The life and times of an uncertain blogger

I told myself last week that I wouldn’t cry when I left. I steeled myself to prepare for it. I just knew I had conquered it.

This week, though, was another story. I blubbered like a baby. I don’t do goodbyes well, even though I know it’s not like we won’t see each other again. We can have lunches, we can meet for dinners, there’s the phone.

Never-the-less, I’m a crybaby.

And the thing is…I look really bad when I cry. I mean it’s seriously ugly. And I don’t just cry a little; I weep, my breath hitches, and the more I do this the worse it gets until I just can’t hold on to it anymore. So, as I’m sure you can guess, I hate to cry in front of people.

I’m convinced that my mirror synapses are just really strong. Our mirror synapses are the cells in our brain that allow us to learn from watching others and to feel what we think they must be feeling. We call this empathy. The original words from which the word empathy was derived literally mean passionate feeling.* And those words truly describe why I cried this week. Life was nothing but a big ball of passionate feelings.

Passionate feelings, while driven by mirror synapses, cause certain chemicals to be released in our bodies. Crying is the necessary release of those chemicals. With that in mind, I’d say that my brain and body are just working as designed when I cry. In fact, I’d say that my body is incredibly efficient in the way it handles these processes.

So, now all you folks who were with me when I started to cry this week know the truth. (And I guess if you read last night’s blog below, it makes the situation even clearer.) Being with you and knowing that I won’t get to be with you on a day-to-day basis made me passionately sad this week.

I can blame it on the mirror synapses and the chemicals that were aching to be released, but even though science can explain it, it’s the heart that understands it.

I just wish I could look a little better when I do it.

*1903, translation of Ger. Einfühlung (from ein “in” + Fühlung “feeling”), coined 1858 by Ger. philosopher Rudolf Lotze (1817-81) from Gk. empatheia “passion,” from en- “in” + pathos “feeling”

Stumble It!

I‘ve never been a social person - no one in my family is. We’re more the “family first” types, and so we don’t go out with friends very often. Because of that, friendships at work become even more important than they might otherwise. Work itself becomes more important - because I love my friends, I love my work, and I put more of myself into it.

After four years at my current job, I’m pretty invested. The people there who I call friends mean more to me than I can possibly put into words. I’ve learned so much from each of them, and I’ve received so much more than I ever expected I would. They have blessed my life in a thousand ways.

As I look back at my time at Dobson, it has been punctuated by so many memories…

My initial experiences on the phones with no training, except for a couple of days listening to and watching Micah, one of the most talented phone professionals I’ve ever known.

My time as a team lead when I took over 100 escalated calls a day, did a ton of my supervisor’s paperwork, took incoming calls and did all the cancellations for our region. If it hadn’t been for one sassy little girl named Andrion, I’d have never survived. As different as we are in age and culture and experience, I grew to love that smart, funny, talented young lady, and I couldn’t care for her more if she were my own daughter.

My time as a sales trainer when I was lucky enough to get to travel to so many small towns in Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas and Missouri and meet so many wonderful people. I will always think of Kristi, Danny, Stormy, Kelly, Steve, Keith and so many other wonderful sales gurus with great affection. With such difficult jobs to do, they are all great successes, and I know no one with bigger hearts.

My time as Project Manager of Internal Communications when I had the indescribable pleasure of working with the most talented people I know - Kathy, my friend and shoulder, who works harder than just about anyone I know; Kathleen, who has entertained me with her quick wit, buoyed me when I was down and wowed me with her amazing speaking skills; Ken, who has engaged me in some of the best conversations I’ve ever had; Jarred, who is mature beyond his years, funny and talented to no end and has a heart of gold; Shannon, who let me boss her around and saved me from myself a hundred times; Amanda, who’s tough as nails and an extremely talented communicator; Diane, who has taught me that even Yankees can be lovable; Michael, who shares my love of Jedi mind tricks; Joyce, who amazes me with her amazing wit, strength and courage; and Lori, who’s sharp as a tack and shares my love for the Beatles. Heather, Dan, Court, Heidi and the other wonderful trainers…awesome people who have done so much for me.

Getting to work with my wonderful son, Michael, who is talented beyond measurement and doesn’t even know it.

And there are so many other people there who have come to mean so much to me - the HR gang (such funny, sweet amazing women)…Cindy, Justin, Russell, Braxton, Bill, Thom, Terry, Miriam, Danny, Jason, Lori, Jackie, Rick, Andrea, Frank, April, Karla, Sara, Crystal, Nick and so many more of you. If I named you all, I’d never be able to get through this. You know who you are.

You have all made such an impression on me. You all mean SO much to me.

So, it should be no surprise that leaving you is so hard for me to do. I am filled with truly mixed emotions - excitement that I don’t have to search for months to find a decent job and sadness that I can’t be with you and just go on doing the great work we’ve been doing for all these years. I desperately want to take you all with me - to start something new and wonderful and show the world what we’re truly worth. We could so wow them!

But that is not possible, and so tomorrow I bid you all my fondest adieu. I know each of you will come out of this on top, carving out even better niches for yourself one by one. I just wish I could be there to see it.

I love you guys.

I miss you already. Thanks for being my friends.

Stumble It!

We all like to feel good; don’t we? Which would you prefer; a day where you feel like crap and look worse, or a day where you’re content and have a glow about you? Come on; tell the truth. This one is a no brainer.

When you boil life down to its lowest common denominator for any living thing on Earth, the bottom line is happiness. We all do what we can to get it. Some people take relaxing vacations. Some people drink, smoke or do drugs. Others eat. People find their happiness in a thousand different ways.

Me? I smile.

Okay, I know what you’re thinking - Poliana is at it again. But it’s true.

I wasn’t always a smiler. As a matter of fact, as a teenager, I was the queen of wearing my heart on my sleeve. Back then, if I was having a bad day, you’d know it just by looking at me. I could be very sullen - what a joy I must have been to be around.

It was because of my sullenness that I learned the power of wielding a smile. It happened on a warm afternoon when I was about 16. I was working at the counter at McDonald’s, and I didn’t want to be there. My head ached, I was cramping and my mood was just horrible. Being the responsible kid that I was, though, I went to work anyway and then let everyone around me pay for it.

After about an hour of this, my manager came up behind me and told me that if I didn’t get a smile on my face that I could go home for good. So, I swallowed my anger and pain and smiled. Every customer who came in over the next hour saw that smile. As time passed, more and more people came in until it was one of the most hectic days we’d had in a long time. Still, I smiled, and sometimes laughed. My customers smiled and laughed, too. Even the people who came back to complain smiled.

People were being nice to me! I remember trying to figure out why people were being so pleasant, and then it hit me, it was the smile! I figured out then and there that if I’d smile, even when I didn’t want to, people around me couldn’t help but smile back.
So, I started smiling all the time. Not only did it make me feel happier, but it caused the world around me to feel happier, too. And that made my life so much easier! No more did I get a frequent stream of angry customers, no longer did I face a sea of sullen faces.

And it’s been that way my entire life since then. My smile has opened doors for me. It’s kept me out of harm’s way. It’s just made life easier. Try it for yourself! The toothier the better!

Stumble It!

Change is never easy for some people. It causes anxiety and angst, fear and frustration, but the hardest part of facing change is the disequilibrium you feel when faced with it.

Disequilibrium is, quite literally, a feeling of unbalance, of not having both feet on the ground. I get that feeling every time I have to face a major change in my life, and until I feel like I have both feet on the ground, I’m just not comfortable.

One of the worst situations for me, personally, arises when I have to change jobs. It doesn’t matter if the new job makes tons more money than the old one. It doesn’t matter if the benefits are better or my office is bigger. What matters is that I’m out of my element. I don’t know any of the people. My environment is different, and I don’t know the rules. Put those things together, and you have major disequilibrium and an unhappy person, at least for a while.

Feeling self assured is my goal, and I suppose, to some extent, it’s everybody’s goal. (Can you imagine a world where everyone didn’t care about that? I’m not sure that’s a place I’d like to live!) Changing jobs means major insecurity; so how do we reconcile that insecurity for our need to be self assured?

The only way I know is to handle it one of two ways. One, you never change jobs. This method is all well and good if you’re a turnip (which I’m not), but for the more ambitious of us, that alone would make us nuts. The other way is to just grin and bear it. Do whatever you can to learn the environment around you, and soon you won’t have to worry about being different. You’ll be one of the gang, your projects will be easy, and you’ll be a star.

Stumble It!

As anyone who’s ever been out of work knows, finding a new job is a numbers game. You send your resume hundreds of times, knowing that you’ll be lucky to get one interview for every ten you send. Then, if you’re lucky, one of those interviewers will call you back for a second interview and possibly offer you a job.

Looking for work can be demoralizing and depressing, but if you remember that anyone looking for a job will face rejection more times than selection, it’s easier to keep a positive outlook on the process.

People in sales immediately recognize this process as parallel to the sales process. As sales people, they make hundreds of cold calls and are lucky if ten out of a hundred set an appointment to meet them about their products or services. And out of that number, only one or two may buy.

Even so, sales people don’t suffer the pains of rejection. They understand the process is about finding the right product for the right person, and their job is matching the two in the best way possible. Sometimes, they’re able to do that, and sometimes they’re not. It’s just a numbers game.

Finding a job is just like that. You may apply for hundreds of them, but when the right person (you) is matched with the right job (a job that matches your skills, talents and desires), both you and your prospective employer will know it. So, keep your chin up and keep plugging away! The right job is out there waiting for you!

Stumble It!