FINALLY got through the skills matrix I have been putting off for a small eternity. Now to finish my job description and submit it to the powers that be for some revisions. Morning has made the inevitable submission to early afternoon and I am still not dressed. I had my usual assortment of varying oddities for breakfast, yogurt, protein shake, spinach, wheat thins; nutritionally balanced, visually arresting. I’m making my first pot of coffee for the day at 1:30 hoping it will carry me through the resume and into the trip to the gym later. I think my coffee machine is an albino darth vader. It’s all white but it makes horrible noises and controls the dark side of the force in the form of hot caffeinated death bombs.
I want to grab certain people and shake them, sometimes. I had the fun experience of living with 4 college girls for a couple weeks this month and sharing their daily trials by means of interspersed ‘heart to heart’ chats and overt voyeurism. Listening to them complain about the treatment they received from others and then watching them dole out the exact same treatment back to everyone around them gave me no end of amusement. I’m sure everyone does it in some fashion; it’s just part of the human condition. It stops being amusing or fun, though, and goes straight to exasperating when it happens to me. To sit and listen to an individual deliver an intelligent, thought out analysis of another person, decrying the persons lack of insight on their own issues and lamenting their inability to enlighten that other person, while I am seeing almost identical issues in the speaker, issues that I have purposely addressed with the speaker and been dismissed almost out of hand, is maddening.
The higher parts of our evolved brains have an amazing ability to analyze and critique so many things in a productive and creative manner. For some reason no one, myself included, seems to be able to turn this discerning eye on themselves and work through their own problems. Reflexively applying insight and constructive criticism to ones self is one of the most powerful tools for self improvement that most of us will never use.
I am extremely lucky in that I have an amazing pool of friends who help me out with this. I try to be constantly redefining my reality to be more powerful and more inclusive of the truth. I will talk and talk about a certain subject attacking it from every angle that I or anyone else can come up with until I can figure it out. Some of the things I come up with I really don’t like, but I can’t have the whole world my way. Eventually, I just have to accept that some people simply won’t give everything they are capable of, and if that is good enough for them, it will have to be good enough for me. If I can’t come to that conclusion, that what I receive from another person is enough to satisfy me, then it is my responsibility to move forward; leaving that person to their issues and seeking my own happiness.
Just because someone doesn’t love you the way you want them to, doesn’t mean they don’t love you with all they have.
People don’t see themselves the same way ohers see them. Being too close to the action comes to mind. An outside observer is usually more objective, but you’re right. Not many people can accept constructive criticism. I know plenty of people that outright dismiss it as not applicable. And I’m not even sure how I myself take it. But hey, no one is perfect, right?