Work Sucks Sometimes
2/21/2008
Epiphanies do not tend to happen all that often but when they do they can be life altering. They tend to be a culmination of a lot of life experiences rather than a miraculous thought.
We all have crappy days at work from time to time. For some people there are more crappy days than good days. Fortunately, my average day is pretty good. Without going into a lot of the details surrounding the root cause of most of my bad days, let’s just say there is a coworker of mine that is drastically under qualified.
I often become frustrated that she not only got the job in the first place, but that she still manages to keep the position. This is not only her fault but that of management. Again, the specifics are not the important issue here. Recently a series of events led to several frustrating days at work in a row. After a few conversations with us individually our boss scheduled a meeting with the both of us together.
The night before the meeting I debated with myself on how I should handle it. I could do what my emotions wanted to do which was list every reason why she should not be working there or I could take the rational high road. Each option seemed to have its benefits. Sure, it is easy to say take the high road but I had done this before with this person and it had not resolved the issues.
Before I went to bed the night before I let the dogs out and peeked outside to look at the lunar eclipse that I knew was occurring. Even though it was quite cold outside I decided to lie down and stare at the moon and countless stars. It is really easy to feel insignificant when you realize the expansiveness of space. Almost like a cliché, I just realized then that most stressors really don't matter in the long run. It's often hard to see this in the midst of all of the details though. We get caught up in emotions and the need to prove our righteousness.
I thought, “In five years will this still matter?” The obvious answer absolutely not. It probably won’t even matter a month from now. Stressing about it simply isn't worth it! I realize that might seem elementary to some but to think this way and to truly accept and understand this is potentially life altering. The outcome of the meeting became irrelevant in an instant. Regardless of how it turned out it was not going to affect my life in a substantial enough of a way to stress about it and I understood that.
There are always going to be crappy days at work but as long as I can remember to measure stress by years and not hours or days I think work and life will be a lot more pleasant.
Why? Just Because!