marriage

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I Started My Career Exactly 20 Years Ago Today

Now that I think about it… When people ask me what I do for a living, I usually just keep it vague, by simply saying, “I work from home.”

I’ve learned that most of the time, people don’t really have follow-up questions anyway.

What do I do for a living? I work from home.

It was twenty years ago today, on January 2nd, 2006; that I accidentally began my career… as a recruiter.

I hire diesel mechanics (and previously truck drivers) from all across the country for the company I work for. It’s basically a sales job under the division of HR. Every month, I have a monthly quota to fill, but it doesn’t stress me out at all. I am motivated by the challenge. I love what I do!

I never knew what I wanted to be when I grew up. I was more than halfway through college before I landed on majoring in English; after discovering I was the only guy in my entire dorm who actually liked writing papers and actually enjoyed speech class.

Did I have a passion for it? No.

Did it come easy for me so that I ended up graduating on the Dean’s List, despite nearly failing basic college math and science classes my freshman year? Yes.

Shortly after moving to Nashville, I decided to visit a temp agency to see if they could find me some gigs to do, in addition to my part-time job I had unloading trucks for Fed-Ex.

At the end of my first day on the first assignment they gave me, I asked the employer how long the job would be for… assuming the answer would be just a week or two.

Instead, the supervisor for that job responded, “Well, actually… permanently.” So I just went along with that answer for the next 12 and a half years, until the company eventually closed down the office at that location.

At that point, I had accumulated well over a decade of experience, so naturally, another company snatched me up to fill their recruiter position. And now, I’ve been at my current company for over 7 and a half years.

It sounds weird to say out loud: As of today, I have 20 years of recruiting experience.

Now I’m imagining the absurdity of the current version of me traveling back in time to tell the college freshman version of myself:

“Okay, so just get an English degree and then once you graduate college, take the first full-time job you are offered, which will be in recruiting. That’s what you’ll be doing for a living. Oh, yeah… and at some point, you’ll be able to start doing your job much more efficiently by never  even going to an office and instead, working from your house.”

Yeah, that definitely would have sounded like someone from the future talking to me.

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I’m in Hurry and Don’t Know Why

Being born in 1981 in the town of Fort Payne, Alabama meant that my childhood and teenage years took place where the legendary country band Alabama was always part of the backdrop.

Some of my earliest memories in life include me regularly performing a concert to the four walls of my parents’ bedroom as I stood up on their bed using it as my stage, while the vinyl record of Alabama’s 1984 album Roll On played on the stereo.

But the Alabama song that has stuck with me my entire life was actually one that came out when I was eleven years old in 1992: “I’m in a Hurry (And Don’t Know Why)”.

It’s one of those songs that is easy to assume is light and fun because of its upbeat tempo. Instead, it’s actually a pretty deep song that involves a person addressing the paradoxes of their own human existence. It feels inspired by the book of Ecclesiastes in the Bible.

Out of nowhere in the Alabama band’s song catalog is this realization that life is crowded with meaningless distractions:

All I really gotta do is live and dieBut I’m in a hurry and don’t know why

And now, more than 30 years after the song was released, this concept is even more relevant. At this point in my life, my focus has been narrowed to simply enjoy the life I have right here in front of me.

I think there is something almost unsettling, at least for me, to realize:

“Oh, I don’t have to try as hard as I used to, for life to be enjoyable: simply, as is.”

For the past couple of years now, I have been much more aware of so many of the meaningless distractions that I can just swipe left to. So many things we are taught to fear… we don’t have any control over anyway. So many things we’re taught to love… they only cause us to self-destruct. Our peace of mind has a price that is paid through our attention… if we let it.

For so many years, life was on “hard mode”. But now I’m in my mid 40s and I have genuinely earned plenty of “experience points”, meaning that I’ve overcome enough challenges to be confident and secure; despite the chaos that life seems to constantly present to us.

I could pray for God to help me understand what my purpose is, but it seems pretty apparent, as if He would say…

“Just enjoy the life you have in front of you. Right here, right now. This is it.”

And if that is what He would tell me, then I wonder if ironically, that’s one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do:

To stop running. To stop racing. To just relax and appreciate the view.

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The Hustle and Bustle of Christmas

I was convinced I just didn’t like holidays anymore. In my mind, I equated them with all stress and no fun.

But that finally changed a year and a half ago when our family moved away from Nashville and began our conversion to living a quieter life in Fort Payne, Alabama.

Last weekend, for the first time ever, I chose to participate in decorating our family’s Christmas tree. Every year until now, I had always found something else to be doing instead. My subsconscious perceived holiday-related activities as some kind of personal attack on my sense of well-being and inner peace.

So, what has changed to make my heart grow three sizes? I figured it out. It’s because I’m not having to travel anymore for the holidays. No more having to drive three hours out of state after having worked all week, only to have to try to get kids bathed and then not be able to sleep in my own bed, using my own pillow.

It’s not really that groundbreaking of a concept, I guess: That traveling out of state makes any holiday more stressful. After all, so many classic American movies have plots based around this concept. Consider Planes, Trains, and Automobiles or Home Alone as obvious examples.

We’re all in it right now. The cliche: “The hustle and bustle of Christmas”.

Yet I feel fine. Because I am not traveling. I am sleeping in my own bed, using my own pillow.

Not only am I not feeling any kind of holiday-related stress right now, but I am specifically enjoying the holidays.

In my effort to understand why, I considered this: Why is it that my wife is drawn to Hallmark movies?

Part of it is that the plot almost always revolves around a small town and its signature traditional event associated with Christmas: A pageant, a ball, a market or festival… and it causes the two main characters to fall in love.

And where we live now, whatever the season, there is always a signature traditional event either where we live or in a nearby town. During the sunny months, our town hosts “3rd Saturday Cruise-In” where the main street shuts down for the evening, as classic car owners like my dad line up their vehicles for everyone to come check out.

In February, it’s the DeKalb County Children’s Advocacy Play. On the 4th of July, it’s the fireworks show in the field behind the high school.

Last weekend, it was Christmas with the Alpacas at TMMA Farms in Trion, Georgia.

This past Friday, it was the Fort Payne Chamber of Commerce Christmas Parade. I find it hilarious that my California-native wife not only happily went along with the seemingly “very Alabama” idea of standing on the back of a Jeep and throwing candy and old Beanie Babies in the parade, she thought, “Why not also toss out some Ramen and oatmeal too?”…

So we did. It was equal parts ridiculous and heartwarming, as our entire family was heavily  involved with our small town’s signature traditional event.

It’s official: Now that the traveling aspect has been removed, I like the holidays. That was the problem for me all along.

I am no longer the Grinch.

 

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Looking Back on 17 Years of Marriage

“Seventeen years is a long time to do anything. It almost seems like longer,” my wife observed in the car ride back home this past Saturday on our wedding anniversary. We had visited Mountain Escape Spa near Chattanooga, followed up with a fancy steak dinner at The Creag at McLemore Resort, then stopped by Mentone Market for dessert.

I agreed, “At a certain point, us being married became synonymous with life itself.”

From there, I explained my fascination to her that 17 years ago, at ages 27 and 26, we surely were completely different people; as compared to the versions of ourselves we would gradually evolve into over the years.

While we certainly are much more mature and “broken in” by now, compared to 2008, I am also able to identify that despite our “personality makeovers” which took place over the past 17 years, we are still fundamentally that same guy and girl we were back when we were mostly clueless.

It is so intriguing to me that the younger versions of us instinctively understood the psychology of our attraction; that having barely dated a year before we got married, and much of that being long distance, the 2008 versions of ourselves knew we were the right match for the long haul.

Looking back through pictures of us spanning those past 17 years, I can’t help but smile. Thank God those kids followed through with their intuition. They were right about each other.

We were right about each other.

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“Happy Wife, Happy Life” is Garbage

This past Saturday as we were checking into Mountain Escape Spa near Chattanooga, where my wife got a facial while I got a deep tissue Swedish massage, the owner congratulated us on it being our 17th wedding anniversary. She then smiled and asked us, “Wow, 17 years… What’s your secret?”

My wife and I just laughed and looked at each other confused, apparently both feeling unqualified to answer that question. I responded, “Well, I guess it depends on who you ask!”

A few hours later, after our spa treatment and after a fancy steak dinner at The Creag at McLemore Resort, we drove to Mentone Market for dessert before picking up our kids at my parents’ house.

We further discussed the question proposed by the owner of the spa, in regards to what’s our secret of being married 17 years.

“Patience?” was my wife’s answer. She’s right. Over the years, we have largely evolved into much different, yet more mature versions of ourselves; compared to when we first got married.

It has been vital that we have given each other time and space to discover who we are constantly evolving into- and to choose to move forward together while learning each other’s personal growth- in real time.

As for me, my answer to the question of “What’s your secret?” is more exclusive to being the husband. My secret is, “I just take all the advice I was given by other men right before I got married… and do the complete opposite!”

The immediate example of “bad advice” that comes to mind is how husbands have been collectively taught by modern culture to shrug their shoulders and hesitantly say to each other, “Happy wife, happy life…”.

We continue to hear it from other men who have been married longer than we have. We see it on all of those house hunter shows. We can even order t-shirts off of Amazon that say it.

It rhymes, so clearly it must be true. (For the record, nothing really rhymes with “husband”. I Googled it, just to be sure.)

But “happy wife, happy life” is garbage. There, I said it.

And my wife agrees with me on this.

Here is why I openly and passionately disagree with this motto.

It puts the pressure, expectations, and responsibility on the wife; while assuming the husband is doing the right thing by just going with the flow. Specifically, it means the husband puts the wife in a consistent leadership position over him from the start.

This only causes resentment for both parties.

By the husband focusing on “avoiding conflict”, it ironically promotes greater conflict; by drying up a sense of emotional connection in the dynamics of the wife and husband; creating a dangerous state of complacency.

There needs to be a healthy amount of tension in order for things to be interesting in the relationship. Otherwise, the marriage is not a partnership. Instead, it becomes a one-way street: It is imbalanced, as the husband unknowingly places his wife on a pedestal; which by default, puts her in a position to look down on him.

I now see the reality of being married in a much clearer light: A husband can’t make his wife happy by basing the health of their relationship on her being happy.

The wife needs her husband’s authentic input. She needs him to engage by providing his perspective and opinion; even at the risk of it completely opposing hers. And that is not only healthy, but it is necessary.

I wish I knew this 17 years ago. Instead, like most men who are about to get married, “happy wife, happy life” was the advice that was presented to me.

No, I’m not claiming to be any kind of marriage expert. I definitely am not claiming to have the answers.

But I am able to confidently make this call:

“Happy wife, happy life” is officially cancelled.