Getting Fired at 65
MY SPIDEY SENSES TINGLED FOR WEEKS, SO ALTHOUGH IT WAS A SHOCK, I WASN'T ALTOGETHER SURPRISED
Before mining companies equipped miners with portable oxygen tanks and sufficiently ventilated mines, miners carried canaries into the mine’s depths in small cages.
The birds were susceptible to oxygen levels and would keel over dead when oxygen was insufficient. Miners used canaries to indicate when it was unsafe to stay in the mine.
My MenPathic traits make me feel when circumstances or events aren’t right. It’s similar to having a canary on my shoulder to alert me when unseen individuals and processes are acting concertedly to produce an event that will undoubtedly impact me.
Such was the case recently when I was summoned to the office —I’ve been a remote worker for a year— nearly 90 miles south of Vancouver, WA, where I now reside, for what I was told would be my annual review. After all, it was two weeks overdue, so it came as no surprise.
Instead of conducting my annual review, I was fired.
Fired —for winning five projects in my one-year tenure (that will translate to over $80M in anticipated revenue), my most successful year in 20 years of doing this work
Fired —for doing everything I was ever instructed to do and much more
Fired —for creating a go-to database of materials that all writers/editors across the nationwide company could use
Fired —in my opinion, for being 65
Age discrimination is illegal, especially when the firm tells you your position has been eliminated. Still, I knew they’d secretly hired a much younger person two weeks before to perform the same job with the same duties and title.
Triggered but with a difference
Because my MenPathic traits endow me with a sense of knowing in advance when things aren’t right, -my ESP (extra-sensory perception, or spidey senses) always alerts me.
If you’re also empathic and/or an HSP, you’ve probably experienced a similar sense of ‘knowing.’
About a month ago, I knew something wasn’t right around my employment. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but my Spidey Senses have never been wrong.
In this way, my insecurities about not being enough (which have decreased over the years) were triggered. However, I noticed a difference and attributed it to my meditation practice this time.
Even though being fired without cause triggered the old internal narratives, instead of following the false logic down that rabbit hole, I could see it for what it was: just a reaction in the mind and nothing more.
There’s nothing magical or woo-woo about Zen Buddhist meditation. There is no altered state of consciousness, though many stereotypical images and writers will attempt to convince you otherwise.
Meditation is sitting, sometimes with others in silence, and sometimes being guided by a facilitator or teacher, like I do each Monday evening with a tiny but loyal group. Over time, the regular meditation practice empowered me to drop the stories I’d tell myself about whatever happened and see it for what it was.
The stories might sound like, “I was victimized,” or “Poor me, look what they did to me.”
While the reality of my situation is negative, it’s my choice to engage in the drama surrounding it and wallow in self-pity and/or the sympathy of others. But that doesn’t mean I must become a doormat for my former employer and leave quietly.
They don’t know me that well. 🤨