Second Piece of the Puzzle (Coming Full Circle)

I accepted a job offer! It's with a small financial planning and investment management firm in midtown Manhattan. It's a bit ironic that after leaving NYC for Arizona, Asia and NJ, that I am now planning on being back in Manhattan again - and get this, the office is 2 blocks away from my last job! LOL. But honestly, I feel that this time around things will be different. You (and God) are my witnesses - I will not allow this job or the busyness of life to take priority over my relationship with Him. I don't want to just go through the motions. I want to wake up each day excited about what God has in store for me. I want to enjoy each moment and take advantage of all the great things about the city and the surrounding area that I overlooked or never had the chance to see. I want to be open and obedient to where and how God wants me to serve in and outside of church.

This job search has been a really interesting and rewarding experience. Even though at times I stressed myself out unnecessarily, for the most part, it was fairly painless and peaceful. God totally gave me favor and was so gracious to me in this whole process, which took about 5 weeks. I took my time and made contact with people that I knew, I did not use a head hunter, I applied for less than 10 jobs on monster.com, I interviewed with 3 firms and got 3 offers. Sure, they were probably not the most competitive positions in the world, but nevertheless, in this job market, I am very thankful. What was particularly interesting is that throughout the past month, I prayed for God to open doors that He wants opened and to close doors that He wants closed. And looking back on it, none of the 3 firms that I interviewed with were the result of referrals from people that I've known for a long time. One was an introduction made by the man that teaches the young adults group at church - he forwarded my resume to his friends ONE DAY after meeting me and realizing that I was looking for a job. The second was a response to a monster.com posting. The third was a firm that I read about in an article and I thought they sounded like a great company, so I looked up their website and emailed one of the principals. I didn't even know if they were hiring or not at the time. These 3 opportunities are very different in terms of location, business model, what my role would be, so it made the decision tougher, but more interesting. It's almost like God closed the doors that I had thought would be opened and opened doors that I didn't know existed!

I kept flip-flopping among the 3 firms, it's like I wanted to work for the firm that I spoke with last. I knew I was being emotional and it can't be an emotional decision. So I thought how can I be as objective and logical as possible in this situation? Then I remembered. I spent hours updating my resume and a good friend of mine suggested that I put a professional objective at the top of my resume so recruiters will know what type of job I am looking for. I put a lot of thought into my objective when I first started this process. I took out my resume and re-read my objective. The answer became very clear. I made my decision with peace. Occasionally the thought that maybe it's not the right decision still pops up but I try to disregard it.

I am so thankful for the Lord's grace and favor. He could have allowed me to suffer through painful interviews where I can't answer certain questions or feel embarrassed. The people I met could have been rude and condescending. I could have not gotten any interviews at all. But He chose to give me favor because He loves me. Even though I am not perfect, even though I got annoyed at my parents for asking me about my offers because I was stressed out, even though I don't consider myself great in interviews and don't know as much as I should about the financial markets, God still has the final say. And that's a very comforting thing to know.