Journal

xxx

People I'm 2 degrees from

John Denver

Albert Einstein

Kurt Kobain

Cortney Love

Corin Tucker

Patrick Swayze

Tonight write about being overwhelmed by empathy. Bring up exampe from the ghost tour. Talk about the search for other points of view, now not being able to keep them out. I would love to have the random "funk" but my life is a funk.

n most corporate environments, colleagues "play nice" with each other. But what happens when you come under attack in the office?

Whether it is nasty office gossip or an outright assault on you as a professional, being attacked in the office can be damaging to your career in the short and long term. That's why you need to look out for No. 1 and protect yourself if you become the subject of an office attack.

Say, for example, that a jealous co-worker is gunning for your job and is feeding your manager tall tales of mistakes you allegedly made that just didn't happen. How can you handle this without sounding like someone who is defensive, paranoid, or just a whiner?

Here are a couple of strategies to take to make sure you are protecting your best interests.

1. Keep good, detailed records of your work.

One of the best ways to counteract an attack on your professional character is to have the documentation to prove your worth. This means keeping important files, notes of your meetings and conversations with others, important e-mails, letters of praise from others, and more.

2. Learn how to toot your own horn.

Many people shy away from the spotlight. While modesty is an admirable trait, you must help others see your value if you come under attack. It's important that your superiors see the good work you do. Copy your boss on e-mails to show that you are getting the job done. Give frequent updates about projects to demonstrate that you are on top of things. Invite your manager to meetings so he or she can see you shine.

3. Stay out of the office grapevine.

One of the best ways to defend yourself during an attack is to remain professional. If a co-worker is insulting your performance or character, you will only help his or her cause by throwing back similar gossip or insults. You won't come out ahead by engaging in an office catfight.

4. Don't become oblivious.

Sometimes, we just want to come into the office, get our work done, and ignore what is going on around us. But disengaging too much can mean trouble. While you do need to stay out of the rumor mill, you must also be aware of how others perceive you and what they say about you.

5. Have an honest conversation with your manager.

If a colleague is attacking you, sit down and have an open conversation with your supervisor. Explain your position calmly, without getting angry or upset. This meeting is where your documentation will come in handy. If your colleague is attacking your performance, you will be able to demonstrate your worth and prove your attacker wrong.

6. Utilize your company's resources.

The human resources department is a very important resource available to all employees. If you cannot resolve the issue by talking to your boss, set up a meeting with a senior level HR professional and lay out your case.

Prepare for this meeting just as you would for a meeting with your manager and take your supporting information. Even if your HR department is not able to fix the situation, your meeting will be on record.

The business world is highly competitive and it is important defend your performance and reputation from those who try to undermine it. Always be professional and learn how to calmly stand up for yourself in the office.

Talk about how at Toastmasters when giving the subjects people became primed and couldn't exactly think...their answers reflected things I told them.

Hobbies

When I was a kid I used to draw and doodle all the time and my parents wanted me to be a professional artist so bad they drew the doodling right out of me. Can you give us an example of a hobbie you had as a child that you don’t anymore?

If money and time weren’t a limitation I’d buy myself a Lear Jet and fly to every country in the world. If money and time weren’t limitations for you, what would be your dream hobbie and why?

If I wasn’t limited by reality and could have any my fantasy hobbie I’d get out of the atmosphere and explore the universe in a starship. If you could choose a hobbie that were more fantasy than reality what would it be and why?

I never have enough time to do woodwork or learn new recipes or how to keep some of the plants in my garden alive. What’s your excuse?

I’ve always wanted to write a book and sometimes I feel like nothing I write is nearly as good as what other people write. Do you have a hobbie that sometimes frustrates you because you think someone else is better and doesn’t it make you want to slap them?

We take it for granted we have to breath, eat, and shit. But then we are told "truths" but aren't taught the importance of other truths. We don't take care of ourselves. WE don't try to find balance. But we eat every day we shit every day we breath every day. Why aren't we balancing every day?

One problem I have with birthday gifts is dissapointment. When kid there was so much excitement and any toy was cool. Now...no. So I get my hopes up too high or too low and I don't know where to put them and then it's just a book or a whatever and secretly I was thinking it's my birthday, this year I wanted something wonderful to happen. And then I feel let down then I feel upset that I'm not appreciating people as much as I could be then I feel guilty for being upset, etc.

I've been having a lot of karmic flashbacks the past week or so. A "karmic flashback" is a lot like a strong "snap shot" memory that you can hear and feel and smell except you can see it from dozens, hundreds, thousands of points of views all at once and you have a deep understanding of the place the karma at that point in time plays now, yesterday, the day before, and the day before, all the way back to the flashbulb event. It's a little unnerving sometimes, I'll be riding the bike or reading a book or taking a shower or having a conversation with someone and it all rolls over me and I see then and now and future and his point of view and hers and theirs and it overwhelms me sometimes with sadness and happiness all at once. I started having karmic flashbacks a few years ago but now they're pretty frequent and quite intense and there's often a sense of sadness as if my soul says, "Why didn't I see that before?" and I hear the answer, "You did, but the karma had to play out."

To understand this is to understand acceptance.

Time to be more honest with myself. Time to come out in the open and admit what's been causing an appreciable amount of spiritual and emotional strain this year. Time to admit to the experience to admit the transformation.

There are so many ways to word it. I could say, "I don't trust anyone," or "There's no one in my life I can trust," or "I don't believe anyone is trustworthy," or "Everyone I've known has somehow betrayed my trust." All of these look at issues I have with trust in different ways and all have some truth to them yet none of them are adequate or entirely truthful to the experience. So what is it I'm going through and what does it have to do with trust?

And what is this trust thing anyhow? When most people say something like "I trust that person" what they're really saying is that they have a strong belief that the person they're referring to will not do anything to hurt or take advantage of us. Then there's a deeper sense of trust, that is to say the strong belief that a person will always act with our best intentions at heart even when it might sometimes hurt us (a good parent, in my opinion, should engender this form of trust with their children). And then there's this silly notion that the only thing we can trust is that people will be who they are and we should "trust" this.

The last one I'm having a hard time with. Doesn't the whole idea, even the very word "trust", become irrelevant and meaningless if and when we fully accept that people are who they are? When we typically use the word "trust" between the lines we're implying a hidden expectation, the idea that we believe someone will act towards us in a beneficial way. Yet if we are to trust that people are who they are we're opening a Pandora's box, aren't we? By trusting in this manner, by having faith in this way, we are forced to accept people on their own terms and take responsibility for whatever comes our way.

Trust me, life is "easier" when we can project trust onto others. Trading a projected sense of control and stability for and acceptance of what is, now that's hard.

list bad things in life that have caused you distrust

And I've had those karmically or purposely imposed on me...to learn, to balance, to grow, blah blah blah.

Back to trust issues again...