Tell a New Story, Live a New Life

June 17th, 2009

I’ve been giving a lot of thought to stories these days. Earlier in my life, I wrote a lot of fiction. I became very adept at creating characters from scratch and then, during the rewrite phase, changing key aspects of their personalities and lives.

Now that I am a professional writer of resumes and bios, it has become apparent that the lives we lead are often dependent on the stories we tell about ourselves, first the stories about ourselves that we tell to ourselves and then the ones we tell others.

“My career has kind of been all over the place,”  I was told by a client over the weekend when discussing her resume. She was apologetic.

What she didn’t know was that I hear that same thing all the time. And in most cases, as in this one, I don’t agree. “No it hasn’t. You’ve had four jobs in the past twelve years and all of them have been in the area of communications. Writing, creating presentations, giving talks…” I said as I surveyed the page.

“Oh, yeah,” the client replied after a pause, her voice betraying some relief and surprise. “I guess that’s true.”

So “I’m a flake.” or “I’m a mess.” turns into “I’m a communicator.” and, with the new resume I have written for her promoting her in that way, she can confidently go out and look for their next job. And even if she still feels like a mess sometimes, as long as the story she projects is “I’m a communicator,” she should have no problem getting hired.

What stories do you tell in your life or in your career that are holding you back?

Related posts:

1. Layoff Survivor Story
2. Free Resume Winner
3. One Way to Find Your Strongest Life
4. What “Self-Story” Is Holding You Back?
5. The Power of Transformation

Filed under: miscellaneous career advice

Tags: career advice