Job searching when you aren't good enough

Let me start by saying, yes I love Brene Brown and yes I'm good enough.  Honestly whatever, this isn't a post about my worth but my job search.  So read or don't, this is a pity party. 

I'm about 6 weeks into my job search.  I've had a couple of interviews.  So far I haven't heard about moving to the 2nd round of anything.  Mostly the airwaves are silent.  They are silent and I'm stuck at home.  This is a horrible combination for me.  This is when self-doubt increases, self-worth decreases, mean as a snake self-talk takes over.

Last night DH had to spend a good two hours trying to convince me that my professional career hasn't been a waste or mistake.  He truly believes I haven't peaked yet that I have some good to do in the world.  See, I look at the past 21 years since high school graduation and see so much struggle.  So much work and swimming against the current that I think/feel maybe I've been wrong.  Maybe instead of college and graduate school and such, I was just supposed to be a maid.  Maybe what I need to do now is just wipe my resume to that one Christmas season at Old Navy and just work as a custodian. 

See, I have had like 50ish professors between all of my college and graduate school studies and I've never been encouraged to do research or write.  The fact is my classmates were and this evidence leads me to think that the professors, professional evaluators of our chances to add to the field, clearly see that I don't belong there.  These are the same type of people looking my work over saying "Nope, not her" when it comes to jobs in Academia that I am trying for.  I see and hear from other classmates amazing opportunities that pursue them, find them, invitations for conferences, prizes, research; me, nothing.  Last night I told DH that I am that person in the middle of the room covered in gold and no one sees me. 

Given the evidence, maybe I've been wrong this whole time.  I've been trying to live above my station.  Maybe my fate really is to be a maid and it is time to stop swimming so hard and just go with the flow.  Maybe being a high school librarian was my peak and now is the time to work some hourly job with no benefits, long hours, and zero responsibility.

DH says I'm just getting to the start line.  I need to be patient.  That just because no one has seen me yet doesn't mean I'm invisible.  He is a good guy.  He sees me as gold instead of pyrite. 

I don't mind working hard.  I don't mind waiting.  I'm just looking at the evidence before me. 

Bitter pill of never enough

One of my defining characteristics is that I'm a very driven person.  If I put my mind to it I will do it.  This is a good and bad thing.  I am lucky to be able to focus not on things but usually on improving myself.  I know some people are driven to get stuff but stuff is not a big factor for me.  I usually put my energy into education, career, marriage, friends, or my child.  I don't let things or people stand in the way of something I want.

So why the drive?  Why do I have to work so hard?  The answer is pretty easy.  I think most people who are driven come from a place of fear.  Fear of not having enough money, enough food, enough love.  Not a need for more just a fear of not enough.  At least that is my drive.  I don't want more money.  I am happy being poor but I am afraid of not being able to choose this as my life.  I hate the idea of living by default.  Maybe the root fear is actually control.  I hate to be out of control too.  I know control is a total figment of my imagination.  I know I control nothing.  I think I am sitting safely at my desk but the roof could cave in and kill so so much for control, right.

The idea of enough has been really present in my mind since reading Daring Greatly from Brene Brown.  I can so easily see in my life were I feel like I am not enough and that is from childhood.  I have never felt enough for anything.  I'm not Mexican enough, or American enough.  I'm not skinny enough for the normal girl clothes section or fat enough for the big girls section.  I'm smart but not I'm always just behind in getting a concept down or being able to express my thoughts fully.  I just told Dh the other day, I'm pretty but not pretty enough to make anyone want to risk actually hitting on me.  At the same time I'm not ugly enough for anyone to really notice me either.  I feel like I live in the gray space of invisibility.

I think most of that is a comfort thing.  I don't want to really be noticed because then I would have a responsibility. I want to be able to operate at my own place and in my own space.  I want to set a goal and achieve it; earn a masters, run a 10k, get some research published.  I think I lost my point but anyways, I am driven.  Driven by fear mostly but it works for me so onward I march.  Maybe someday I'll feel like I'm enough at something, hell maybe the best at something till then I gotta work.