Tender

For some reason, my heart feels like it's being pummeled by a meat tenderizer over these past few days.

I feel especially sensitive.

I'm taking things personally that have nothing to do with me - other people's moods, their degree of happiness, their degree of bitterness.

I wonder sometimes, does anyone ever stand around the water cooler and share what they like about their job?

It's a rhetorical question, really. Most of the time, people are looking for someone to blame. They're looking to point the finger at that person, place or thing that caused them to feel like X, Y, Z.

As a manager, I can control, to some small degree, some of the things that go on in the workplace, but the truth is that most things are way, way outside of my realm of influence.

Like most people, I do the best that I can.

When I take things too personally, it makes me want to act. It triggers my urge to fix.

But the truth is that inaction is sometimes the best way to solve a problem. To get the hell out of the way, and let the other person figure it out all by themselves.

Imagining that I'm responsible for everything is just plain wrong -- if not the hugest ego leap in the world. It's also a one way ticket to Unhappiness Town.

Personally, I want to get off at my stop. Serenity Town. All aboard.