Ad astra per aspera, or prospering through adversity

I talked last time about the benefits of life-long learning, and learning as a kind of change for the better. One of the kinds of learning we all need to, and in fact do, engage in constantly is learning from experience. In fact, anyone who fails to learn from experience is going to keep repeating the the same mistakes, and is going to wind up miserable or dead.

In today's adulation of youth culture, it's easy to forget the truth of the old saying that "wisdom comes with age." Not because we automatically become wiser as we grow older (I've known my share of middle-aged or even elderly idiots), but because wisdom comes from experience, and experience accumulates over time. This is not to say that young people can't be wise in some ways, but anyone who is wise at twenty will be even wiser at forty, or at eighty. How do we become wise? By paying attention, learning carefully the lessons that experience -- our own or that of others -- can teach us. If you are a good learner, you'll soon find that you are wiser than your peers who may be navigating life on autopilot.

Keep in mind, though, that some of the most instructive experiences are those when we fail, or have to struggle with adversities that befall us by chance or even through the evil intentions of enemies. The title for this post, ad astra per aspera, is taken from the writings of Cicero, a Roman statesman who lived in the turbulent first century B. C. As  a young man, he wanted to be successful, and he carefully studied the means for achieving the kind of success that was most admired in his day, which happened to be political success. He rose to the top of the political ladder, and might have rested on his laurels afterward, except that his world was changing and the political scene became dominated by power-hungry men who were more interested in their own fame and wealth than the common good. Cicero saw that the tide of public life had turned and realized that politics was no longer the way to serve the common good, so he turned to philosophy (the pursuit of wisdom).

Perhaps, with the benefit of hindsight (one of the best teachers), Cicero came to regret having chosen politics over philosophy in his youth, or maybe he just saw that it was time for a midlife career change. Anyway, ad astra per aspera ("to the stars through rough times") was a sentiment that accorded well with the Stoic philosophy he held dear -- don't let life's hardships get you down, find a way to learn (better yourself) from them. If you'd like to learn how one young man has already being learning this lesson, head on over to The Change Blog and read J. C. Deen's personal account, "How Extreme Focus Can Change Your Life."

My own life has provided plenty of uncomfortable situations from which I've learned. What about you? If you've ever benefited from the lesson's of experience -- your own or another's -- why not leave a comment and tell us about it?

Former Finnegan No. 3: Graphic design by the seat of my pants

After leaving the job at the blood center (with a boot print on my backside), I decided to look upon my temporary unemployment as an opportunity rather than a calamity (that was a little easier to do, once my former employer lost his bid to deny my unemployment benefits). I decided to pursue all leads that presented themselves, without ruling anything out until I had looked into it. Since I still didn't know "what I wanted to be when I grew up," for all I knew my "true calling" could turn out to be just about anything. I tried not to think about the fact that I was in my late twenties and now not only a (grad school) dropout, but I'd also been fired from a job that a trained monkey could have done (if he'd known how to type). 

Since I had no savings and no real ideas about what to do next, I procured a signature loan from my Dad's credit union and signed up with a couple of employment agencies that would help me find a job for a hefty percentage of my first year's salary. I interviewed for anything and everything that the agencies could line up, and turned down offers from all sorts of businesses. I just couldn't see myself managing a tire store or running the night desk of a motel; I might have accepted the job with the newspaper, if it hadn't paid as badly as the job I'd just lost, and required me to work the graveyard shift the first three years. (This also when I interviewed with the Johnson O'Connor Research foundation, as recounted in my previous "What I learned between Finnegans" post.)

On the strength of my experience designing promo pieces at the blood center and using a dedicated word processor that I had bought hoping it would encourage me to do some writing (this, at a time when "personal computers" were still rarities), I hired into the art department of a large professional association at the moment that it was beginning to shift from traditional layout to computer-based layout programs; my job was, for the most part, to execute on the computer what the designers came up with on their drawing tables.

Wow, I learned a lot in that job -- about graphic design, emerging computer systems, and just how much truth there is in Dilbert cartoons (which were very big at the time; see daily cartoon in this blog's sidebar). The art department had just been split off from the communications department as the result of the latest skirmish in a bloody turf war; as a result, the new art department needed a clerical assistant (that was me). The designers hated the fact that we were going over to "desktop publishing," so they both quit by the end of my first year there, and the art director soon followed them out the door. Not long after that, the art department was quietly folded back into the larger communications department, and the art "director" was just the art "manager" -- turf war concluded. Fortunately, I had kept a low profile and let the bullets fly over my head, so I was one of the few who emerged unscathed.

In fact, by staying out of the fray, I also managed to come out of it all on higher ground. I had been learning everything I could about page layout programs, publication design, typography, you name it; as a result, my job title, job description, and salary were upgraded annually to keep up with what I was actually doing. Before long, I was officially tasked with staying up to date on the various kinds of software we needed for publication design & layout. The second art manager who signed on, having at that time no actual artists to manage and too few freelance designers to do the work that needed to be done, found herself in a tight spot one day and asked me if I'd like to do a little design myself -- I was more than ready for her. Soon I was designing and doing layout for about half of the jobs we put out, and I even won an award from the local chapter of the International Association of Business Communicators for a newsletter that I redesigned. Eventually my job title was upgraded to "graphic designer" (although I was required to take one community college course in design so that I would have a "credential" to go with my experience and self-taught skills).

I was having fun, even if I did have to subdue my "inner editor" every time I cast my eyes on the dreary verbiage that passed for "business communications." (I learned to see words as just shapes on a page -- hard to do when you grew up read dictionaries as if they were pulp fiction.) As a kid I had for a time dreamt of becoming a book designer or a commercial artist, and finally the right side of my brain was getting some exercise. I was happy for a few years, but I knew it couldn't last; I realized that a "real" designer in my situation would be looking for a new job with new challenges, and I also realized that I didn't want to stay in design forever. There was too much of me that was beginning to feel stifled.

As long as I was learning new things I was happy, but the intellectual part of me was starting to  go stir crazy; the teacher in me, which had been awakened back in grad school, was starting to irritate my friends (I not only gave them books to read, but want to discuss the books after they'd read them!); and the student in me (never dormant for long) was itching for something new to learn. The tinder was dry and just waiting for a spark, which was struck one day when my boss was enthusing over a community college advertising course she was teaching. She loved her students! She loved being respected for her hard-won knowledge of her field! She loved the challenge of creating and implementing a curriculum, and a little extra income never went amiss. As I listened to her, I began to think that maybe a little part time teaching was just what I needed to keep from getting bored.

Well, I was right and I was wrong, as you'll learn in Former Finnegan No. 4. Meanwhile, if you're reading this and you would like to throw in a comment, feel free!

What I learned between Finnegans: Learning to be your whole self

Back when I was casting about for something new to do after being booted out of my lousy job at the blood center, one of the jobs I interviewed for was a position with the Johnson O'Connor Research Foundation, a non-profit organization that offers aptitude testing for people contemplating a change of life -- for instance, high school students trying to figure out what field to pursue in college, or adults experiencing career burnout. They offer a battery of tests that identify a person's natural talents and innate abilities, and then help the client find an occupation that makes use of those inborn gifts. Since the job I was applying for involved administering the tests, interpreting the results, and counseling the client, my interview process allowed me to undergo the testing myself, and to be counseled on meaning of the test results, at no cost. As a result, I learned some valuable lessons, about myself and about what we need to be happy in life.

Before I tell you what I learned, let me describe the process a bit. Anyone reading this who feels him or herself at a crossroads in life, or who perhaps feels unhappy or uncomfortable in what is, on the surface, a successful and fulfilled life, would be well advised to consider spending the money it costs to take the Johnson O'Connor aptitudes tests-- the benefits may prove invaluable, as they have been for me.

One thing I found was that this aptitude testing was nothing like the kind of standardized testing that school kids or college students take. The Johnson O'Connor battery of aptitude tests included things like manual dexterity, spacial memory, and the ability to discriminate musical pitches, as well as inductive reasoning and something called ideaphoria. In the course of the tests, I found myself doing such things as picking up tiny metal rods and sorting them into groups of five, while being timed; or seeing how much I could write non-stop over a set period of time, in response to a simple writing prompt; or trying to reconstruct a complex 3-D puzzle. There were also the kind of word-association tests that reminded me of the verbal part of the SAT, and intelligence tests I'd taken as a kid. Almost all of these tests were timed, but I was told not to hurry because speed was not necessarily a virtue (high-testing subjects were sorted into "slow-accurate" or "fast-accurate" results). While I didn't take the entire battery of tests, I was tested on eleven of the sixteen aptitudes, which I was assured would give a representative sampling.

After I had taken the tests, I met with the counselor to go over the results. I was eager to see what she had to say because I figured even if Johnson O'Connor didn't hire me, what I learned could help me find the right  kind of job. First, the counselor told me that, of the eleven aptitudes for which I had tested, I scored either "high" or "very high" in nine of them. Well, I'm sure I beamed with pride -- I'd always been a good test-taker, and was glad to know I hadn't lost my edge. But the counselor just sighed and shook her head. "No," she said, "that's not necessarily a good thing. It means you will always find it hard to be truly happy, because there will probably always be some natural abilities that will go unfulfilled. this can make you feel frustrated and dissatisfied with your life."

No infringement of
Looney Tunes copyright intended!

For a moment I felt like I was Wile E. Coyote, and had just been flattened by one of those giant Acme weights of my own devising. In my benumbed state, I heard the counselor going on to explain that most people have aptitudes that cluster neatly together, making it relatively easy for them to find occupations (job or hobbies, or both) that let them do what they naturally do well and, thus, it would not be difficult to achieve happiness once they understood what their natural talents were and found ways to use them. But since my inborn aptitudes covered such a disparate range, I would probably have difficulty satisfying all my natural inclinations at any given point in my life. I could try multi-tasking like crazy, or decide that, rather than trying to do everything at once, I would just do different things at different points in my life. But, one way or the other, I needed to realize that at any given moment I would feel "unfulfilled" in one way or another.

After I got used to the idea, I found my newly-acquired self-knowledge liberating. I'd always felt that there was some clearly-definable vocation with my name on it, something that I needed to find and claim, but now it seemed like that wasn't the case. I could quit my quest for the elusive "right thing" and just find something that was good for now, that would let me develop some (perhaps still buried) talent, knowing that a few years down the line I would probably need to change direction again. In other words, it looked like I was going to need to keep re-inventing myself from time to time, just to avoid being miserable. I've worn many hats since then, and have been happy doing so, even though sometimes I feared being a "Jack of all trades, master of none." I can see now that what seemed to be a wandering course was really just leading me up to the place I am now, which in many ways is the best place I've been so far. And this I owe, in part, to what turned out, in the end, to be a failed job interview.

You see, I didn't get the job with Johnson O'Connor, although they wanted to hire me, and I wanted to work for them. It seems the corporate powers-that-be wouldn't agree to keep funding the position, so I had to look for another line. (Sometimes I wonder what would have happened in the long run if I'd hired on with them, but things turned out alright anyway, as you'll read in the following posts.) But I'll always be glad that I was able to find out about the valuable work they do and to benefit from it myself.

The good news for all of us is that every single person has a unique combination of innate abilities that can be discovered and developed so that we can each live happy, productive, and fulfilling lives. They don't all have to be exercised in our paid employment -- plenty of people have routine jobs but happy lives, because they exercise their talents in other venues, such as hobbies, volunteer work, clubs, athletics, or just caring for their families.

If you're feeling dissatisfied with your life, or don't know what to do next, take the opportunity to reflect on the kinds of things you find most satisfying and see if you can find new ways of employing those abilities. Sometimes just a small life adjustment can produce huge satisfaction.

Have you ever discovered that you had a natural talent you'd never suspected? Or do you have some pastime that helps keep you grounded when the rest of your life is driving you crazy? Please leave a comment and let me know.

Former Finnegan No. 1: The Ace Student

Before I start describing the transition I'm currently going through, I thought I would begin with a little recap of my life up until I lost my teaching job at a Midwestern university a few years back. If you haven't already read "Dumped off the merry-go-round," you should do that first. I say there that I'm currently reinventing myself for about the fifth time; here are my former identities:
 

The Phi Beta Kappa Kid

I started off as an ace student -- National Merit Scholar, Phi Beta Kappa, double major, etc. Liberal arts the way. Very impressive to everyone but myself. I seemed to be the only one who realized I worked hard at being a good student because I had no idea how to do anything else. The problem is, the people who might have helped me find a direction in life either didn't bother (because I seemed to have it all together) or didn't know anything but academics themselves (faculty mentors), so they just encouraged me to go on to graduate school straight after college. (I fantasized about joining the Peace Corps, but I was afraid that might turn out to be too much "real life" experience.)

So I trusted my faculty advisers, took their advice, and three months after graduating from my tiny liberal arts college I was enrolled as a Ph. D. student in a comparative literature program at a humongous state university. As a Teaching Fellow I was instructing students just a little younger than myself but who completely lacked my zeal for learning, and I was taking courses in literary theory that managed to suck all the joy out of literature. I found grad school cold and competitive in an every-man-for-himself kind of way, so even though I was at a big university, I felt very lonely. I knew that I was there only because I didn't know what else to do. Pretty soon, I found that I was miserable, and this time I had no faculty mentors to turn to. After a couple of years, I simply fled back to my home state, looking to do anything except being an academic.

What did I learn from this experience? That you shouldn't keep at something just because you're good at it, if it's eroding your life in other ways. Unless you have faith in yourself, the praise of others will be cold comfort.