The Can Circle

By Jacey Eckhart

My girlfriend Alison and I met up for ice tea outside the Barnes and Noble last time I was in San Diego.  Now that Alison has settled the kids in sports and school, sorted out the house, and sent her husband toddling off to the new command, she is ready to focus. 

On herself.

Amazing concept, I know. Especially for a military spouse. 

Alison is already doing a lot of things right in the job search.  She didn’t let herself get distracted or depressed by predictions of double digit unemployment.  Instead, Alison got in touch with a former boss at a volunteer position who turned her onto a job opportunity.  Alison promptly applied and interviewed, but the organization hired an employee that had been pink slipped from another position.  Dang.

Here is the thing:  Alison didn’t blame the military for moving her around.  She didn’t agonize about how her husband’s career was holding her back from getting the jobs she wanted. She didn’t start mainlining Prozac.  Instead she started reading career guides.

“I hate those little circles they make you draw,” she told me.  “I know you are supposed to make all those little circles about what you like to do and what you want to do and the skills you are capable of doing, but I can never get my circles to intersect!”

We laughed over that.  While creating those intersecting circles is a great exercise at the beginning of adult life, it loses some effectiveness when you start adding all your other obligations.  When you add the necessary complications of full and dramatic military family life, the circles they demonstrate in career guides don’t quite cut it.

And, really, that’s OK.  Alison and I figure that the long-term benefit of being married to guys who love us and understand us and root for our successes and paint our bathroom walls makes our occasional career sacrifices a pretty good investment in our happiness.

So Alison and I came up with our own career circles.  You can do it too.

1.    First, take a note from those professional career counselors.  Go ahead and make a list of all the skills you are capable of doing.   Make the longest list you can imagine.  Include the fact that you can make a mean macchiato and that your brief on environmental solutions for underdeveloped countries won the Nobel Peace Prize. Alison and I would both dutifully record down our bizarre college degrees.  Mine is in Geography (Hey, I can read a map!)  Alison would jot down all the programs she has put together in school libraries all over the country.  I would note that I could write sentences that include both verbs and nouns—and in English, too.   Fill three pages full of things and don’t stop until you do.  Even if the skill you are writing down is as basic as using an industrial can opener without cutting off a finger, include it.

2.    Next, we think you should write down skills you have that aren’t so easy to codify.  For example, Alison is deeply peaceful.  She makes you feel good when you are with her.  She is just the kind of person to calm an office full of anxious people. Other people might note here that they are the most competitive people on earth, or that they remember names and faces, or that they can’t rest until things are completely, utterly and undeniably finished.  As for me, I jotted down that I do not spit when I talk.

3.    Only when you have these lists complete do you draw your one big circle.  Make it really, really, really big.  This is your “Can” Circle.  As in, these are the opportunities that I can do here.  That last word is the biggie, ain’t it?  What can you do HERE?  This is the one that kills military spouses.  Even if you live in a big metropolitan area like San Diego or Washington, DC instead of 29 Palms, CA or Meridian, MS, the word “here” is the problem.  It often feels like we can’t do anything “here.”   If we lived anywhere but here, jobs would jump out in front of the Honda until we could barely roll forward. But here???

4.    Abandon hope all ye who enter “here.”  Because I’m not going to let you off the hook.  And neither is Alison.  When we spouses marry our military members, we make a primary choice.  We choose to put love as our first priority.  Work comes after that.  Put on your party pumps and celebrate it.  Plenty of people would change places with you.  That’s why all those wedding shows are on TV.

5.    So now you are going to fill in the Can Circle. You are going to pack it full.  Not with the things you think should fit in there, but with things you can do here and now.  The key is to show your lists and your circle to everyone and ask them to jot down some suggestions.  Take it to your spouse, your mom, your Alison.  Then take it to the person on base whose job it is to administer all those get-a-job programs to military spouses.  Call Military OneSource and ask for career counseling.  Some of the suggestions may not be jobs.  Sometimes people will suggest that this is your chance to go back to school and finish your degree.  Or get a certificate you know you ought to have.  Or volunteer in an area you care about, but aren’t qualified to work in. 

6.    Pick something.  Anything. Even if it sounds hard.  Even if you are worried you can’t do it. If the job turns out to be a mistake, try again.  Big whoop.  You’ve got Tricare.  Move on until you find meaningful work.

We military spouses have a lot going for us in the love department.  But we also have a lot going for us in the what-I’ve-got-to-offer-the-world department.  Remember that the most satisfied military families are the ones in which spouses have jobs.  So go out there and try the Can Circle.  It can only make things better.

Jacey Eckhart is ravenously curious about  your career trials, triumphs and tribulations.  She is also a speaker, trainer, and military life consultant working in the Washington, DC area.  Contact her at Jacey@jaceyeckhart.com.