BAN "unemployment"

Those of you who have been to Ireland will know that the “F” bomb is part of our vernacular. It is used as a verb, an adjective and a noun – often in the same sentence! So I’m not easily offended. There is one word though that drives me absolutely crazy and to me is akin to a swear word. The word “unemployed” or “unemployment.”
I spend a lot of time speaking to people in job search and job transition. If you’re in that situation right now, you know how painful and dispiriting it can be. About the only thing that gets me rankled when speaking to jobseekers is when someone says “I’m unemployed.” NO, YOU ARE NOT!
I’m not playing with semantics here. The person in job search is doing THE most important job they will probably ever do in their life, searching for and securing a well paid job. The results of the work the job seeker is doing now will determine the pay level, benefits, vacation, colleges the kids go to and indeed maybe even preventing the family home going into foreclosure. If that is the work that is being done, do not tell me you are “unemployed.”
I harp on this because vocabulary is hugely important. Words matter. Words can define you. Words can define how you are perceived.
Let’s be honest. Today we have as President a man who achieved very little prior to gaining the White House. (I voted for him and am glad I did.) Barack Obama gained the White House because of the vocabulary he used and how he made people feel. Indeed the last President to secure the Presidency with such an insipid senatorial record was JFK. It was words and oratory that were his key weapons in achieving the White House. It was words and oratory that helped America feel young and vibrant after the relatively sedate Eisenhower presidency. The same can be said of Ronald Reagan who made Americans and USA feel good simply because of what he said at a time when American self pride was at a low ebb.
When the job seeker uses the word “unemployment,” it says nothing positive. It is a self-knocking, self defeating word that skewers self confidence; and the job seeker desperately needs self confidence and to believe in themselves. If you are in the job search, use words that make a difference to you. Use words that say something positive – “I am in job search,” “I am between successes,” “I am in transition,” “I am in unpaid employment, the pay isn’t good but the ultimate benefits will be.”
Go on BAN unemployment (I refuse to capitalize the word) from your vocabulary. It will ultimately help you to ban the concept from your life, because when you believe in yourself, when you believe you are doing something positive in unpaid employment, you will then walk into that interview 12 feet tall and bulletproof!
Go on: BEAT the living daylights out of the recession. I know you can.