Got my copy of 2010 Parachute

I finally ordered my own copy of the current What Color Is Your Parachute? and looked through it, last night. It’s really an exciting book. I noted that the author has recommended many of the same sites I frequent, and there are many more that I didn’t know about.

He too makes a point of looking for not just any job, but one that inspires enthusiasm/passion. He suggested that this enthusiasm generates an energy that communicates itself to interviewers.

It also points out to me, again, that writing resumes and letters for others really is where I belong as far as a paying job. I have continued to enjoy it for nearly 26 years, now.  I wouldn’t know how to choose between working with people on their job search work and my photographic art activities.

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Another Monday Morning

Another Monday morning! It’s wonderful to have another week ahead of me. I’ve already completed my first appointment and sent off an edited paper by e-mail.  It’s been a nice and productive morning, so far. I was able to reschedule an appointment from tomorrow morning into this afternoon’s open time, which is good, because my energy level is high, right now.

I’m caught up for the time being and sitting out in the gazebo, listening to the wind blowing through the cottonwood tree in back of me. There was a brief rain shower when I first came outside. Looks like it might sprinkle again before the clouds move on out.  I just may have enough time to put in 5 to 10 miles (telephone permitting) on the exercise bike before lunch. The weekend was totally too hot and humid for any sort of exertion, so I enjoyed some time off.

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Rain and Flowers

Hollyhock in Rain, by Liz BennefeldRain and flowers go together in more ways than one. First, of course, most plants need rain to grow and bloom. Once in bloom, though, rain and rainy days seem to enhance the beauty of the flowers. Clouds filter and scatter the light differently, the colors become richer and deeper, and raindrops sit on the flowers and leaves like ornamental gems.

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Old Poems

Over the years, I have written some of my best poems in response to writing prompts. “Boundary of Fear” was written to a prompt while I was a member of the Wild Wolf Women of the Web, I think.  While there, I discovered that I don’t fit comfortably into close-knit groups in which there is a predominate culture. In a way, this poem has to do with a danger inherent in not fitting in.

BOUNDARY OF FEAR

A boundary of fear encompasses my life,
protects my trembling heart and shaking hands
from reaching out to you for reassurance.
Familiar terrors comfort and protect me
from the urgent need to change, to grow.

Within that searing ring embraced,
I rest secure and safe, static and unchanging,
until sheer time would crumble and decay
what life, love, pleasure, joy, and laughter,
may not erode or intrude unkindly on.

Copyright © 1998, by Elizabeth Wicker Bennefeld.

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The Joys of Self-Employment

overhead dark

As you may know, I have a home-based business writing and editing resumes and letters for people, mostly in the local area, but also farther afield. I edit other sorts of pieces, but seldom any longer-term jobs. Because job search work is confidential, I work by appointment only. (I also do photo art, which adds the occasional trek beyond local confines.)

Anyway, working at home could get boring because of the sameness of the work environment. This morning, we have rain, the air is cool, and Samantha and I have moved out to the gazebo. I love to listen to the rain on the roof. If it gets too cool, I can pull out an old quilt to wrap up in or close the windows to keep out the breeze (and rain). Have you noticed that when it’s raining, the birds and squirrels find shelter…and then they talk among themselves quite loudly. Their chatter makes for a continuous background for the rain, here, rising above the sounds of the wind moving through the leaves of the trees and the suddenly clearer sounds of the train to the north of me and the traffic on a main thoroughfare to the south, both many blocks away. I note that the construction folks finished up with the roof they were shingling, yesterday, a couple lots away from ours. The hammering and loud conversations were more distracting than the rainfall and the wildlife–although there is that squirrel…

Sometimes I even come out here to work in the wintertime, on sunny days, when the light comes into the gazebo and warms the air to above freezing. In the summer, the exercise bike lives out here, giving me at least an hour a day to be out of the house, as long as the temperature is below 90F degrees. On those warmer days, It is coolest in the basement, and so the dogs and I retreat downstairs to sit among the quilts and pillows. They nap while I work. (Hardly seems fair!)

I guess this is about quiet spaces, really. We need times apart from the structure, the confines of walls and telephones and tasks. We need them for renewal. We need renewal every day, not just on weekends or vacations. Not an Anthony Newley Stop the World–I Want to Get Off, but a stepping outside of the boundaries for a little while.

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Sunlight and Shadow

Sunlight and ShadowI was happy to be out in the early part of the morning to capture some photographs of the hollyhocks while the sunlight was still lighting that side of the house. Again, I have seen no honeybees in the flowers. I worry that between the parasites and the insecticides, there will be no more bees in the flowers, and that would be a shame.

There are more photos of mine, besides this one, of hollyhocks for sale at RedBubble.com. Also, I have found and uploaded some photos from earlier years of hollyhocks with bees.

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Softly Lighted

A peony in my backyard garden: "Softly Lighted," by Liz Bennefeld

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Words

I am posting this poem, which I wrote in the mid- to late 1970s, in response to a conversation on Asakiyume’s LiveJournal about “fear of words.” Her article is here: http://www.apexbookcompany.com/blog/2010/06/fear-of-words/

“Words”

Words on a page
frighten me,
define me,
spell me out to strangers,
lock me up
in expectations.

I may not want, tomorrow,
still to be
the person that I am today,
but written words create
an outward mold I’m  trapped into
without a choice.

Copyright © Elizabeth W. Bennefeld.

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The Clouds of May

The Clouds of May - Matted Print“The Clouds of May” is the most recent addition to my Art Gallery at RedBubble. The photo is available as a greeting card, postcard, and matted, laminated, mounted, canvas, and framed print.

On the day this photo was taken, clouds filled the sky, and the wind aloft reshaped them continuously. It was quite beautiful, and I was sorry that I had to go inside. Would have loved to stay out there for as long as the weather lasted.

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What Color Is Your Parachute?

I first started writing resumes for a living when I decided to take advantage of a severance option while Norwest Corporation was going through corporate reorganization during the 1980s. One benefit of the severance package was a training seminar that covered how to write an effective resume and cover letter and how to go about looking for a new job. The seminar resources were great. The actual training? Not quite so much, but much better than the mandatory training sessions provided by the local North Dakota job service at that time.

The missing key for me was the book, What Color Is Your Parachute? by Richard Bolles (ParachuteGuy on Twitter). His Web site is JobHuntersBible.com. The first edition came out in the 1970s, and he revises the book annually. It was his perspective on the job search process that helped me to realize that I didn’t want to find a job so much as I wanted to concentrate on doing what I enjoyed doing and was good at, which was helping other people write their own resumes and cover letters. I matched my strengths with available jobs, and even though I spent a year and a half actively looking for employment, I never did find anything I liked enough to quit the job-hunting process.

The thing is, looking for work is not just finding someone who will hire you to do something that will give you a regular paycheck and benefits package. The goal is to find a work environment and activities that fit you, your skills, your strengths, your values, and, potentially, your interests. Bolles’ book helped me to sort out what I needed in my work environment in order to be happy, productive, stimulated, and challenged to continue growing personally and professionally.

The talents and skills that I brought to my new career were my enjoyment of meeting and getting to know new people, my writing and research abilities, my studies during high school and college in a broad range of disciplines, and a lifelong fascination with technology, which has allowed me to continue learning and using advanced computer and IT resources over the past 42 years. Also, I enjoy solitude, quiet, and concentrating intently on the task before me, which makes self-employment satisfying, where doing the same work in a corporate or office environment would be eminently frustrating. And indeed, after reading What Color Is Your Parachute, I realized that that was what had made the preceding 16 years of working for others stressful for me to an unhealthy degree. I loved the work I was doing, but I was unsuited to the work environment.

If you are looking for work or even thinking about changing jobs, I recommend that you read What Color Is Your Parachute, and discover if his observations and insights might be of help to you in your job search.

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