For the first time in my life, I've written a CV. I've never needed one before because I've only written open job applications. But now I needed to create one because I'm meeting a career counselor tomorrow.
Kind of funny if you ask me. Well. My CV looks surprisingly purty after all. It looks nice that I've been working for the English department for three years now, even though it's only been perhaps a couple hundred work hours at best. The time span is deceptive. I like that.
It sounds impressive too, "coordinating, updating, classifying and compiling corpora". My two conference presentations give a nice touch too. And then there's the translation job for Auringon lapset. No one can tell how much or how little work that was.
That's what I hate about applying for jobs. I feel extremely dishonest. The key in getting a job is basically to productize yourself and your skills. You need to give a good sales speech. What can you offer to your prospective employer?
The problem is, nothing I've done or anything I know or can do is useful. It's absolutely ridiculous that anyone allowed me to give presentations at linguistics conferences. I mean, come on, I can't even handle the basics of English grammar! What is a participle? I don't know. What's a mood? An aspect? What's the point of case grammar? I don't know. It all still confuses me, after years of studies. I've hardly ever been sane enough to actually care about my studies, most of the time I've been drudging through so I can get my study grants. My formal qualifications are full of air.
My language skills are not particularly impressive. I know the basics in many languages, but only English I'm happy with. Even so, I'd like to be a much more fluent English speaker.
And then there are those elusive skills that every employer seems to want, no matter what the job. Even a cleaner should be active, social, positive, superhuman, motivated, blah blah blah.
I'm not a social person. That cancels out about 90% of job openings. I'm not motivated. I can't help it. I can't really say I want to live for very long. So it's kind of hard to be motivated about working, especially in the beginning when you have to learn how to do it at first. I just don't have that extra energy to try to do my best. Sometimes I do, but that's about 5% of the time.
No one should employ me. I'm more trouble than I'm worth. I hate lying, but that's what I have to do if I want to get any kind of job. It's disgusting.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Friday, February 27, 2009
Limb of the matter.
There's something strangely blissful about living in a limbo.
I consider sentences of one sort or another. None seem of any consequence.
I look outside. Snowflakes twirling down from the sky. Should matter. But doesn't.
A happy smile. Laughter. Should matter. I laugh and then stop. It won't lead anywhere.
Manual labour. Corporeal punishment. Satisfying. Matters as long as it steals time from me.
They ask questions. I have no answers. I search my mind but I find nothing. Echoes ricochet all around and come back to square one. I'm sorry I'm like this. Is it not enough that I'm smiling and laughing?
I have nothing to contribute but I like the emptiness. I'm content. Satisfied. Nothing can move me one way or the other.
Bless this blissful state.
I consider sentences of one sort or another. None seem of any consequence.
I look outside. Snowflakes twirling down from the sky. Should matter. But doesn't.
A happy smile. Laughter. Should matter. I laugh and then stop. It won't lead anywhere.
Manual labour. Corporeal punishment. Satisfying. Matters as long as it steals time from me.
They ask questions. I have no answers. I search my mind but I find nothing. Echoes ricochet all around and come back to square one. I'm sorry I'm like this. Is it not enough that I'm smiling and laughing?
I have nothing to contribute but I like the emptiness. I'm content. Satisfied. Nothing can move me one way or the other.
Bless this blissful state.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Peacey.
I feel like I'm in peace right now. I feel content that I finally took control of things. I hate feeling out of control. I'm not an extreme control freak, but I definitely have some symptoms of it. I love routines. They're my lifeline. If everything is under control and I can do the things I've planned everyday, life is good.
I didn't realize how inexpensive depression meds actually are. Only 3,30€ for a month! It's nothing compared to other regular medication, like painkillers or contraception. Perhaps subsidized by the government? I know it's a ridiculous amount of people who are on depression meds these days.
I always thought, and still do, that there must be something wrong about that fact. Can it truly be the case that such a huge proportion of people need to be treated for depression? Is it a new epidemic, or has it always existed, only doctors didn't have a name for it, let alone treatment?
It would make sense if it was somehow caused by the living conditions, the way the society works here. Probably also the environment, considering that this country with long and dark winters rates very high in suicide. Personally though, I'm more inclined to believe in the former - there's something wrong with our way of living.
Maybe we're simply too well off. Too much time to think, as we don't have to spend all our time and energy on simply surviving. If you fear starving over the winter, you're hardly going to think about some of your smaller worries. Then there are the ridiculously inhuman expectations in today's working life and life in general.
Everyone should be 100% effective for 8 hours a day five days a week, should have more than 2 kids to keep Finns from becoming extinct, mothers and grandmothers and men in general should all stay fit and healthy for all their lives to diminish the costs on the society as far as health care, and young people should apply to exactly the right kind of education for them so the society doesn't waste money on education for nothing.
Oh and people should also be willing and able to move around the country and to other countries whenever their employers decide that it's more cost effective to do business elsewhere. And of course, everyone should cut down on eating, heating, CO2 emissions, lighting, air conditioning, watching tv, increase garbare recycling, use public transport, forget holidays abroad.... am I forgetting something? Probably. It can't be this simple, can it?
It's really difficult even for professionals to decide whether the increasing number of diagnoses is due to the advance of medicine, i.e. we know more now what causes what and how it can be treated, so it will of course be treated. Or, we may be diagnosing as disease some symptoms that are a fundamental, inevitable part of the human condition and life in general. It's the so called medicalisation phenomenon, and everyone thinks they know the best what's going on.
However, with increasingly more information circulated in the media, in a simplified form, people are of course more educated on a basic level and know that they can demand treatment and get better. The problem is, they think they are fully aware of everything related to it, while of course they aren't. There's a reason why doctors undergo a long and difficult education and training, and consequently someone who hasn't can't really claim to know or understand the intricacies of diseases.
Of course you get depressed if you lose someone. Or you suffer a serious injury, or a miscarriage. Anything with a big impact on your life, any major disappointment, will affect anyone. It's a whole another matter when you're depressed for years without any apparent reason.
Well, all I can say is I don't envy doctors in the least.
I didn't realize how inexpensive depression meds actually are. Only 3,30€ for a month! It's nothing compared to other regular medication, like painkillers or contraception. Perhaps subsidized by the government? I know it's a ridiculous amount of people who are on depression meds these days.
I always thought, and still do, that there must be something wrong about that fact. Can it truly be the case that such a huge proportion of people need to be treated for depression? Is it a new epidemic, or has it always existed, only doctors didn't have a name for it, let alone treatment?
It would make sense if it was somehow caused by the living conditions, the way the society works here. Probably also the environment, considering that this country with long and dark winters rates very high in suicide. Personally though, I'm more inclined to believe in the former - there's something wrong with our way of living.
Maybe we're simply too well off. Too much time to think, as we don't have to spend all our time and energy on simply surviving. If you fear starving over the winter, you're hardly going to think about some of your smaller worries. Then there are the ridiculously inhuman expectations in today's working life and life in general.
Everyone should be 100% effective for 8 hours a day five days a week, should have more than 2 kids to keep Finns from becoming extinct, mothers and grandmothers and men in general should all stay fit and healthy for all their lives to diminish the costs on the society as far as health care, and young people should apply to exactly the right kind of education for them so the society doesn't waste money on education for nothing.
Oh and people should also be willing and able to move around the country and to other countries whenever their employers decide that it's more cost effective to do business elsewhere. And of course, everyone should cut down on eating, heating, CO2 emissions, lighting, air conditioning, watching tv, increase garbare recycling, use public transport, forget holidays abroad.... am I forgetting something? Probably. It can't be this simple, can it?
It's really difficult even for professionals to decide whether the increasing number of diagnoses is due to the advance of medicine, i.e. we know more now what causes what and how it can be treated, so it will of course be treated. Or, we may be diagnosing as disease some symptoms that are a fundamental, inevitable part of the human condition and life in general. It's the so called medicalisation phenomenon, and everyone thinks they know the best what's going on.
However, with increasingly more information circulated in the media, in a simplified form, people are of course more educated on a basic level and know that they can demand treatment and get better. The problem is, they think they are fully aware of everything related to it, while of course they aren't. There's a reason why doctors undergo a long and difficult education and training, and consequently someone who hasn't can't really claim to know or understand the intricacies of diseases.
Of course you get depressed if you lose someone. Or you suffer a serious injury, or a miscarriage. Anything with a big impact on your life, any major disappointment, will affect anyone. It's a whole another matter when you're depressed for years without any apparent reason.
Well, all I can say is I don't envy doctors in the least.
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