I never moved out...
Horses, Zebras and Unicorns...
“When did you move out of doing physics full time into bodywork?”
“Never. I never moved out”
- Moshe Feldenkrais
My heart is racing as inch up the stairs of a renovated Charlottesville Virginia apartment complex, now office. I’ve strategically timed my entry to coincide with precisely 2pm. I pause outside the door to the nursing managers office, double checking my printed resumes for spelling errors while hoping I don’t soil them with my clammy hands in the July heat. I slow my breathing once more to sooth my anxiety. I carefully open the door and proceed with my mission.
I’m greeted pleasantly and asked to take a seat across from the nursing manager. She’s the corporate type, out of “fieldwork” for years. She’s focused on the business’s bottom line, public productivity metrics and medicare star ratings. She’s invited her sidekick, Debbie. Debbie has 20 years of stone cold clinical experience, day after day after day. I can’t help but respect that. This job interview is destined to fail. But she could be the one…
We proceed with the smalltalk and high level nonsense about growth and not being in it for the money. I outline my career path as the adolescent elephant in the room hits a rebellious hormone induced fit. I weave through three years of outpatient PT clinics, a year and a half of home health PT and wrap up with leaving the field to pursue medical school. I’m back now because I’ve realized that was a horrible idea. The two thousand dollars in my bank account and looming debt payments aren’t overtly mentioned, but have a covert presence that’s palpable. The conversation starts to lighten and flow as the manager and I chuckle over challenges with past coworkers and love hate relationships with patients.
But Debbie, I’m counting on you Debbie. The elephant is now streaking on the rooftop after a line of cocaine on a Vegas boys trip. You can do it Debbie, you can see the elephant and call it out like no one ever has before. Finally, after being nearly silent for almost an hour, she asks her first question…
How do you expect us to believe you want to come back to this? You haven’t kept a single position on your resume for over a year??? - Debbie (legend)
I want to be a Physical Therapist again but my actions reflect an impressive drive to leave.
Recruiters
Today’s recruiters want experience. They want a sure thing, a proven skillset, a wealth of experience. You’ve worked with all our tools for 10+ years? Perfect, you’re hired, come in and do your thing. They want certainty with no risk, skill with no investment. For programmers, it’s 5+ years experience with Python and 10+ years with C++. What does that even mean?
The real target is something like: How well can this person acquire dynamic knowledge over a relatively short (weeks/months) period of time to solve emerging problems. Screening the above is difficult, so the default is “experience”.
The idea is to screen out extreme negatives, but the filter also catches the elusive positives.
Bouncing around to different careers is not allowed. Make up your mind, say your prayers, eat your vegetables, be a nice boy and show up for work on Monday. Fair enough.
This position is for a horse, not a zebra and God forbid a unicorn. There’s nothing wrong with a horse. They’re reliable. They won’t rock the boat. They’re a known entity.
What if you’re not a horse?
Don’t apologize, and don’t pretend to be one. If you’re a zebra, be a zebra, if you’re a unicorn…radiate your grace, healing and magic.
Zebras
Zebras are in the wrong field and need to make a switch. This is about temperamental fit. Perhaps you signed up to be a doctor but are really a writer. You’re in Texas but your home is on the Sahara.
Mark Twain once told a story about a man who scoured the planet looking for the greatest general who ever lived. When the man was informed that the person he sought had already died and gone to heaven, he made a trip to the Pearly Gates to look for him. Saint Peter pointed at a regular-looking Joe. “That isn’t the greatest of all generals,” protested the man. “I knew that person when he lived on Earth, and he was only a cobbler.” “I know that,” said Saint Peter, “but if he had been a general, he would have been the greatest of them all”.
-Susan Cain (Quiet - The Power of Introverts)
Traditional Career Paths
Traditional career paths are dead. Look at medicine or the majority of health care professions.
Time Investment = Massive (10+ years)
Financial Investment = Massive ( 200-300k debt on average )
Opportunity Cost = Off the charts
Further, you are signing up for something far off in the future. Whatever it is when you sign up will not be the same when you arrive. Significant portions of your training will be far different than your ultimate job, potentially reinforcing a faulty notion that you are pursuing something you love. You may excel at the academics of basic sciences, conscientiousness and test taking which are a very different, even oppositional, to most in the trenches healthcare jobs. In some professions (PT), there will be times in your training where you’ll be interning at a clinic, often handling a significant caseload and thus creating significant income for the clinic yet paying full tuition to your school. You will also learn a tremendous amount of information that you will never apply and consequently forgot very quickly. There will be substantial periods of time where you are paying large sums of tuition to study for board exams and tests (ie rote memorization of information in a textbook).
I’m not saying this is worthless. I am saying it’s an overvalued product. It’s for a horse. The predictability of a horses upbringing allows numerous parties to exploit the path financially. There’s nothing wrong with signing up to be a horse. Horses won’t go away, just realize the car is on the way some day.
Unicorns
Unicorns will be ridiculed and shamed for not fitting in with the horses. They explore diverse career paths that bounce around and seem unfocused. They can’t get their act together. As they follow their heart and hone their skills toward the task at hand, they develop building blocks that may ultimately combine to build a breathtaking architecture. It’s often not obvious until it’s obvious.
Maybe you’re a Zebra that needs to find your zeal? Zebra’s aren’t loners, their camouflage works in group settings. Maybe you’re a unicorn that needs to build and eventually unleash your magic?
John Danaher
Take legendary Jiu Jitsu/ MMA coach John Danaher. After growing up in New Zealand, he arrives in the United States to complete a philosophy PhD at Columbia. He’s exposed to Jiu Jitsu at the illustrious Renzo Gracie academy and begins training there. His crippled leg from a rugby injury and multiple surgeries limit his ability to compete but streamline his focus on coaching. Ultimately Danaher decides to leave academia to teach/coach Jiu Jitsu/ MMA which is debatably not even a real career at the time let alone a reputable one.
He excels at combining diverse skills he’s honed and to an extent mastered over his lifetime.
Critical thinking
Systems thinking
Principles of teaching/learning
Strategies/tactics of war/battle/martial arts
Jiu Jitsu, MMA, Muay Thai, Self Defense, Street fights, Rugby (even hockey fights)
Philosophy
Stone cold work ethic and discipline
Many others I’m likely not aware of
Unicorn. It would have been a shame if he stuck with the Columbia PhD and spent his days debating social justice warriors (horse path).
I Never Moved Out
The car is coming to try and replace the horse. Time for the proud and majestic unicorns to emerge without shame. Just because you aren’t actively playing the game of a traditional career path, doesn’t mean you can’t acquire skills and experience that have value. I worked in fitness for several years, was a physical therapist for 7 years, trained jiu jitsu for 7 years, spent 10 hours a day coding for several years, played football until I was 22. None of those paths are me, but they are all parts of me. I’m proud of all of them, whatever my journey becomes.
I never moved out.
Recommended Reading:
Epstein, D. J. (2019). Range: Why generalists triumph in a specialized world. Riverhead Books.