The Bench

I got benched.

I just spent a week being very frustrated. I got a horrid cold/flu along with laryngitis. First off, I don’t do sick well. I like to be busy and doing almost anything other than resting. This means my version of sick is me trying to pretend I feel fine and then collapsing in a heap on the couch. My kids love the laryngitis part of the whole gig. I can’t talk, so they get away with a lot more bad behavior. What kid wouldn't like that?? That said, I did learn something about myself this week. Apparently, I normally sing a lot around the house - I know funny huh? I discovered that it’s not nearly as much fun listening to Pink crazy loud when you can’t sing along.

Working as a recruiter with laryngitis is almost impossible. All of my "sign language" can’t be seen over the phone and face to face meetings with me sounding like a frog are less than desirable - ugh. On the other hand, some people say my voice sounds great this way. However, the price to pay to have a, to quote a client - "sexy-raspy" voice for a week is too great. It plain ol' hurts to much to talk, so I shut up.

I guess I’ll have to reflect on this week as a rare week of Zen like silence – almost. It is definitely a lesson in taking better care of myself, which seems to be the true lesson being imparted to me through this experience. I guess occasionally getting off the roller coaster ride is a necessity in spite of the fact that I much prefer it! Sitting on the bench some days and letting others take the ride might not be so bad every once in a while. Regardless, it seems to be something I’m going to have to learn to do a little more often.

Now where does the line start? I want to get back on that coaster!!!

Taking my own advice - get out of your own network!

Last Friday I decided to take some of my own advice and get out of my normal work and social network. I RSVP'd for the Chapman Woman in Film Conference. What a great conference for women in general, and what fun it was learning about the film industry.

I majored in Communications/Public Relations. When I graduated from Chapman, I thought I’d never use the skills I learned in school recruiting. I was wrong. My classes taught me how to write and market. In the past, recruiting was all about talking and networking face to face. Now with recruiting becoming an on-line profession with more written communication than verbal all those classes with Janell Shearer and Veston Rowe came in handy. So going back to my roots was a good thing. I reconnected with some people I have not talked to in years and connected with some new people. Getting out of your normal network does work!