Time to move on?

It's time to move on!

We've probably all come to that feeling in our jobs. Maybe you're facing a transition from military to civilian life, or feeling you've done about all you can for your present employer and are ready for new challenges. Or perhaps you're thinking about retirement – which no longer means, for most people, just sitting on the front porch watching the cars go by.

It doesn't matter whether your transition is carefully mapped out or spontaneous. One thread in common to all these situations is often a sense of uncertainty, a questioning of whether your skills are going to match up to your goals or whether your résumé is impressive enough.

You might not even know exactly what field you want to work in, but you know that where you are doesn't seem to fit. It's not uncommon to wonder just exactly how you're going to move on.

I've made a number of these leaps into the dark, going from teaching to business to government service and now in my present calling, spiritually helping others through prayer.

I've found that prayer – declaring the allness of God and my relationship to Him – is a tool more important than a résumé in the job search. This may seem a surprising statement, but it's true.

Where do you fit in the allness of God?

The Bible offers many answers to this question, and one I like very much states: "The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old. I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was.… Then I was by him, as one brought up with him: and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him" (Prov. 8:22, 23, 30).

God possesses us, sets us up, and delights in us. We in turn rejoice before Him in our expression of the Divine in our daily lives.

This puts us at a wonderful starting point, working for God, representing the source of good. It shifts our focus to the Divine. It also transforms our thinking about job history.

For example, designing that more efficient spreadsheet didn't just help your employer's accounts-receivable balance; it was your expression of God's qualities of creativity, intelligence, insight, and orderly thought. Your training experience with recruits and new hires was really your development of qualities of integrity, the beauty of precision, and nurturing. Your work in the bank was an expression of honesty, accuracy, and punctuality. These God-like qualities, and examples of how you used them, are your strong points. They give you a provable consistency.

Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of this newspaper, wrote in her major work, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," "The divine Science of man is woven into one web of consistency without seam or rent" (p. 242).

Seeing spiritual qualities first, and not just rehearsing job experience, helps you show on that résumé or cover letter that those God-inspired qualities you bring are what any prospective employer needs. They bridge over job sectors and give the employer the confidence to hire you. Emphasizing the spiritual not only enhances your daily experiences, it makes you an irresistible applicant!

I will instruct thee

and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go:

I will guide thee

with mine eye.

Psalms 32:7, 8