Where it suddenly started flowing again

Sometimes it feels like you are doing everything you are supposed to do, and yet nothing happens. You write, you send, you wait, and you get… silence. No rejection, no invitation, just nothing. As if you are talking to a wall that cannot even be bothered to echo back.

In earlier posts, such as Three Temporary Contracts and Then Nothing, Applying for jobs: between visibility and silence and Between movement and stillness, I already wrote about that phase. About searching, trying to be visible, and above all about the lack of responses. At some point, that silence becomes deafening.

The silence that lingered

There came a moment when I realised it was costing me more energy than it was giving back. Applying for vacancies again and again, hoping each time that something might come of it. And each time, nothing.

That silence did something to my motivation. Not all at once, but slowly. Drop by drop. Until I started to wonder why I was still putting energy into this at all.

That was the moment I decided to do things differently. Not because I had a well-thought-out plan, but simply because this approach was not working.

What changed

Instead of applying for vacancies, I started reaching out directly to organisations through their own websites. At the same time, I also made a conscious effort to activate my network. Simply, without anything being open. Without expectations either, to be honest.

And then something happened that I could not have predicted.

Within a week, I was invited to three interviews. Three. After a period in which I barely heard anything at all. All three conversations were positive, and all three led to follow-ups.

The contrast could hardly have been greater. First nothing, and then suddenly movement. As if a switch had been flipped somewhere, without me being able to point out exactly where.

Maybe it was in the way I wrote. Maybe in the timing. Or maybe in something I was not even aware of myself. Whatever it was, it felt good. Not just because opportunities appeared, but because it finally felt like something was coming back in return for what I put in.

A new place, a new beginning

In the end, I chose a new challenge as a chef at Hotel Paleis Stadhouderlijk Hof, a remarkable place in the centre of Leeuwarden. A building with history, once a palace of the stadtholders and connected to the royal family, now part of Fletcher. You can read more about it on Wikipedia.

The kitchen team is small and young. Given my age and experience, I will be adding a bit of diversity there. That feels right. Familiar too, to be back in the kitchen again.

I will be starting next week. At the moment, I do not even know my rota yet. And strangely enough, that does not feel like a problem. The contract is signed, the choice has been made, and the rest will follow.

Maybe that is the biggest difference compared to a few weeks ago. That things are flowing again. Not because everything is fixed, but because it has started moving.

And sometimes, that is enough.