A few weeks ago, I suddenly found myself motivated to return to the workforce (fortunately, the motivation is primarily internal) – I guess a year off was enough, somewhat to my surprise.
My first step was to join ProMatch; I was lucky enough to get on my first choice of teams there, the JumpStart team, and I’ve jumped right in; I co-facilitated a workshop on “Marketing Yourself” yesterday (which, by sheer coincidence, followed a presentation by Dilip Saraf on “Personal Branding” which set up our session very nicely, as well as being interesting and useful in its own right) and will be co-facilitating another workshop next week. I also got invited to the Facilitation Team, and have given a Brown Bag seminar on Improv. I even got called in for a short TV news piece about the improving unemployment numbers.
I also have gotten very involved in the local Toastmasters club, the Los Gatos Silver-Tongued Cats; I volunteered as Webmaster and am going to be the VP for Education for the next six months; I’ve also given 8 speeches as well as visiting other clubs and competing in the area Table Topics contest (I placed second).
I’ve even started looking for actual jobs. I went a long way through the process at one company but didn’t get an offer, at least not this round; I’m now casting my net wider.
In short, I’ve been busy.
But today has been a change of pace; I managed a long walk this morning for the first time in a couple of weeks, then went out and hit a bucket of golf balls for only the second time this year (I haven’t improved!). And then I came home, and did nothing in particular.
Ahhh!