Mostly I just want to start my professional life with a clean slate. At the time it didn’t seem like a big deal. But then things progressed quickly: exclusivity, monogamy, becoming a “we”.

Now I don’t want to take my partner with me anywhere. There are a lot of reasons for this: My partner is in the midst of his own educational program and he won’t be done for sometime. I also really want a fresh start.

So how do you manage this relationship, how do you behave in a way so that no one gets hurt? That last caveat is seemingly impossible from my current vantage point. I do not see a way this can end cordially. In fact, I think the situation will resolve itself in one of three ways:

1) I will move to a new town, start at a new school, and have a partner until one of us gets bored/distracted/interested in someone else. Cue teary phone break up.

2) I break things off before I leave, and I have to walk around campus trying to avoid someone very angry at me.

3) I plunge myself into work so much I fail to realize that I’m not really part of a relationship anymore. This can go on indefinitely.

If I was smart (and oh, if I had a penny for every time I typed that) I would not have gotten myself involved in the first place. I would have backed off earlier. I wouldn’t have capitulated to commitment so easily. So I get to add this extra stressor into the mix of job search, school, and the potential of moving.

3. Someone else’s #@$* up

So yesterday I set up an interview with one of my dream schools (aside: I wrote out a list at the beginning of my job search of places I would love to work in a perfect world. This school was in the top five). While I should have been celebrating, in short order I found out that the reservations for two of my hotel rooms had been screwed up, one of my flights was cancelled, and oh yes, apparently my gas bill was twice its normal size (especially galling considering how long I was home for in December and that my gas was SHUT OFF during that time). This morning I got calls from the hotels and the airline rectifying the problem (and admitting that the error was theirs, not mine. Not surprising since I have the extensive documentation to prove it. Go Js!) But needless to say it pretty much rained on my parade. The next time an airline goes bankrupt I may have to gloat a little. (I know it sucks when people lose their jobs, just give me this one moment of venality dear reader).

posted by StudentAffairs.com @ 4:01 PM