short answer Sunday: 6 short answers to 6 short questions

Six questions, six answers.

Overcoming a history of job hopping

How do I overcome my job hopping past? Not only have I had a million different jobs, I’ve dabbled in a million different industries from fashion to professional services to advertising to IT.  I started my career in finance, then moved on to sales and was laid off almost two years ago from a professional services firm, working in marketing. I honestly have no idea what I want to do anymore and it seems impossible to secure an interview.  I can’t help but wonder if my job hopping past is finally hurting me.  I have been working in the corporate world since 1995 and my last rate of pay was $73k per year.  I also dropped out of college.

This is why I get frustrated when I see career “advisors” claiming that job-hopping won’t hurt you.  It often does.

To solve this, you’re going to have to think like an employer. If you have no idea what you want to do and you’ve had a zillion different jobs in a zillion different industries, would you hire you? You’re going to need to figure out the answer to that and how to present yourself in a light that would be appealing to an employer. That’s not something I can figure out for you, but that’s the key to getting past this. (One possibility is to network your way into a job and skip applications altogether, as you’re at a real disadvantage with the latter route.)

How can I push my manager to promote me?

I’m in a senior position at my company.  My manager resigned, and I applied for his job.  The director who will make the decision told me that I’m doing such a good job, he wants to keep me as the Senior I am.  He complimented me and my work, and said he has big plans for me in the future.  As nice as this may sound, it doesn’t do me any good because I’m determined to get a manager position in order to move forward in my career.  I already have a couple of opportunities on the horizon, but I’m feeling a bit torn.  If I had the chance, I would really like to stay with my current employer.  I can only do that if the director gives me the manager position.  How can I let him know tactfully that it’s now or never?  Or do I just say nothing, and turn in my resignation in a few weeks?  Or, can I just be honest about the fact that I’m actively searching for something new?

You need to pin your director down on what these “big plans” for you are, and what the timeline is for making them happen. Don’t accept vagueness; find out exactly what your future prospects are there. If he won’t be pinned down, or if you don’t like what you hear, then sure, start looking elsewhere. You don’t need to use overt threats, though; you simply make your goals clear and ask what the company can do to help you meet them. Any halfway smart manager understands the implicit message behind that — that if they can’t meet your goals, they risk you going somewhere that does.

But definitely don’t resign without something else lined up. And take the time to make sure the new job is really going to meet your goals; you sound like you’re in a hurry, and there’s no reason not to proceed thoughtfully and deliberately.

Being asked to write your own recommendation

I asked for a recommendation from my manager and was told to type up something and she’ll sign off on it! What do you think about this?

First, you don’t need a written recommendation unless you’re applying for grad school or a faculty position; for most jobs, employers want to talk to past employers and letters are pretty worthless. If you are applying to grad school or a faculty position where a letter is required, well, it’s nicer if your boss cared enough to write it herself, but her request of you isn’t at all uncommon; it’s pretty typical, actually. Take advantage of the opportunity and highlight the things you want highlighted.

Where are the best places to look for jobs?

I’ve been at my current job for 2 years now and I feel that I need to move on. I’ve been looking mainly online at places such as Indeed, Monster, Career Builder, and Simply Hired. My question is: If you were looking for a job with only 2 years experience, where would you look?  Also, since I only have 2 years experience, do most companies still consider that entry level material or should I go ahead and apply for the jobs that require 3-5 years experience?

A job search strategy based only on the big job boards isn’t a strong one; you might land some interviews, but the odds are against you. Your chances go way, way up if you include niche job boards for your industry/profession, listings with your university career center, and other more focused sources. And you should lean heavily on networking with past colleagues and other contacts, which are often where your strongest leads will come from.

And go ahead and apply to jobs that require slightly more experience than you have; as long as it’s only a difference of a couple of years, you won’t look unreasonable.

Do online applications work?

Online applications: Do these things work?  I have applied to countless jobs via brassring, taleo, etc. and not one call back.  If that wasn’t annoying in and of itself, half the time you get to the end and are kicked out, cannot submit, get some type of error and have to retype all of your information again, need to create passwords with a capital letter, a symbol and at least 8 characters.   What is the point of these things and should I even bother!?

Yes, they work. Companies use them because it streamlines things on their end. Most are a notorious pain on candidates’ end though.

Including your mailing address on a resume

Should your mailing address be included on your resume or left off?

It doesn’t matter.  I prefer to see your location, but I’m not going to reject a great candidate just because she didn’t include her address.

{ 46 comments… read them below }

  1. John*

    Some companies actively search for employees with a varied career path as it can ensure that the employee will look at the situation with broad rim glasses rather than the tunnel blinkered approach.

  2. Sabrina*

    Regarding job searching… what do you suggest for someone looking for a job like administrative assistant with no niche job boards? None that are legit, anyway? I don’t need to be in a specific industry for that. And for someone who is horribly shy and doesn’t know a lot of people in a city she hasn’t lived in for very long? I was once told “not to let yourself get into that position” but that’s kind of like giving a condom to a pregnant teenager.

    1. Kimberlee*

      Ugh, I was in that boat last year. Admin jobs are IMPOSSIBLE to get in this economy. I applied for them for a year, and I learned that those job postings I was applying for (usually off craigslist) were getting around 200-300 applicants each, consistently.

      My advice for landing an admin job (which should be taken with a grain of salt, because I never actually landed one, though I did get one offer and a couple interviews): have an AWESOME cover letter. It has to say something in the first paragraph that the person reading the applications hasn’t seen before. I actually got one interview because, as the hiring manager put it, I was “the first person who wrote anything at all interesting” in my cover letter.

      The other recommendation I have for applying for jobs off sites/craigslist is to apply FAST. For big firms, this won’t matter as much, because they have a timeline that they’re gonna stick to. But if you’re applying to be a receptionist at an auto body shop, often they’re gonna call people to interview that day, as soon as someone stellar comes up.

      Good luck!

      1. Jamie*

        If you want to get in with admin positions one of the best things to do is temping. Research temp agencies and pick one with a great reputation (where there are tests evaluating your level of proficiency on Office at least) and start temping.

        Admin positions are filled by temps a lot, and then you get the benefit of working for a lot of different companies which is the ultimate in job shopping – and a permanent offers do come out of those fairly often.

        For a shy person, temping can seem scary – I’m shy also and it was the hardest thing for me to get past when I did it…just being the new girl all the time was more daunting than anything for me. But once I started thinking of myself not as the new girl, but as a hired gun on a contract job it was MUCH easier.

        I cannot advocate temping strongly enough – I’ve seen this as the way in to admin positions so often it is one of the best ways to go.

        1. Sabrina*

          I posted below as Anon (this is what I get for posting from 2 computers). I’ve tried temping, and have gotten no where. I’ve had one agency tell me that I HAVE to stay at a temp job through the assignment. Well why would I stay at a temp job that’s going nowhere if I get an offer elsewhere with benefits? And another that told me that my job history was too spotty the last couple of years. Apparently you need a solid work history to fill in for a receptionist for a week? I’ve talked to other agencies about temping, they tell me there just isn’t a lot of work available right now. :( I would like to temp b/c I’m getting very little in unemployment and it won’t last long. I just keep being told that there isn’t anything available.

          1. Jamie*

            It is part of the deal to stay through the assignment – so I would recommend only agreeing to a long term assignment if you’ve temped there before and know you want to finish it out. The longest period I ever agreed to without having previously worked at the company was two weeks – you can deal with anything for two weeks and then you don’t look like a quitter if you don’t reup.

            It really sounds like the agency with whom you’re working doesn’t know what they’re doing – it sucks that it’s been such a bad experience for you.

            There are huge differences in agencies. I used one which only placed white collar positions – and they acted like half recruiter/half temp agent. Some agencies, especially those who also deal in day labor, tend to be a little more careless in how they treat their clients (both the temps and the companies).

            This is a broad generalization – but based on being on both sides ( as a temp and someone who hired temps) but the agencies who also supply manual labor positions know that’s where their money is – the office positions are not their high priority. The agencies that only deal in professional positions – from admins to accounting, etc. – get their money from placing good people for return engagements and the big signing fees when you go permanent. You want an agency where your line of work is their priority.

            You also could have used the right agency and gotten a crappy agent – which sucks.

            You said spotty work history is an issue – I do know with temping the biggest factor (once you meet minimum skill requirements) is reliability. So if you have gaps I would take care to explain that and really hammer home your dependability.

          2. Sabrina*

            Oh yeah, two weeks would not be an issue. Even a month. I don’t think I can commit to 6 months though. Just stop my job search for that long and be out in the cold once the assignment is up? Then what? As for my job history, it’s only been spotty the last 3 years. Prior to that I was with a company for 10 years. I left that company to move to a new city with my husband. I haven’t found anything really suitable since then and have taken a series of “umbrella” jobs just to get by.

          3. Anonymous*

            Admin jobs are being outsourced just like everything else, or professionals are being forced to do their own admin work. Give up being an admin. Seriously. It’s a sad, sad job anyway. Learn a skill that can’t be given to cheaply paid foreign workers.

          4. Sabrina*

            Working on it. Until I’m finished with school it’s the best paying option I have.

        2. Anonymous*

          To someone who said admin job is a sad, sad job: Huh? I’m an admin, and very happy with my job. So not sure what you were refering to as a sad job. The earning? I make close to 100K/year, so definitely enough to cover expenses in the bay area. It’s only sad if you have a bad boss, but isn’t it the same as any other job?

  3. Anonymous*

    A quick note about Careerbuilder/Monster: while hacking it alone with online applications and post-your-resume sites can never and will never be as useful as knowing someone, IF you are experienced and not new in the workforce, they can be much more useful than most people think.

    Case in point: in the past year I’ve received at least 10 “scouting” calls for legitimate opportunities from legitimate businesses. I generally ignored the staffing agency recruiters unless they are doing a direct hire placement. I have, however, had 2, both of which were completely excellent! While I didn’t receive an offer for interview 1, the company from interview 2 is paying to fly me out to Massachusetts next week for a second-round interview with the senior execs.

    You will also undoubtedly receive e-mails and calls trying “recruit” you for commission-only insurance sales jobs and other scams. But honestly, these aren’t that common (I’ve actually received MORE calls for legitimate jobs).

    Unless your current boss is completely bloody insane and is checking up on what employees have their resumes up, it’s not a bad idea to have it posted.

    1. Joe*

      Unless your current boss is completely bloody insane and is checking up on what employees have their resumes up, it’s not a bad idea to have it posted.

      Even if your boss isn’t a control freak, I would still exercise caution. I’m pretty sure I was caught a few years ago by the head of my department, who works in another office. A day or two after I posted my resume on this one website, he posted a job opening on the same site, then printed the confirmation/receipt using the printer in our office. Various documents from that office have ended up in our printer before by mistake, but I’m pretty sure his actions were intentional even though he never said anything about it.

    2. Anonymous*

      I too have had a lot of success with posting my resume on job boards. I agree that this only works for experienced candidates though. Career Builder gave me way too much spam from insurance companies so I took my resume down quickly. I got my current position through Dice and was bombarded with phone calls while I was looking. An interesting point is that I recently put my resume back on Dice but took off my phone number because I can’t have recruiters calling me at work. This time I’m getting far fewer inquiries. It might also have helped me the first time because I was out of work, could start right away and was willing to relocate.

    3. pushthen*

      CareerBuilder introduced me to, on average, 3 scams a week. I call scams any job advertised which doesn’t exist – regardless of the reason. Of those 3, one a week was the hated nigerian bank scams (reported) and the “pay for us to put you on a list of job searchers.” The others were staffing firms that are trying to beefup their portfolios to get more clients… They have completely lost control of their domain and if I was an employer I wouldn’t even trust a job searcher who said they found my company through CB. I have talked with their security techs many many times… they seem to have their hands tied and rely on us to turn in the bad ads. Major Fail.

  4. Joe*

    Yes, they work. Companies use them because it streamlines things on their end. Most are a notorious pain on candidates’ end though.

    Quoted for truth.

    Recently I had to redo my application several times for a government job in another state because the software they used doesn’t save your application until the very end, and it kicks you off after five minutes of inactivity. I did get invited for an interview though (not even a phone screen, which is nice but odd), but am going to decline due to some red flags and time conflicts.

    I also submitted an application for a job last night that populates the fields with the appropriate info from your uploaded resume. It even grabbed the bullet points, which was nice until the software turned them into question marks after the application went through. Aggravating!

    1. Anonymous*

      The ‘best’ bit of the online applications is when, despite having verified your email address, you still don’t get so much as an automated one line rejection.

  5. Anonymous*

    Re. Job hopping: as an interviewer, it does make me wonder how long you will stay if I hire you. It takes about a year to learn the process in my IT department. To come in with the attitude that you will be flying solo within a week or two and learn everything you need to know in a few months is….well, arrogant. Been there, been burned, and won’t hire a job hopper again. You need to mend that mistake by finding a job that you can commit to for five years. Until you prove you can stick to a job, the really cherry jobs will go to others. It’s tough, but that’s the truth.

  6. Anonymous*

    Exactly what *is* a job hopper? I had a job for 10 years and since I left there nearly 3 years ago, I’ve had three jobs, none of which lasted more than 6 months. I *can* stay at a job longer, obviously. Only one of those jobs I left on my own, the other two I was laid off from. I don’t think of myself as a job hopper, just as someone with a string of bad luck. Still, I was recently told by a temp agency that their clients were looking for candidates with a solid work history for the last three years.

    1. Anonymous*

      Same deal here. How do you make it easily known that it was NOT YOUR CHOICE to leave and it was due to no fault of our own? Do we put “LAID-OFF” (because the owners are idiots who spent their way into near-bankruptcy) on the resume? WHY ARE THERE SO MANY ASSUMPTIONS MADE BY HIRING MANAGERS?!!!! Sorry, I’m livid. After over two years of unemployment, being almost homeless, and doing EVERYTHING possible to find a job, I can’t take any more of the B.S.

      1. Ask a Manager* Post author

        I’m sorry you’re dealing with that; it sucks.

        The reason hiring managers tend to make a lot of assumptions is that they’re dealing with a flood of qualified candidates. It’s not realistic to talk to all of them (because of time), so they take shortcuts to narrow down the candidate pool to a more manageable size.

        I know that doesn’t sound helpful to you — but it actually can be useful to understand how they’re thinking, so you can better position yourself within that context.

  7. Anonymous*

    Anon from just above here. I don’t count laid off or leaving a job as a “hop”. In IT, a lot of folks think it’s cool to move on and move up after six months or a year. What I am saying is, if I invest in you for the year it takes to learn the job, I expect a little return on that investment.

    1. Jamie*

      In IT staying anywhere 6 months to a year? Agree 100% with the post above that for anything but the most entry level of IT positions you typically need a full year to completely integrate to the job and the second year is spent making it your own and adding value.

      Short stints like those mentioned for IT would say to me that you interview well and can talk a good game, but when called upon to back it up with practical skill you bail.

      Job hopping in IT after 3-4 years though, would give me less pause – depending on the specialty. Unfortunately for network/system admins or DBAs – or IT generalists who are one person departments in a non-tech field…doing your job properly means things are running smoothly and if there aren’t new projects/challenges it can get mundane – which is the kiss of death for many tech people.

      And sometimes when things are running smoothly because you have a fabulous in house IT, management can forget how much of that is because of the IT and raises can slow to a trickle once the dog and pony show of new procedures is over.

      Sometimes jumping is the best way to get the bigger salary bumps you need. But that’s jumping after years of providing value – not the in and out of the true job hopper.

  8. Anonymous*

    Regarding the promotion to management:

    I think AAM is right on that you can be tactful and subtle in mentioning that your goal is to move into a management position in the near future, but remember that your goal in the conversation is to make the Director think they might lose you by not acting, just not to do it in a way to make the Director feel bad.

    That is, AAM’s approach is great for most “smart managers” who will understand a “if I didn’t get this promotion, how can I get one soon” conversation means the employee might leave. But I’ve worked with some bosses I consider generally nice people and effective bosses who would not hesitate to try to keep good people under them as long as they possibly can. If that’s your director, by all means be courteous, as you are hoping to stay with the company, but make sure to get the point across that won’t be satisfied with a general promise of “soon.”

    I know AAM knocked you a little bit for seeming impatient, but if you’ve proved your worth and are only being held back because someone else wants to “claim” you, you have every right to be impatient, because this is a situation that doesn’t improve by paying your dues.

  9. Karl Borris*

    On-line applications are one of the most difficult paths to take in securing an interview. We all know that keywords from the job description must be included in our cover letter and resume, but the odds of getting as return call are slim at best. A better alternative is to seek out an informational interview with the company you desire to work for. Bring a number of excellent questions that show you are a great candidate, and only take as much time as you requested. To get the job you want these days you must do what others are not willing to do.

    1. Sabrina*

      And for companies that won’t consider you if you don’t apply through their system? Or who don’t have time to schedule informational interviews?

      1. bob*

        After having filled out countless versions of these damn things I’d say you’re screwed unless you actually know someone. It’s their way or no way.

    2. Anonymous*

      I know of plenty of job seekers. Not one has ever gotten and “informational interview”. This is some kind of career-coaching myth that experts try to sell job-seekers on, as though it would ever actually happen.

  10. Melissa*

    I had a boss who specifically rejected resumes from candidates if they didn’t live close to the office. She had a bad experience with an employee who lived “too far away” and from then on would only hire someone who lives in the same city as her office. Therefore, if the mailing address didn’t appear on the resume, she threw it away. Not saying it’s right, but it’s what she did.

    As for job hopping, I’ve had 10 jobs in 18 years. All but two of these jobs were in my chosen career field (I’m a paralegal/legal assistant/law office manager). I am an Army spouse and we’ve moved 9 times in 18 years (getting ready for our 10th move this summer). I’ve been very lucky in that I’ve had employers who were willing to take a chance on me and hire me, knowing full well that they would lose me in two years or less. So as far as job hopping goes, I’m not worried. I’ve been able to find a job in every city/every state we’ve lived in for the past 18 years.

    And for me, online applications have worked. In the last city, everything I applied for, I applied for on line. I got three phone calls and two interviews, and was hired. I’ll be applying on-line in the next state as well.

  11. ThomasT*

    What is gained by leaving your mailing address off of your resume? If I’m looking to make a local hire, (or want to know what relocation is going to cost), that’s useful & important information. It risks taking time in a phone interview that could be better used for demonstrating your worth, or worse, giving the impression that you’re hiding something and getting knocked out before the phone screen.

    I’m actually especially surprised to see AAM take this position, as she’s previously stated a preference for cover letters as attachments. It seems to me if you’re going to make your cover letter an attachment, it should be a well-formatted business letter inside, including the writer’s address. The cover letter is not the resume, of course, but they’re part of the same package.

    In the end, I think this is similar to the functional resume and high-design resume questions – you need to demonstrate a convincing advantage before deviating from the standard format that nearly all of your competitors will be using. Lack of disadvantage is not enough.

    1. Ask a Manager* Post author

      I’d certainly prefer to see an address than not. But I’m not going to discard a great candidate over the absence of an address.

      (BTW, I don’t have a preference for cover letters as attachments. I actually have a mild preference for them in the body of the email, but again it’s not something that’s in any way make-or-break.)

      1. ThomasT*

        Oh dear – I totally misread that previous post! I either misread “latter” as former, or confused the order in my head or something. I definitely had that exact post in mind when attributing that preference to you, and I was completely wrong. I apologize for my error.

    2. Anonymous*

      Single women living alone are advised to leave their full address off the resume. Anyone who advises otherwise does not put safety first.

      1. ThomasT*

        Per my suggestion in my last paragraph, if you feel that the safety advantage of leaving your address off your resume outweighs any possible negative perceptions that an employer might take, then leave it off.

        And to quibble slightly with your safety statement, anyone who advises or does otherwise has a different level of risk tolerance and/or awareness than you do.

  12. Rose*

    As for job hopping….

    I’ve had almost 30 jobs(!!!) but the upside is that I can find a commonality in a bunch of them…..like 4 might be related to marketing, for instance. So, then I make a resume that says “Marketing Experience” and “Other Experience”. I know people say that non-chronological resumes are a no-no, but I think this might be a big exception. For instance, I have strong teaching experience but I took 4 years off, so if my resume was chronological, some of my best experience would be stuck below a bunch of temp jobs.

    Your cover letter is also extremely important. I worked a lot of those jobs for the same temp agency, so I try to highlight that I stayed with one employer for years, just doing different contract jobs. Have you ever been asked back to a job? Put that in. Did you hop jobs do to lay-offs or personal reasons? Put that in. Basically, you need to write a narrative of your work life and how it has been leading up to a long-term position at X company….

    A kickass cover letter definitely helps. If you can make a compelling case that you really like X company, that you’ve researched them, if you mirror their ad in your letter, and if you minimize your job hopping (“I took a couple years to pay my school debts”, etc.), and hype up your vast skills, you can convince people. You really need to be assertive that everything has been leading up to this job and you’d like to stay in the job for years if you can…..

    1. Jamie*

      Yes – if the plethora of different companies is due to temping absolutely list the temp agency as the employer and the companies for whom you did the work beneath that. Because you are showing a solid history if you worked with one agency and had a multitude of successful assignments.

      I don’t know why, but some people are reluctant to put temping on their resume, but I don’t see why they think there’s a stigma to that. The damage of looking like you hopped around to many different companies after committing has to be far greater than whatever they think is wrong with temping.

  13. Chuck*

    Re #1 – You must find a job and stay for a few years to reverse the stigma of being a job-hopper. In the interview, I would counsel you to admit you realize it’s been a mistake to change jobs so frequently and that state emphatically, “Lesson Learned!” Assure the employer you realize how important it is to not change jobs so quickly again.

    Leverage that reasoning into why you will be the most loyal, hardest-worker on the staff (b/c you won’t quit and you can’t allow yourself to be laid off as it would add to your job-hopping record).

  14. Chuck*

    Re mailing addresses on resume – I would strongly urge you to include an address with a ZIP code. Employers who search their candidate database might use ZIP code to find a local candidate and not having that on your resume might result in your not being considered.

    Remember that you might not get hired for today’s job opening, but your resume could result in your being hired for another opening next month. Smart employers will review resumes to find the best candidates even if they applied last month for a different job opening.

  15. Anonymous*

    Re: the job hopper. You never finished college and you’ve hopped around in all of your jobs? This is someone who likely can’t commit to something or will get bored.

    I don’t want someone like that on my team. Tough to hear, but entirely true.

    My best advice is to finish your degree.

  16. Mike C.*

    Regarding question number 2.

    Your boss doesn’t give a rat’s behind about your career and is holding you back. If he really had “big plans” for you, they would have happened already. Why are the plans such a secret in the first place? This isn’t a surprise birthday party or a Christmas gift, it’s your job!

    Time to find a new job and leave this guy in the dust. To quote another well known advice columnist from Seattle, “DTMFA”.

  17. JessB*

    Re: Being asked to write your own recommendation

    I’m studying part-time and was amazed at the resourcefulness of a fellow studen last year. When she started applying for jobs (which was happening throughout the course), she got written references from some of our lecturers. I was amazed to see this happening, but you know what? She was able to take her pick of jobs!

    Of course, as Alison says, by writing the letters herself, she was able to highlight the points she wanted to highlight, especially in relation to specific jobs.

    In this case, it helped that she was a stellar student who had loads of good points. Teachers were delighted to help her out.

    P.S. Alison, we do a professional issues course, which is about how to get a job – networking, applications, basic stuff. I told everyone last night to read your blog, because you’re so awesome.

  18. Kelly O*

    I wish there were a way to explain that sometimes there really are circumstances that make job-hopping just a part of life.

    We went through a phase not too long ago, and our living situation was very much in flux. We moved from one state to another, knowing we weren’t going to be there long. Because of my spouse’s situation, I had to take whatever was paying the most at the time. I’d get a call about something that would bump me higher and I took it. Three jobs in the course of about a year and a half. (Then, of course, the bottom fell out of the economy and my sweet temp job disappeared and I worked retail through the holidays until we moved again.)

    It wasn’t necessarily that I was doing anything awful or trying to screw up my resume, it was just what we had to do to survive. Believe me, there was way more than just looking for the best paying job going on, and I know I wasn’t at my best at that point.

    Suffice to say now I’m looking for that long-term job. But now I have to explain the situation we dealt with, while not sounding like I’m trying to earn sympathy points (because really I know everyone has a story) but still wind up decently paid with good benefits. And until I can find that, I’m stuck at the Funny Farm, barely making enough to cover daycare, baby supplies, and groceries, stressing because they keep insisting I’m a receptionist, even though I’m doing senior level administrative support and office management.

    It’s just really, really stressful all around. The recruiter is trying to get the best person in their budget, and has umpteen hundred resumes from people of all shapes, sizes, and experience levels pouring in. There are people actually appropriately qualified trying to stand out and following the same advice everyone else is, getting more and more depressed by the day wondering how to be unique “just like everyone else”

    In the meantime, trying to finish that degree while working full-time, taking care of your family, dealing with the rising cost of everything, and occasionally finding time to get a hair cut or do something enjoyable feels so far away, and so unattainable.

    I guess what I’m saying is, whichever side of the equation you’re on, just stop and put yourself in the other person’s shoes, even if only for a moment from time to time.

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