Re: Thanks, all ;-)

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: : Everyone, you don't know how helpful this has been. Thank you so much : : Ev, I'm printing out your words & bringing them home this weekend to remind myself. They are wonderful. Thankyou. : : You are right about this hard time obscuring the way I look at everything else. I have done this for as long as I can remember. As soon as I get a bad blow in life, or a couple of bad blows at once, everything looks black & hopeless to me - so very, very black. The pain is so intense, but your right, it doesn't last. By tomorrow, I will be feeling better. And the day after that, a little better even. : : But the 'purpose of life' thing does not go away. I just need a goal, a direction, to make me feel worthwhile. I feel a bit lost & it's been for some time now, where my career/purpose in life is concerned. But your comment about the whole planet going through this really, really helped. You are right - sometimes I am so hard on myself. : : I just have to keep plugging away, I guess. Though boy, it ain't easy, is it? ;-) : : Everyone have a wonderful weekend, & I'll try too - -- - -- : Summer, now that the weekend has passed, was wondering if you are feeling any better? : It was so painful reading your initial message and I was aching to write you back, but I wanted to say something that would pull you out of the depths of despair, and couldn't think of the right words that would do this. : Then I thought about it over the weekend. I remembered the time I was still living with my parents, and got the letter from the bar examiners telling me I failed the test. How I sat on my bed in as if mortally wounded, with my parents sitting downstairs in the den knowing the letter came, and waiting with anticipation for the news. How I had just enough strength to pull myself off the bed, go downstairs and tell them I failed. Then on seeing the looks on the faces, how I turned like Bette Davis in one of her melancholic moments and remounted the stairs, thinking I would never again descend. I shut the shutters and just stared at the wall, feeling so oppressed, all energy drained. I was immobilized and felt like such a failure. I didn't even have the strength like some depressed fours to throw the study materials across the room. : Years later I realize as an E-four that that oppressive quicksand I was in that prevented me from moving, from being energized, were those four feelings. And here are the three truths about feelings: (1) they are constantly shifting like moods and thoughts, up and down, up and down, sometimes based on external circumstances like test scores and interview results, sometimes based on our own chemical processes; (2) the other enneagram types have shifting feelings, but not to the extent of (3) we fours, who believe, no matter how many times the enneagram books say otherwise, that how we are feeling at the moment is who we are and will always be forever and ever. To (3), I say NOT TRUE! I couldn't move around the day I got the news, but the next day I was able to put the walkman on my ears and walk through the neighborhood to the park, walk the bike path in that park, taking in and breathing all the trees and flowers on a deep level (don't underestimate this gift of rehabilitation you have as a four, it will not let you down). I felt better. [and I must add this from another psychologist, actually Richard Carlson in his book "How to Be Happy"--NEVER, EVER try to make a decision, especially an important life decision, when in a blue mood. You will want to for sure, but resist. Go for a mint chip shake, movie, or walk instead--to distract yourself. Then when the mood lifts, and it will, you will be in the right frame, to know what next to do. But I digress] : By the end of that summer, my dad co-signed a lease on my first apartment out of the house, and that made a huge difference. I felt such a sense of freedom, the emotions were overflowing. I was eventually able to take this failure and reconnect. I became a member of community theater group and, while rehearsing for a play, I restudied for the bar, and this time passed. None of this happened in a week or in a few months, but nothing good in ones life ever does. It's the discovery process and the smelling of the flowers that fours connect with so deeply that allows them eventually rise above those feelings of the moment.End of story. : I bet you have gotten up and done something, ever so small, to reconnect and make yourself feel better. I bet just hearing those words of encouragement from other fours seeped into your soul and helped. Fess up. (I have saved every thank you and Christmas card I ever received, and re-read them when I am down and reading these messages makes me feel so connected). : Lastly, and for what it's worth I agree with the other messagers that it's the casually dressed company's loss for not hiring the right candidate just because of something physical. I won't say something like "who wants to work for them anyway" because I know how badly you wanted the job and it would probably have been a good fit for you. BUT with your credentials, you can going to get that chance again to shine, and having gone this profoundly disappointing experience you are going to find a way to make it unique and valuable the way fours are so good at doing, and will transcend yourself above the other candidates the next time. P.S. Let me tell you a secret about myself: In my entire life (and I am close to 40), I have never, ever gotten anything right the first time. Knowing this about myself, that doesn't stop me from trying my best the first time out, but when I watch everybody else get it right the first time and move on to level two, and I have had to withdraw into the corner to lick my wounds and cry my eyes out, something (like an angel on shoulder) seems the next day or so, to allow me to put the event in perspective, and come back like gangbusters the next time, so that teachers and interviewers, whoever, are incredulous. It like that second or third time, I can see the event on a deeper, more profound level, having gone through the suffering that the others didn't. You know what I mean? You're ripe for one of those times, it's a four speciality, it's gonna happen to ya, prepare thyself...and when it does, you be sure and report back to us. Afterall, we take the bitter and the sweet in equal measure. : Wishing you a much happier week. --J; P.P.S. Did you get my message about Don Riso's new Book, the Wisdom of the Enneagram?

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