A Personal Story of Listening for Guidance, Part 1

Ch 7 in Listening for Guidance: A Little Known but Life-Changing Spiritual Practice

When I began writing this book, my intent was just to create a how-to manual of Listening for Guidance. I planned it to be a companion to my actual books of spiritual memoir, published under separate cover. But in case this is the first book of mine you’re reading, I feel the need to give you a taste of what Listening for Guidance has meant to me personally.

Over the next few chapters, I’ll unfold the single best illustration of the impact Listening for Guidance has had on my life. The story starts at a time when I was so stressed out over my job that it caused severe physical symptoms.

Photo by Engin Akyurt on pexels

It Has Never Been Just One Message

I’ve made a lot of claims over the years about how important the practice of Listening for Guidance has been. How significantly it impacted my life story. The truth is, most of the time, the impact of any one conversation I’ve had with God has been fairly small.

This fits with my general thesis about what a relationship with God is like.

The value of such a relationship is not in a big, showy, divine-visitation, booming-voice, bright-lights, blindness-inducing experience. The value of having a personal relationship with God is in the impact it can have on our daily lives. It’s about having a Creator with a listening ear, who is there to help with all sorts of little problems and decisions that pop up along the journey of life.

But, then again, every so often, there will be a life-altering story arc: a series of conversations that help with one particular, thorny problem.

My favorite personal life-altering story arc is about my first career transition. It is a story of a time when Listening for Guidance had a major impact on my life and on my outlook on life. And, it is a story that taught me some really big lessons.

Career Changes

To give you a bit of background, I had been working for Westinghouse Electric’s Research & Development Center (eventually renamed Science & Technology Center) for almost 20 years. My husband (who also worked there) and I had survived a couple rounds of layoffs previously.

In fact, I had surprised him back in 1982 (when we were first dating) by my lack of panic in witnessing that year’s cuts, our first since being hired, including someone in our department. (My faith in God was already strong.)

In 1990, I had begun a long, gradual pivot into an overhead (administrative) job managing Total Quality projects.

My husband continued to do “technical work,” i.e., he worked on actual research projects. By this time, we had gotten married and I was expecting our second child.

Not long into the pivot, I began to feel dissatisfied and underappreciated. My administrative job (working for the Division General Manager) turned out to be way more stressful than I would have predicted. As early as 1992, I asked God for guidance in handling the increased stress.

Cutting Phone Lines

Actually, it was one project in particular that caused the bulk of my stress. It was a cost-cutting project that involved determining what employees didn’t really need personal access to a phone. The VP wanted to reduce the number of phone lines by an arbitrary-sounding 15%.

Remember, this was in the early 1990s. At that time, the only people who didn’t rely exclusively on landlines were the more-affluent or higher-on-the-corporate-ladder types. And even their “mobile” phones were tethered to their cars’ dashboards.

The theory was that someone working only in a lab space didn’t need to be on the phone with suppliers and customers and such. So they didn’t need a phone for their own personal use.

So imagine having to tell some 40-year-old lab tech that they would no longer have a phone in their lab. Hence, if there was an emergency with their kids, their partner would have to call an engineer, whose work would then be interrupted, to go look for the tech to tell them to call their partner.

The whole thing just smacked of discrimination. I guess I’m too caring or something. I lost sleep over this one.

A Bad Perm?

Anyhow, this project affected me so negatively that it triggered stress-related alopecia areata (a condition that has plagued me off and on since my late 20s). My hair began falling out. And continued to fall out.

I had a bald spot at the base of my skull that was about six square inches. I had to comb my hair in an odd way and spray the begeebers out of it so no one would see.

And no one did see. Years later, Husband told a co-worker about how I had lost all that hair. Her response was “Oh. Is that what it was? I just thought it was a bad perm.”

Nevertheless, I lived in fear of a strong wind making a mess of my careful camouflage.

I had a lot of chats with God about my hair loss. God always said not much longer, not much longer. I guess I learned a lot about patience in those dark months.

The job did get less stressful after that project, but it took a good year for my hair to grow back.

And the job just never expanded as I thought it would. I kept lobbying for a promotion, more responsibility, and a better title. My boss kept putting me off.

Looking at Options

Finally, in March 1994, my boss just came out and said it. I would not be getting the promotion I had been hoping for. Suddenly, I felt driven to get out of Westinghouse.

But God cautioned me against doing anything that would have a negative impact on my family. In addition, there was a hint that something else, something important, was on the horizon.

On April 6, 1994, I sat down with my journal and my pen to seek guidance.

Father,

I somehow feel that [Husband] and I are still in the middle of a crossroads with respect to ultimate family size, job, and housing. We thought (I thought) when we bought this house that this would be it – our last move. Yet now that seems less likely.

How can we best serve you in all these important issues – family, location, careers?

Love, Sharon

To my daughter Sharon,

It is not for you to know all my ways or plans for you and [Husband] yet, but know this – I do have a definite and important mission for you to fulfill, but it is not yet time to reveal it. Even the timing I cannot yet reveal.

However, know that I will reveal it in good time and that it will not involve undue hardship for either of you. Yet my mission MUST be fulfilled in order for you to achieve the spiritual growth you seek. Once the time for this important mission is at hand, you must not fail me. Amen.

So, I kept going. But I was keeping my eyes open for other job opportunities.

Light at the End of the Tunnel

In May, I had another (long) conversation with God about my future. It was interesting, if not terribly specific. But even more interesting was the conversation on June 6.

Father,

Today is my 19th anniversary with Westinghouse. I still seek to be doing something new in five years…

I continued my letter to God with a bunch of questions about related issues. The response answered most of them. But before those answers, there was some surprising guidance.

To my daughter Sharon,

Even now I prepare the way for you and [Husband] to both leave Westinghouse. You must wait only a little while longer. Perhaps only a year or less if all goes according to plan. …

… I say now that you must begin in earnest to seek a new family business suitable for both of you soon after you quit Westinghouse.

You need not start the business immediately, but you must begin searching for it almost immediately so that not too much time passes before you actually return to work. Six months is a long enough sabbatical—perhaps just long enough to get your house in order before embarking on a new, second career. …

I found that to be an interesting way to phrase it: …I prepare the way for you… to leave Westinghouse. But regardless, I was eager to move on.

And, with this message, I now saw a pin prick of light at the end of the tunnel.

Only One Option

Let me just mention, in the early 1990s, there were not a lot of jobs in Pittsburgh that would fit my needs and abilities. So my opportunities in the corporate world were limited, especially if I wanted to stay in town.

Westinghouse (Pittsburgh’s third largest employer at the time) was laying off waves of technical professionals. Appropriate jobs that could have taken up the slack were years away from creation. And with two young children at home, I wasn’t in a position to just quit and spend an unknown amount of time trying to find another suitable job in the area.

Husband and I had talked about starting a business, but we didn’t really have anything specific in mind. And now here was God talking about figuring that out in six months. But there was no time to think about it as long as I was still working.

For the time being, I would have to be content with my only option. I stayed put and waited.

* * * To be continued. * * *

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