Whilst planning my next blog post, I spent a while half a minute this morning contemplating a comparison between my - thus far - unsuccessful job hunt, and the world of running, not only because this started out as a marathon blog, but also because the world seems to delight itself with unimaginative clichés. But then I remembered that I find clichés distasteful, and those based around running I find the worst of all.
However, I have amused myself over the last few weeks of international sporting excitement by trying to spot the most poorly-applied clichés. Tennis commentators seem to be the worst. Football is a close second. Both sports constantly use running phrases. Djokovic was nearing the finish line in yesterday's fourth set, before continuing his marathon struggle into the fifth. Both players hit the ground running in the opening set. And whilst neither the Netherlands nor Costa Rica could claim to do the same, at least they could go home feeling that they gave 110%. (Thankfully I didn't hear the phrase "it's a game of two halves" which would have been horrendously inaccurate, since I counted at least three halves plus penalties).
Anyway, back to the job hunt. I'm pretty sure that someone, somewhere, has written a careless article about the job search being a marathon not a sprint (oh look, I was right: here, here, here, here, here, here, ad nauseum). But I'm tired of marathon clichés applied by people who haven't run marathons. I know they haven't run marathons because the cliché doesn't fit. If you really want to run a marathon, you will, because the only person on which the outcome depends is you, and you know the finish line is attainable, whether it's an 18 week program or a year's worth of training. There's a visible, knowable end point, with nausea and hunger and aches and milestones that you can control and meet, and it's all comforting and predictable and satisfying. Finding a job match depends so much on external factors and other people's desires and intuition that I feel largely powerless to guide my search to a successful resolution. And think how ridiculous you would look if you were to go for an interview in a post-run state: shirt soaked and stinking, salt caked on the temples, dried froth and dribble crusted around the mouth. No. That would be unprofessional.
So apart from some sweatiness and nausea before interviews, job searching is not like running at all. It's not a sprint or a marathon. Nor is it, just so we're clear (as crystal), a warm-up, 1500m, 5km, 5 mile, 10km, 10 mile, half-marathon, warm-down, stretch, ice-bath, or post-run-nap-beer-and-burger. It's not that I've hit the wall. It's just a seemingly endless stream of happy shortlistings and soul-crushing rejections, and if it were as easy as a marathon (yes, I said it) I'd have done the training, inhaled some energy gels and skipped along to the office with a bunch of bananas by now. I'm not afraid of hard work, and there's an transparent formula for running a successful marathon which is simple once you commit to it. But for this hazy, unknowable task, there's no finish line, and to think that my work would be over once I'm offered a post would be a big mistake. I can't wait till I'm successful at an interview and can start working.
However, I have amused myself over the last few weeks of international sporting excitement by trying to spot the most poorly-applied clichés. Tennis commentators seem to be the worst. Football is a close second. Both sports constantly use running phrases. Djokovic was nearing the finish line in yesterday's fourth set, before continuing his marathon struggle into the fifth. Both players hit the ground running in the opening set. And whilst neither the Netherlands nor Costa Rica could claim to do the same, at least they could go home feeling that they gave 110%. (Thankfully I didn't hear the phrase "it's a game of two halves" which would have been horrendously inaccurate, since I counted at least three halves plus penalties).
So apart from some sweatiness and nausea before interviews, job searching is not like running at all. It's not a sprint or a marathon. Nor is it, just so we're clear (as crystal), a warm-up, 1500m, 5km, 5 mile, 10km, 10 mile, half-marathon, warm-down, stretch, ice-bath, or post-run-nap-beer-and-burger. It's not that I've hit the wall. It's just a seemingly endless stream of happy shortlistings and soul-crushing rejections, and if it were as easy as a marathon (yes, I said it) I'd have done the training, inhaled some energy gels and skipped along to the office with a bunch of bananas by now. I'm not afraid of hard work, and there's an transparent formula for running a successful marathon which is simple once you commit to it. But for this hazy, unknowable task, there's no finish line, and to think that my work would be over once I'm offered a post would be a big mistake. I can't wait till I'm successful at an interview and can start working.
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