Healthy stages of life.
Something In Me Quit, Long Before I Was Fired
Jason Versey
A little over two weeks ago I was let go, canned, terminated,
relieved of my duties...fired.
I'd been with the company for less than nine months.
It had already been a challenging demoralizing week. It seemed
everything that could go wrong,
did and it felt like I was playing defense (rather than offense) in this game we call life.
We were down to one car as our other vehicle decided, over the
previous weekend,
that it was time for a new transmission which set us back a little
over three grand.
Despite the undo financial stress and inconvenience this caused us
we were still able
to scramble about the necessities of our lives with the one
vehicle...
getting my three kids off to their schools, my wife to her job and
me to mine.
We looked at each other
(dumbfounded) and then both began to laugh in unison
in the face of our newest
adversity. We couldn’t believe the week we were having.
It was either laugh or cry and
we chose to laugh.”
By Thursday we had formulated an efficient system that seemed to
work quite well
until that fateful morning when a giant piece of jagged road
reflector found its way
into the middle of my left rear tire. It was the dumbest luck
and a most improbable way to flatten
a tire I had ever witness. I pulled the truck, cautiously,
into a grocery store gas station
and beheld this giant piece of plastic stuck dead center in the
middle of that tire.
My wife and I would now, undoubtedly, be very late for work. We
looked at each other (dumbfounded) and then both began to laugh in unison in
the face of our newest adversity.
We couldn’t believe the week we were having. It was either
laugh or cry and we chose to laugh. “Well…” I said. “If it were not for bad
luck this week…we wouldn't have any luck at all.”
We both made our perspective phone calls into our offices
and then
began the arduous process of changing the tire. I’m ashamed to say it but I simply could
not figure out how to release the spare tire from beneath the truck and found myself under it
sweating in my dress clothes in the midst of Houston’s humidity
combined with embarrassed
frustration.
(Nothing like losing precious
man points in front of the woman you’ve vowed to love
and care for until the end of
all time.)
Anyway, we finally figured it out .
A few good Samaritans helped me jack up the truck and exchange the
tire
and we were soon on our way. The spare was essentially past
its shelf life
and unfit for us to use for any more than a few miles so we drove over to a tire shop
and
they were kind enough to sell us a brand new shiny tire.
A couple hundred
dollars and an additional hour later I was able to drop my wife off
at her place of employment and head
to my office.
The day couldn’t have started any worse.
Friction is necessary. Ease of life leads to complacency and the
atrophy of the human will
and spirit. Within our struggles lives our strength,
within our trials lives our triumphs.
Friction creates a platform for change, generates heat and or fervor
and creates
a motivational charge that gives us an opportunity to be better.
A gem cannot be polished without friction and so neither a person
without hardships.
Friction within and friction without sharpens our senses and revives
our internal resolutions.
Friction is uncomfortable, hardships are distressing but both are
necessary.
We cannot light a match without friction nor can we hone steal.
Uncomfortable as it may be,
our adversity ultimately lights a fire and sharpens our very will to flourish.
Today, let us not be
discouraged, let us not be bitter in our suffering rather let us be encouraged as
we look to our trials as a medium that will eventually make us better.
― Jason Versey, A Walk with Prudence
Coincidentally, driving in I ran into the company's CFO in the
parking lot
and got him up to speed on the terrible week I was having. In hindsight, I can now
recognize and understand why he had lacked such empathy for my morning drama and recent car
troubles.
The conversation seemed one-sided, he was distant and his mind
seemed to be elsewhere.
It was. He already understood that my day was about to
get infinitely worse…a flat tire
and a burned out transmission would soon be the least of my problems
this week.
I worked until about three o’clock when my direct supervisor (who flew in from out of state)
and the company’s CEO requested to meet with me in the conference room.
I’m not sure if I can adequately describe this moment but when I
looked at their faces
the air in the room seemed to have been sucked out and everything
around me began
to move in slow motion. I was all of sudden extremely conscious and
fully aware of everything around me. It was like I had Super Spidey
senses and I could hear my own breathing,
my own heartbeat and it was as if I could see their feelings and
thoughts.
I assessed their faces, their body language and their eyes…I felt
their anxiety.
I had never experienced this before but I instinctively comprehended
that I was being fired.
They were extremely polite, respectful and very professional.
I felt for them, I suppose, because it seemed they were feeling for
me.
In reality they spoke to me quite normally but in the realm of my
experience their words
seem to come out extra slow and deliberate. I felt numb as I
listened to my direct supervisor’s explanation for the termination but simply
found myself looking into the eyes of the CEO.
The monotone words and reasoning hit my consciousness but I was
unable to break my stare. Again everything around me had decelerated and
I nodded in agreement that I understood
the reasons but in truth…that was just an instinctual response.
Surprisingly, I heard my breathing and felt my heart beating but
neither was panicked.
I experienced no anxiety and simply felt a comfortable familiar
sense of peace.
If you play sports the only way to describe the moment is that
feeling you experience
just before you shoot a basketball free throw when the game is on
the line,
or that moment in between the snap of the football during a
goal-line stand
right before everything will soon collide, or that moment before a
pitcher winds up
and throws that third strike over the plate. Everything slowed
to almost an absolute stop
and as I comprehended the levity of my reality I recognized it was
just me
and that moment…completely aware, completely conscious and
completely in the now.
And so I was able to respond to what was happening with clarity of
mind with conscious awareness and surprising emotional control.
“The bottom line Jason, this
simply wasn't a good fit.” Those words of wisdom catapulted
the moment back into real time for me and I found myself, sincerely,
agreeing
with the CEO's assessment. “It wasn’t a good fit.” I was repeating those words within my
spirit
but I had already known this truth for the last seven months.
I had been too timid to break away and find something else.
You see something in me quit long before I was fired and it was in
that moment of clarity
that I could freely accept this termination with a sincere sense of
honest calm
and peaceful character. In that moment...I felt as if I was
freed.
Yes, I was experiencing all the insecurities that rush in when
someone loses their job
but in that moment I recognized that they didn't fire me...I fired
me.
Although, I did my job every day I didn't do it with the passion and
desire that I was capable of.
I wasn't compelled to play the usual corporate game and looking back
I had withdrawn
from the corporate players and found myself disinterested and turned
off by their personas
and personalities. My sales production never quite got off the
ground and it was only
a matter of time that if I didn't start producing, there was a
mighty good chance I could be let go like others that had gone before me.
Even knowing this truth I found it hard to get motivated.
I was unmoved. "It wasn't a good fit." This
was obvious to both of us.
I once heard it said that getting fired is nature's way of telling
us that we had the wrong job
in the first place...there is great wisdom in that. At age 45,
in all my years as a professional
I have never been fired from a job. It was a unique and
profound experience for me
and I'm (actually) grateful for it. I'm truly filled with
gratitude that my previous employer
had the courage to cut me lose when I failed to find the will or
courage (within me) to do it myself. For that, I will be forever grateful.
At the end of the day, it didn't work out and it is...what it is.
I'm a better person because of this experience. It taught me
to listen more closely to my instincts and my spirit. Life is much too
short to go to a job that you have already (internally) quit on.
That being said...getting fired just might be the best thing that
ever happened to me or you,
for that matter...
Steve Tobak a
contributing writer to MoneyWatch sums it up like this.
"Just like with relationships,
once you get past the sense of rejection and loss –
the financial implications as
well - getting fired is usually the best thing that could have happened
to you. You see, there are
five basic reasons for getting fired:
Your company's not doing so well.
You're not doing so well, i.e. job performance, you're miserable,
etc.
Your boss is an idiot or dysfunctional.
You've done great but have become complacent.
Stuff that has nothing to do with you: market changes, executive
turnover, reorganization, restructuring.
In every case except that last
one, you'll be better off somewhere else, in the long run.
And getting canned was the kick
in the pants you needed to get out and find a better career, company, job,
situation, or whatever."~ Steve Tobak
What an amazing perspective.
To all who might find themselves in a similar situation please take
heart...
The day after I was terminated guess what I learned? Yup, you
guessed it...the sun still shined,
the birds still sang and my phone still rang. As miraculous as
it may sound...I was quickly hired
by an amazing new company a week later and (truth be told) I couldn't be happier.
I only share this with you because there is nothing particularly
special about me... so if it can happen to me, it can certainly happen to you.
My sincere desire for you is to be encouraged.
It's really quite astonishing (when you think about it) what we all can achieve if we maintain
the right perspective and attitude in the midst of our most
difficult moments.
It's with this very real experience that I wish for you all nothing
but great success in your future endeavors. If you are going through a tough
time right now...hang in there because today
is the day it will all turn around! Many blessings. ~Jason
Versey
Sometimes we scratch, claw and
climb so hard to conquer a mountain that, once achieved,
we cling to its summit much too
long and it ultimately instigates our fall.
As we dangle by our fingertips
we grasp and claw at what’s no more; with a fear of falling
into the dim unknown. But,
ironically, it’s in that very moment that we are empowered to choose. We can
stay cliff hanging in our darkened fears, clinging to a time that has past us
by
or we can faithfully and freely
fall into the hands of a new destiny.
Sometimes, persevering...is
simply having the courage to let go.
― Jason Versey, A Walk with Prudence
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/something-me-quit-long-before-i-fired-jason-versey
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