Accidental Career Suicide: the hot new trend sweeping the internet

I worked with a girl who sent an email to an office of almost two-hundred people about sneaking out early to go shopping with a friend. Any time I hear of someone losing a job, I always ask if it was a Homicide or a Suicide. Career Limiting Manoeuvres (CLMs) cuts somewhere in between. Whether you're blowing your nose in your food on film or putting fairy photos of yourself on Facbook after telling the boss you're sick, Darwin has a list for you.

I love the number of self-destructive people who step to the plate and CLM themselves right out of their job on Twitter or Facebook. According to a research poll, over 60% of 12 - 24 year olds think their friends' postings could damage their reputations, while 48% are sure they're embarassing themselves with their own postings. In an earlier post I warned about the damage the all-seeing, all-knowing internet can do. Then I found this article on iconoculture about Facebook Remorse. You think people would think twice about posting self-destructive info online. Wrong. Whether it's a snarky comment or a half-nude photo, the internet will remember.

I recently read that four out of five recruiters run web search to screen job applicants. Same goes for college recruiters. Same goes for dating. Oops. Resume Bear did a dead simple search for different CLMs and here is an excerpt (the rest are found here, enjoy).

Here are a few things you needs to know:

- always think before you send

- just because you deleted a tweet doesn't mean it doesn't get picked up by search engine indexing

- simple messaging on internet forums and threads are also picked up by google

- your privacy settings may not keep friends of friends from seeing your facebook activity

- people don't know how to take screen captures off flickr

- sometimes things you say on blogs can only be deleted by the owner

- know that sarcasm doesn't translate into the printed word

And if worst comes to worst, be creative about it. When New England Patriots cheerleader Caitlin Davis was fired for a facebook photo of her drawing dongs and swastikas all over a drunk guy at a party, her legal defense became: "the kid in the picture was a 'drunk guy who passed out and was written on,' as his costume for the night."

Personal Failure: I lost my erection (idea)

A while ago I wrote an article about my friend Jan and his too-late-to-the-race Tauntaun Sleeping Bag idea that someone else produced before him. Broke his heart.

I pointed out that he'd have to take his dreams behind the shed with the rifle and followed with an screed about getting over personal failure, picking yourself up, dusting yourself off, and tips to get back in the game. Today I received an email with the above t-shirt image and I think you could hear my heart actually break through my shirt.

We live in a distracting world, and making that amazing gadget, story, or totally original dick shirt idea you had into a reality is only as likely as your attention span will allow. We are overloaded with information and demands on our time, and the little things are increasingly left behind. Being too busy or too lazy explains away the death of my deflated dick shirt ambitions, so we're getting off that and talking about rage.

There are lots of great reasons to blow a fuse, and so many great places you really shouldn't do it (at work, in front of the family, during court). You don't have to be a parent to watch someone lose their cool in a theatrical way and equate them to little children who don't have emotional maturity. Every doctor in the world will tell you regular exercise increases your ability to de-stress. Well it's too late now. Forget exercise, here's the one thing you can do in the moment to save yourself filling out all those lengthy unemployment insurance or divorce papers: STOP. Immediately.

Whatever it is you think you're going to say or do, you're wrong. Reacting while you're angry is like handing your car keys to a monkey. Anger shuts down the reasoning part of the brain, and misdirected anger is going to turn a pet peeve or misunderstanding into a full-on verbal skirmish. You've seen it before. Before you say anything, count to three, refocus your thought, walk away, whatever it takes. The second you realize you're getting dragged into an argument you have to stop and check your head. Keep your voice down and start over. Oh, and while you're at it, take a breath. Sounds dumb, but you don't breath enough. Your body runs on oxygen, but when was the last time you just took a really deep breath and exhaled slowly. You'll feel your whole body relax. I was told you should mouth the word "relax" as you exhale, which is great for buying yourself some time to think while those around you look at you like a psychopath.

Anger is the death of intelligence, and multi-tasking might be evil, but if you can learn to control one or the other, even to a small degree, you'll be better off.

P.S. Multi-tasking is the devil. Switching gears from one assignment to the next and back again is inefficient. Your brain is only so elastic, and can only refocus so fast, or so well. The complication of multi-tasking leads to stress, and stress leads to errors. You'll also find it leads to a whirling dirvish of half-completed tasks and pulsing temples. You've been warned.

Personal Failure: Pull your Head out of the Oven, it's only your Dreams that Died

Today I'm going to have to break a man's heart. Today he's going to open my email and yell "NO NO NO NO NO" at the top of his lungs for the rest of the week.

Many years ago, my friend Jan invented the Tauntaun Sleeping Bag. It started as a joke on cold winter mornings that he'd gladly slit a Tauntaun belly and climb inside for warmth. If you're unfamiliar with the backstory, in the second Star Wars movie, Luke and Han play Marco Polo on an ice planet, Luke gets punched by the Abominable Snowman, they get locked out over night, and Han keeps Luke warm inside a giant dead donkey-raptor hybrid called a Tauntaun. People loved that joke, and he shared it often.

Announcing, the Tauntaun Sleeping Bag.

This thing comes complete will saddle, intestines, embroidered head pillow, 100% polyester, machine washable and even has a glowing light sabre zipper to illustrate how you slice open the belly to gain entry. It's actually an April Fool's joke, but since Jan wasn't first to market, his claim and dreams are now null and void. I could tell him how sad I was when I saw this less ambitious version of my more luxurious All Day Duvet idea come to life, but that would be cold comfort.

Today he will have to retire his joke, and his dreams. So how will he, or any of us, deal with this level of personal failure and heartbreak? The only way to deal with failure is the oven thing I described earlier, or learn from it and move on. Cold comfort you say? Here are even chillier tips that only you can choose to use, when you're ready of course. Much like an alcoholic, you can't be helped till you're ready to be helped.

Close your oven door

First thing is the crushing pain of defeat. Pain becomes fear, fear becomes hate, hate becomes evil. Of course you're going to feel sorry for yourself. This leads to self-righteousness, which leads to sadness, which leads to boredom. Hate me later, but you have to pull up your bootstraps and struggle. Life without struggle is boredom, and boredom isn't really a life.

Misery loves company

I won't lie and say it's wasteful to mope. Moping is natural and therapeutic and if that's where you're at, I suggest moping as part of a group. Purging your negative feelings is more productive in a group setting and peer feedback is a faster road to recovery than withdrawing into yourself.

Let's point some fingers!

Actually, let's get some perspective is what I meant. At some point you have to stop laying blame, try to be mature and hypothesize a reason it didn't work. It keeps the rage in check and helps you sleep better. If you go on ten job interviews and nothing happens, ask yourself questions like "had there already been a hundred equally good candidates interviewed for the job"; not "why do I suck so bad".

Let's examine our tracks and see if they end with a rebel sleeping in our stomach

If at first you don't succeed does it make sense to try, try again in the exact same way? Or does it sound better to tweak something about your approach and try again. Did you know Edison failed almost ten-thousand times before his light bulb finally worked? Ten thousand times! What an a-hole, right? Wrong. Edison changed his strategy almost ten-thousand times before he found on what worked. Whether it's an invention or an interview, trade your time for opportunity. You certainly have nothing to lose.

Help me (insert name here), you are my only hope

You'll probably have died of hunger before your ten-thousandth interview, so if you're going to suffer, don't do it alone. Fact is, your judgement and objectivity are impaired. Ask people you respect to examine your failure. It's the wiki logic that suggests someone with no prior knowledge of a problem is the best one to offer a solution. My friend from this previous article once pointed out something hanging from my nose. I was a little put off till he asked if I'd rather have not known. That booger changed my life.

Wash that Tauntaun stink off you

Whether you're waking hung over or covered in donkey-raptor intestinal fluid, the bottom line is you need to brush yourself off and get back in the game. Nothing says more about a person than how they deal with failure. I'm failing to think of a fantastic end to this article, but I'm okay with that, and I'll move on.