Job Interviews vs. Casual Conversations
Rainier
giving a speech or doing a job interview than you are hanging out with
your friends?
Case in point. Today I aced my school of education interview. I felt
completely at ease and expounded for over an hour on how I intended to
make everything from the New Deal to Congolese politics relevant and
interesting for high school students. I looked each of the three
professors directly in the eye and treated them as my peers, not my
betters. I'm only the second person in three years to receive an
"excellent" score on my interview.
I promised to call my girlfriend after the interview to let her know how I
did. Guess what? The shybie returns! I'm ill-at-ease, nervous and
tongue-tied. I make up an excuse and end the phone call after five
minutes.
To further add to the irony, my girlfriend is a professional extrovert--an
Oprah-worthy people person--and she actually flunked her initial interview!
How fucked up is that? A shy introvert receives an "excellent" and the
extrovert flunks?
I must be a freak of nature. Potheads and losers intimidate me yet I view
authority figures like professors as equals and contemporaries.
Can anyone else relate?
-rainier
LisatheSequel
I just wanted to say "Congratulations!"
Lash Rambo
news:f1d698ae69f49548...@localhost.talkaboutsupport.com:
> Does anyone else experience this kind of shyness: you're more
> comfortable giving a speech or doing a job interview than you are
> hanging out with your friends?
No. Giving speeches to strangers is still the worst for me, to this day
inspiring an uncontrollable fight-or-flight response. Acing a job
interview is also far beyond my abilities. People only hire me if
they've tested me before hand. I don't seem to be able to bullshit my
competence.
> Case in point. Today I aced my school of education interview. I felt
> completely at ease and expounded for over an hour on how I intended to
> make everything from the New Deal to Congolese politics relevant and
> interesting for high school students. I looked each of the three
> professors directly in the eye and treated them as my peers, not my
> betters. I'm only the second person in three years to receive an
> "excellent" score on my interview.
>
> I promised to call my girlfriend after the interview to let her know
> how I did. Guess what? The shybie returns! I'm ill-at-ease, nervous
> and tongue-tied. I make up an excuse and end the phone call after five
> minutes.
It may just be you need extra time to shift gears. If you've aligned
your thoughts for talking about your educational plans, it'll be harder
to talk about things orthogonal to that. This happens to me a lot when
I'm concentrating on a problem and get interrupted by, say, a phone call.
I'm unable to be very personable because my mind is still "aligned" for
the problem.
Neuroscientists have known for some time that the brain makes temporary
adjustments to synaptic sensitivity*. That's what I mean by "aligning
your thoughts"--actual, physical changes in the brain.
* For kids, the changes are inhibitory, whereas in adults, they're
excitory. I'm unsure whether it's known why. However, it is well known
that children are better than adults at learning, while adults are better
than children at reasoning. Perhaps that (inhibitory vs. excitory) is
why.